Plan to prevent ghost fishing

Excerpts from the Globe's environmental blog.

You probably won't encounter them as you catch ocean waves this summer, but they are off the coast: Ghost fishing nets that can wreak havoc on marine life. Every year, fishermen lose or abandon tons of fishing nets and lines, lobster traps, and crab pots off the nation's coast which can snag on shipwrecks, clutter shipping lanes, and entangle whales.

Now, an alliance among a power plant company, the federal government and environmentalists are doing something about it. Earlier this month, Scituate became the third seaport in the state behind Gloucester and New Bedford to start a "fishing for energy" program which collects derelict or unusable fishing gear and burns it to create energy.

Approximately one ton of derelict marine debris equals enough electricity to power one home for 25 days. Since the program's February launch, some 30 tons of fishing nets, trawl gear, crab pots, and line have been collected and converted into energy, according to Covanta Energy, which owns a waste-to-energy power plant in Haverhill.

As President Bush lifts an executive order banning offshore drilling on the outer continental shelf and urges Congress to do the same to combat rising oil and gas prices, it's a good time to remember that we did have drilling here. Eight exploratory wells were dug to average depths of 16,000 feet about 125 miles east of Cape Cod through early 1982.

Environmentalists say it's highly unlikely Georges Bank will be open anytime soon for drilling - Congress is largely opposed to lifting its moratorium, local opposition is fierce, and the drilling that did take place a generation ago indicates there may not be much oil and gas down there anyway.

But interestingly enough, the last time there was drilling on Georges Bank, it was a similar time of high gas prices and pressures for the nation to become energy independent.

BETH DALEY