Almost all of the work we do benefits orcas. The new orca-centered initiatives add to ongoing efforts that help protect and restore the overall environment.
A Southern Resident orca and her calf swim just below the surface. Photo: NOAA Fisheries
We've been at it for many years
We've always focused on protecting and improving Washington's environment. Our work removes toxics from the environment through prevention and cleanup, improves conditions for the food web, and gathers environmental knowledge to guide continued progress. Here are just a few examples of these ongoing efforts and how they help orcas.
We work to ensure safe handling and transport of crude and refined oil. It is far less expensive — and much more effective — to prevent an oil spill than to clean one up.
Throughout the state we coordinate water quality improvement and shoreline management with local governments to help make sure marine and fresh water resources meet state water quality standards. We protect stream flows that fish and other aquatic life need for survival. Special emphasis programs in the Columbia and Chehalis river basins include work to protect and restore fish passage and habitat. These efforts support the full spectrum of plants and animals that live in these waters, with benefits for orcas and other marine predators at the top of the food chain.
We’re giving special focus to cleanup and restoration of contaminated sites on or near Puget Sound waters. These and other cleanups remove toxic pollutants from the food web. As predators at the top of the food web, killer whales are particularly susceptible to toxic chemicals that build up in the tissues of their prey. These chemicals pass from mothers to their newborns.
Much of the pollution that enters the environment comes from toxic chemicals in everyday products. We enforce Washington's regulations on toxic chemicals in products and waste materials, educate the public about these chemicals, and develop policies to reduce or eliminate the use of toxic chemicals whenever possible.
We monitor and research the environment. This helps us understand current conditions and ongoing trends. Examples include:
Assessment of state waters: Shares our understanding of what fresh marine water quality samples tell us about water quality.
Nitrogen & dissolved oxygen research: Addresses conditions that may be harming the food supply for orcas in Puget Sound.
Saltwater studies in water and sediment: Help us understand how environmental conditions affect marine life.
These and other science efforts help us see what needs to be done to protect and restore the environment. Good conditions for fish and other species — including humans — ultimately benefit orcas.
Doing more to help orcas survive
This longstanding work to protect and restore the overall environment has helped, but its going to take even more. New state laws enacted in 2019 carry out key parts of the task force’s 2018 recommendations. These initiatives aim to further protect and bring about the recovery of orcas, salmon, and the food web on which they depend. We’re responsible for leading or supporting several of these.
We adopted a water quality rule to increase the amount of total dissolved gas (TDG) allowed in the Snake and Columbia rivers.
This is based on the Governor's direction and task force recommendations to increase water released at the dams, in order to help more juvenile salmon migrate downstream. TDG gas is created by the fall of water over dam spillways. Learn more about it in our blog.
More than 20 billion gallons of oil is transported through Washington each year by vessel, pipeline and rail. An oil spill could cause potentially irreversible damage to the endangered Southern Resident Killer Whales and other species.
The Vessel Transportation Safety Act, adopted in 2019, closes important safety gaps related to vessels carrying oil in bulk. This law directs us to:
Assist the Board of Pilotage Commissioners (BPC) in developing rules for tug escorts in Puget Sound for oil-laden vessels, with future periodic reviews.
Develop and maintain a vessel traffic risk model that will inform decisions on tug escort and emergency response systems for Puget Sound.
Amend rules for advance notice of transfers to ensure uniformity among all three modes of transport.
The 2019-21 budget supports additional staff to help ensure industrial facilities and agriculture runoff meets our water quality standards. We will be able to offer more technical assistance, inspections, and advice on best management practices.
Funding to support water quality improvement: We work with agriculture, rural landowners and local governments to promote voluntary compliance, encourage the use of best management practices, help find sources of pollution, and support the completion of water quality cleanup plans.
Additional clean water inspectors in Puget Sound: These inspectors will provide technical assistance at industrial sites that could pose a threat to the fragile food web that the southern resident orca depend on. They will provide technical advice on practices that industry can do to prevent harmful pollutant discharges and where needed, compliance assistance, and enforcement to improve water quality.
We are working on a project to reduce pharmaceuticals and other contaminents in wastewater. New pharmaceuticals and chemicals are created daily. While they are beneficial for the people taking them, some pharmaceuticals can eventually end up in Puget Sound and threaten the health of people, orcas and their prey, and other aquatic species. To tackle this problem, we are reviewing the research, identifying priorities, determining source control approaches.
Streamflow restoration helps restore streamflows to levels necessary to support robust, healthy, and sustainable salmon populations while providing water for homes in rural Washington.
We created a curriculum to train boat operators in the whale-watching industry on techniques to safely deter orcas from oil spills, as part of an organized spill response. This was one of two immediate actions Governor Inslee’s Executive Order of March 14, 2018 assigned to us.
Right: Sound from oikomi pipes hung from vessels can deter orcas from oil spills. Our curriculum includes training for whale-watching industry volunteers to use the pipes. Photo: Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
We applied criteria so that existing grant and loan programs will prioritize stormwater projects that benefit Southern Resident recovery, starting in the 2017-19 biennium. This was one of two immediate actions assigned to us under Governor Inslee’s Executive Order of March 14, 2018.
