New Hampshire / Southern Maine Ocean Uses Atlas: Industrial sector

The Ocean Uses Atlas Project is an innovative partnership between the Coastal Response Research Center (CRRC) and NOAA's Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management (OCRM). The Project was designed to enhance ocean management through geospatial data on the full range of significant human uses of the ocean environment from the shorelines of New Hampshire and Southern Maine to the EEZ boundary. The data were gathered from regional ocean experts and users through participatory GIS methods. For more information on the project scope, background and related data products, please visit http://www.crrc.unh.edu/workshops/ocean_uses/index.html or https://coast.noaa.gov/arcgis/rest/services/MarineCadastre/OceanUsesNewHampshireMaine/MapServer.

The New Hampshire / Southern Maine Ocean Uses Atlas Project fills a critical information gap in ocean management by providing an unprecedented, comprehensive, consistent and spatially explicit picture of human uses for management agencies, policy makers and stakeholders interested in sound and equitable ocean governance. Using participatory GIS concepts and applications, the Atlas Project generated spatial data and map products illustrating patterns, intensity, and temporal changes in a wide range of human uses in three broad categories of use: (i) fishing, (ii) non-consumptive, and (iii) industrial activities. The resulting datasets depict patterns of ocean use on a broad scale appropriate for a variety of ocean planning and management needs. Specifically, the data will be used in the Environmental Response Management Application (ERMA) during the March 2010 Spill of National Significance (SONS) drill. This dataset contains the industrial activities, and is part of the larger New Hampshire / Southern Maine Ocean Uses Atlas database.

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The Industrial sector contains 8 ocean uses: -Aquaculture: includes net pens and shellfish; excludes onshore facilities linked to offshore operations; -Cruise ships: includes extended overnight travel by ship for commercial purposes; excludes private yachting; -Military operations: includes test ranges, war games, acoustic arrays, ship and submarine maneuvers, restricted areas, and munitions disposal; excludes war-time operations; -Mining and mineral extraction: includes sand and gravel, seabed mining, dredging; excludes energy production and beach renourishment; -Offshore alternative energy: includes wave, current, tidal, wind, solar, and associated infrastructure (cables and moorings); excludes oil, gas, and LNG activities; -Offshore oil and gas: includes exploration, production, transportation of gas or oil, LNG, fuel terminals, pipelines, tankers, and seismic air gun exploration; excludes alternative energy operations; -Shipping: includes ships, large commercial vessels, shipping routes and channels including maintenance, and ferries; excludes cruise ships, oil and LNG tankers; -Underwater cables: includes ocean observing and telecommunications; excludes cables associated with utilities and energy transmission, lost fishing gear; For all uses mapped in this sector, the use footprint and dominant use areas are included in the dataset. The use footprint (aka the Maximum Footprint of Use) includes all areas in which the use is known to occur with some regularity, regardless of frequency or intensity. The dominant use areas include areas where the use is most commonly pursued and are defined as areas within the general use footprint that are routinely used by most users most of the time. Future use areas are also included for certain uses where participants anticipated an increase in spatial extent or intensity. Future use areas reflect an anticipated significant and disproportionate (relative to other areas) change in patterns of use through either a lateral expansion of a dominant use area or an increase in intensity of use, or both in the foreseeable future but within the next ten years.

For more information on use definitions and types, see the readme document supplied with the data or visit http://www.crrc.unh.edu/workshops/ocean_uses/index.html.For a crosswalk of field names to use names, see the aliases in the supplied ArcMap document NHME_ocean_uses_atlas_SAMPLE.mxd

Atlas data describe broad uses of the ocean, and are not intended to be used for navigational purposes or provide information on regulations affecting human activities.

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Atlas data describe broad uses of the ocean, and are not intended to be used for navigational purposes or provide information on regulations affecting human activities.

Microsoft Windows XP Version 5.1 (Build 2600) Service Pack 3; ESRI ArcCatalog 9.2.6.1500

Attribute accuracy was maintained by comparing data before and after each process step, and by comparing final product to source data.

Workshops were conducted at a maximum scale of 1:100,000. During post processing, original workshop polygons were aggregated to an ordered one-quarter nautical mile squared grid, so exact use locations within each block are not discernible. Data are intended to portray broad patterns for each use at a comparable scale to inform ocean management but are not intended for navigation or enforcement purposes.

Underwater cables were only mapped to the degree of confirming that areas on published NOAA nautical charts should be included in the footprint.

Logical consistency was maintained by comparing data before and after each process step, and by comparing final product to source data.