The Race to Save the Blue Planet
My name is Dr. Gerald Graham. To commemorate a half century devoted to protecting the marine environment worldwide, as well as for posterity's sake, I have created this website, which provides links to digitised artefacts to much of my work, dating back to 1974, the year of my first publication, and continuing right on up to the present day.
My studies, work and personal interests have taken me to a total of thirty-three countries around the world. Topics I have worked on over the course of the past fifty years include: The BC offshore oil and gas moratorium; The BC North Coast oil tanker ban; The Enbridge Northern Gateway Tanker Project; The Trans Mountain Tanker Expansion Project; Preventing and responding to marine oil spills; Tanker safety; The control of foreign fishing in African coastal countries; Conservation of Southern Resident Killer Whales; Victoria sewage treatment; Circumpolar issues; Marine mammal conservation legislation worldwide; Science policy issues worldwide; and hazardous waste legislation in OECD-member countries.
In terms of my academic credentials, I was awarded a B. A. in Economics from Loyola College in Montreal, Canada in 1970. Loyola is now a Campus of Concordia University.
In 1974 I was awarded an M. A. in International Relations from the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada.
In 1980 I was awarded a Ph. D. in International Relations from the Graduate Institute of the University of Geneva in Geneva, Switzerland.
In terms of my professional credentials, I am an IMO-accredited On Scene Commander for marine oil spill response. That means that if a crude oil tanker were to discharge all or part of its cargo anywhere in the worldocean, I am trained to lead the response operation. Here is a link to my 2022 On Scene Commander's Certificate. NB In 2004 I obtained my first marine oil spill On Scene Commander certificate, having successfully completed a week-long course at the Canadian Coast Guard College on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia. The prerequisite courses for attendance at the OSC Course were the Coast Guard's Basics of Spill Response Course ( BOSRC ), which I completed in 2000, and the Marine Spill Response Operations Course ( MSROC ), which I completed in 2002.
I also have a Shoreline Cleanup and Assessment Technique (SCAT) Certificate. Here is a link to that SCAT Certificate.
Click here for my profile on Oceans Expert.
In terms of my professional career, I have worked as a Consultant to a total of seven Canadian government departments or agencies over the years, plus half a dozen international organisations. My Canadian client list includes Fisheries and Oceans, Transport Canada, Environment Canada, Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, Global Affairs Canada ( twice ) and the Canadian International Development Agency ( CIDA ) (twice ). International clients have included The World Bank ( twice ), IOC/UNESCO, the FAO, the OECD, the European Union, and the German aid agency GIZ. I have also had a number of private sector clients over the years, including a number of environmental organisations.
I also worked full-time for the Canadian House of Commons, plus Natural Resources Canada, back in the early eighties.
Much of my work and travel has been in the Canadian and American Arctic, and Africa, although I also undertook a program evaluation of a remote sensing project in Cochabamba, Bolivia in 1998, and taught the Introduction to Latin American Politics course at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, USA in 1992. I have also traveled to Asia on business.
Fifteen of my publications are listed on Google Scholar, with a total of forty-two citations to date.
Five of my publications are listed on AquaDocs, UNESCO/IOC's Repository of Ocean Publications. AquaDocs is supported by the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of UNESCO, a former client of mine.
Fifteen of my publications are listed on ResearchGate, where they are available for download free of charge. To date, these publications have been cited twenty-two times, and read six hundred and fifty-seven times.
What follows is a decade-by-decade summary of my work ( starting with the oldest ) on domestic and international environmental issues over the course of the past half century, focusing on that part of my work which is publicly available, and for which there is some sort of digital record. The hope here is that the reader might find something of interest from a catalogue of more that eighty manuscripts I have written, plus many articles either written about me or in which I am quoted, and many of the radio and TV interviews I have granted.
1970-1979
While at Loyola College between 1966 and 1970 I served on the executive of the College's AIESEC Chapter. This led to a Management Traineeship at Cumbernauld New Town in Scotland in the Summer of 1970.
1970 also marked the year I took my first computer course, in COBOL ( using IBM punch cards ), at Loyola College.
I was extremely fortunate to get involved in international environmental issues in 1972, when I wrote a paper on tourism development in the Eastern Caribbean, the result of a Graduate study tour that took a group of us from the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs ( NPSIA ) at Carleton University to the Leeward Islands.
That same year- the year of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm, I started researching my Masters Thesis on Arctic marine pollution. That was three years after the American oil tanker MV Manhattan navigated Canada's Northwest Passage, causing quite a diplomatic stir, and raising concerns of a potentially catastrophic marine oil spill.
A digital copy of my Masters Thesis, which I successfully defended in 1974, can be found at this link: " The Canadian Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act of 1970 and the Concept of Self-Protection". A hard copy of my Thesis is also held by Library and Archives Canada in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, as well as at the NPSIA Library in Ottawa.
Upon completion of my MA Thesis I was asked by NPSIA to write this paper, entitled "Oil and Ice: The Political Economy of Law in the Canadian Arctic", which has been cited here. I spent much of the following year working in the High Arctic, first on Banks Island and then on a cargo ship supplying Inuit communities on Baffin Island and in the Northwest Passage. Shortly after returning South, I flew to Geneva, Switzerland to commence my Doctoral studies.
