Global Ocean Health (www.globaloceanhealth.org ) is a U.S. NGO based in Washington State that is leading stakeholder outreach and social impact assessment on behalf of marine science researchers working within the consortium Exploring Ocean Iron Solutions (ExOIS, oceaniron.org), based at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. ExOIS is seeking to comprehensively assess the CO2 sequestration technique known as ocean iron fertilization (OIF) in the North Pacific. CIEIF’s grant to Global Ocean Health will enable it to: 1) conduct initial mapping of regional rights-holders, ocean users, and fishing communities that may have concerns about potential effects of ExOIS’s future OIF field experiments and any potential deployment of OIF in the region; 2) lead the engagement with those fishing communities that rely on species and resources that could be affected by the field tests or future OIF deployments; 3) convene North Pacific fisheries leaders as a panel of “citizen experts,” with the purpose of building their knowledge via scenario-based investigation to assess risks, benefits, and management options; and 4) prepare findings and further social research recommendations for peer-reviewed publication. To carry this out, GOH is partnering with the Institute for Responsible Carbon Removal at American University in Washington, DC.
Global Ocean Health
