Council of Governments Meeting August 3, 2021 SUBJECT PRESENTATION ON BIVALVE INITIATIVE: “ALL CLAMS ON DECK - RESTORING ESTUARIES AND GROWING COASTAL ECONOMIES” Category AGENDA ITEMS Briefings None Contact and/or Presenter Information Mayor John Chappie, City of Bradenton Beach Ed Chiles, Chiles Group Presenter: Jeff Sedacca Action Requested None Enabling/Regulating Authority Background Discussion A presentation will be made on the Gulfcoast Restoration Initiative, All Clams on Deck - Restoring Estuaries and Growing Coastal Economies. Attorney Review Not Reviewed (No apparent legal issues) Instructions to Board Records None Cost and Funds Source Account Number and Name N/A Amount and Frequency of Recurring Costs N/A GULF COAST RESTORATION INITIATIVE Ed Chiles Affiliates: Gulf Shellfish Institute, Sea & Shoreline Aquatic Restoration, Solutions to Avoid Red Tide (START), Sunnyvale Seafood Company (SSC) ALL CLAMS ON DECK: GETTING ON BOARD TO RESTORE FLORIDA'S ESTUARIES • Paradise under pressure: • Development, Pollution, Runoff • Storms & Hurricanes • Harmful Algal Blooms • Economic consequences • Coastal communities • Commercial and Recreational Fisheries • Florida tourism Photo credit: Capt. Scott Moore BIOLOGICAL MITIGATION STRATEGIES: USING NATURE’S TOOLBOXAquacultured Seagrass & Hard Clams FEDERAL FUNDING & FLORIDA LEGISLATION • $15 M will support proof of concept to research and promote large-scale restoration efforts in 3 National Estuaries • Seagrass restoration & Hard clam deployment • Tampa Bay, Sarasota Bay, Charlotte Harbor • Florida Governor and Legislative Ask • Certify bivalves for mitigation credits and create legislation that provides avenue to proceed • Increase mitigation tools available • Increase capacity of Florida’s shellfish aquaculture industry IT’S TIME TO ACT. Website coming soon: AllClamsOnDeck.org Diatom Initiative Seagrass and Bivalve Restoration Florida has the largest coastal environment in the continental United States. This coastline hosts the majority of our population, jobs, wealth, recreation and tourism. One of, perhaps the greatest threat to our coastal environment, and all it supports, are excessive nutrients, primarily nitrogen. Nitrogen nourishes microalgae blooms which we all see in the form of green and brown water as we drive boats or step into the ocean. Excessive nitrogen loads can, and do cause excessive blooms, disturbing the natural balance of the estuarine, and ocean biomes. One of the potential effects of excessive nutrients may be prolonged and larger algal blooms, which may include Red Tide events. Most of the microalgae species are necessary components of a healthy marine environment, as long as they are in balance. However, excessive blooms of all kinds of algae are an existential threat. These microalgae, when in excess, shade our coastal environments, stunting our fish nursery/seagrass beds. Excessive algae and nutrients create dead or crippled marine environments and cause marine mammal and fish mortalities. In proper balance, microalgae are the cleaners of the ocean and they exist everywhere, in every corner, temperature and salinity. Once they get too thick in the water column, they shade not only the seagrasses, and corals, but they also shade themselves. Overly shaded algal biomasses do not receive sufficient sunlight to survive. They stagnate and die, fouling the marine environment, and no longer filtering and cleaning the water. The simple solution is to remove the excess microalgae, which will allow it to grow at a balanced, sustainable rate, and do what it does best, consume and sequester excess nutrients, which it does better than anything else. Just as microalgae are the best cleaners of the ocean, bivalves are the best at filtering, and consuming, microalgae and consequently and sequestering the excess nutrients. Bivalves deposit the nutrients into the marine substrate, where they become a nutritional source for marine grasses, and mangroves. The Chesapeake Bay is leading with this strategy, in which oyster aquaculture and restoration activities are applied as BMPs for reducing the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDL). Preservation and restoration of our coastal environment, our greatest natural asset, development of sustainable aquaculture businesses and jobs, saving commercial and recreational fisheries for the future, controlling and reducing algal blooms including possibly red tide, preserving the basis of our tourism industry (the key to keeping us from implementing a State income tax) can be addressed in large part by restoring bivalve populations to our estuaries and inshore waters. Naming bivalves, clams and oysters, as mitigation products, just like mangroves and seagrasses, would be instrumental in the development of a comprehensive restoration project. Sustainable bivalve aquaculture and restoration are not a zero sum game, as is so much development. Bivalve aquaculture is unique in that not only does it not require expensive mitigation to prevent negative environmental impact, it has an immediate, quantifiable positive impact by its very nature. Notes: High densities of filter feeding organisms (like clams and oysters) enhance water quality by: -removing nutrients (like Nitrogen), -eating over abundant phytoplankton (algae) -increasing water clarity, and -enhancing seagrass growth The ecosystem services provided by these organisms make them ideal candidates for use in restoration and water quality mitigation projects. The goal would be to establish a legal framework in Florida that would use sound science to make it legally feasible for clams, oysters (and potentially other filtering organisms) to be utilized for environmental mitigation and/or nutrient trading and management. This would invigorate existing aquaculture and restoration efforts that are ongoing in Florida, providing incentive for these industries to expand. Increased capacity and market for these products, which are produced by small business owners throughout the state, would stimulate coastal economies and working waterfronts. brief compiled by Jeff from notes, and comments provided by: Angela Collins/Florida SeaGrant Curtis Hemmel/ Bay Shellfish AU Abo1at Florida I 2021 Policy Proposals •BROADBAND SUPPORT increased efforts to promote access to broadband and provide resources to support accessibility, speed and affordability of broadband in Florida. SUPPORT improving service mapping accurately by requiring more granular data from service providers, allowing crowd sourced data to be used to inform the map, and creating an appeal process to challenge demonstrable inaccuracies. •AQUACULTURE Encourage state regulatory relief designed to encourage increased commercial production and harvest of aquacultured bivalve shellfish (e.g., clams, oysters) in state waters through review of submerged land leasing requirements and revision of restrictive or outdated regulatory policies. Direct the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services and/or Farm Service Agency to evaluate the reestablishment of a viable crop insurance program for shellfish aquaculture producers, specifically designed to cover crop and market losses due to mortality or extended harvest moratoriums and disrupted ability to sell product after environmental perturbations (hurricanes and harmful algal blooms). Direct FDEP to evaluate the potential for regulatory reform which considers the use of live clams to enhance the success of seagrass impact mitigation requirements Direct FDEP to evaluate implementation of a nutrient credit program to incentivize production of commercial shellfish aquaculture. Encourage FDEP, FWC and other relevant state agencies to advance additional grant opportunities for the scientific research required to promulgate regulatory standards for deployment of bivalve shellfish for large scale water quality improvement and nearshore habitat creation. • ADDED TO GUIDING PRINCIPLES: FOOD INSECURITY SUPPORTS increased state funding and policies that reduce food insecurity among Floridians, in order to · 1) increase the health and productivity of those currently without consistent access to healthy food, 2) consequently reduce the demand for public health and human services, 3) improve the financial security of those in need, and 4) accelerate the recovery and increase the resiliency of Florida's economy in the aftermath of the COVI D19 pandemic. FAC Contact Need additional information or want to know more about FAC's Agriculture & Rural Affairs program? Contact Jeff Scala, Deputy Director. at [email protected]. GULF COAST RESTORATION INITIATIVE Affiliates: Gulf Shellfish Institute, Sea & Shoreline Aquatic Restoration, Solutions to Avoid Red Tide (START), Sunnyvale Seafood Company (SSC) RESTORING ESTUARIES AND GROWING COASTAL ECONOMIES ALL CLAMS ON DECK: GETTING ON BOARD TO RESTORE FLORIDA'S ESTUARIES • Paradise under pressure: • Development, Pollution, Runoff • Storms & Hurricanes • Harmful Algal Blooms • Economic consequences • Coastal communities • Commercial and Recreational Fisheries • Florida tourism fwd &nd Diffuv.na IRBDI showing "C titive ftuorcscence fr'OIT h gh (n:dl to ow (v iole!). A -necl1on fi!t:ar w.as apphC to remo.,.• speckle . Winds 'ro'TI NOAA NO BC station VEN Fl. BIOLOGICAL MITIGATION STRATEGIES: USING NATURE'S TOOLBOX Aquacultured Seagrass & Hard Clams ECOSYSTEl\1 E C O l\:" O ,l\ll C SERVICES GRO\ YTH > $20 BILLION 992 LBS GDP DEPENDS o::-,.: NITROGEN HEALTHY BAY INCORPORATED INTO CL\.\lS no <)\, JOBS 22,.500,000 RELY ON GALLONS \YATER HEALTHY ESTCARY