Here is a link to my widely-cited publication "Ice in International Law", published in Thesaurus Acroasium, Volume VII: The Law of the Sea. Thessaloniki: Institute of Public International Law and International Relations, 1977, pp. 489-495. As of February 13, 2024 it had obtained 108 reads on ResearchGate. I originally presented this paper at a three-week Seminar on the Law of the Sea that I had been invited to participate in in Thessaloniki, Greece in the Summer of 1976.
In 1977 I was invited to participate in a three-week Research Seminar at the prestigious Hague Academy of International Law in The Hague, The Netherlands. Here is a link to a widely-cited Chapter I wrote as an outgrowth of that Seminar, entitled "International Rivers and Lakes: The Canadian-American Regime". It appears in a book which I also co-edited, entitled "The Legal Regime of International Rivers and Lakes". My co-editors were L. Caflisch, R. Zacklin and H. Dipla. The book was published in 1981 by Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, The Hague/Boston/London. PS I also attended the three-week course on Public International Law at the Hague Academy in 1976, for which I received a Certificate.
In 1978 I co-authored an article with Lee Kimball, James C. Bridgeman and Adolf R. H. Schneider entitled "Balancing the Interests? Third UN-Law of the Sea Conference (7th Session)", which is published in Environmental Policy and Law, Volume 4, Number 2/3, July 1978, pp. 69-77. That same year I was an Observer with the Canadian Delegation to that same Session of UNCLOS III negotiations at the United Nations Office in Geneva, Switzerland. During those negotiations I wrote an article which appeared in a newspaper published by the Neptune Group, a group of marine ENGOs with Consultative Status to UNCLOS III, entitled "Krill: Who Decides?". Here is a link to that article. I was an active member of that same, influential group, which included, among others, the afore-mentioned Lee Kimball, as well as Miriam Levering and Sylvain Minault.
1980-1989
Click here for a link to a digital copy of my 1980 Ph. D. Thesis from the Graduate Institute, entitled "The Freedom of Scientific Research in International Law: Outer Space, the Antarctic and the Oceans". Bound copies of the dissertation can be ordered here. Hard copies of my Thesis are also housed in the following libraries in Europe and North America: Department of Fisheries and Oceans in Sidney, BC and Dartmouth, NS; the Scripps Institution of Oceanography collection at the University of California San Diego in San Diego, CA; the Graduate Institute of the University of Geneva in Geneva, Switzerland; NASA Headquarters in Washington, DC; the Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI) at Cambridge University in Cambridge, England; and the IOC/UNESCO in Paris, France. My Thesis Supervisor was the noted Swiss international lawyer Lucius Caflisch, who also went on to become a personal friend.
My Ph. D. Thesis has been cited four times so far, according to Google Scholar. While I was in Geneva researching and writing my doctoral dissertation I also wrote these two articles in French for the Journal de Geneve newspaper, on the Antarctic Treaty. I was also the Clerk on an International Chamber of Commerce arbitration involving a contractual dispute between Intercontinental Hotels and a Turkish entity.
During this decade I also successfully completed numerous consulting assignments for various Canadian government departments. Topics I worked on included a review of the federal environmental assessment review process and a review of the implementation of the Inuvialuit Final Agreement in the Western Arctic. I was also an Independent Technical Expert to a federal panel reviewing NATO low-level flying in Northern Quebec. During this time I was also a team member of a Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) short-term mission to Guinea, where our team undertook a pre-feasibility study of for a foreign fisheries monitoring, control and surveillance project. As a follow-up to this project, I also trained a Guinean fisheries official in fisheries enforcement law. Unfortunately, none of my reports for these assignments are publicly available. But the following ones are.
In 1981 I worked as a Consultant to the OECD in Paris, France. My work for the OECD included visits to Member Countries, including France, Germany and the United Kingdom, and writing a report entitled "National Legislation and International Rules Applicable to Hazardous Waste Management in OECD Member Countries", which was cited in World Resources 1987 (pps. 222 and 234 pdf ). I also represented the OECD at two international conferences on hazardous waste- one at the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei in Rome, and the other, a diplomatic conference at the United States Department of State, aka "Foggy Bottom", in Washington, D. C.
Also in 1981, I revised and updated a report for the FAO in Rome. I spent six weeks at FAO Headquarters researching and writing my report, entitled "National Legislation concerning the Conservation, Management and Utilization of Marine Mammals". The original report had been written by Michel Savini, in 1974.
In 1982 I wrote a Report for the National Liberal Caucus Research Bureau of the House of Commons in Ottawa, Canada entitled "A Constitution for the Oceans". Here is a link to that report. The following year I wrote another Report for the Caucus, this one entitled "The Pearce Report and the Pacific Fishery". Here is a link to that report. I wrote other reports while I was at the House of Commons as well, on subjects ranging from acid rain to the collapse of the Atlantic fishery, the seal hunt, and the abolition of the "Crow Rate". I plan on digitising these reports very shortly, and posting links to them here. My boss at the House of Commons was the highly-respected economist Dr. David Husband, who went on to become a close personal friend. In the Summer of 1983 I also represented the Research Bureau's on the House of Commons Transport Committee's cross-country consultations on the abolition of the Crow's Nest Pass Agreement, aka 'The Crow Rate".
In 1982 I also wrote a report for IOC/UNESCO entitled "National Legislation and Regulations relating to the Conduct of Marine Scientific Research in Maritime Zones subject to National Jurisdiction". This report ended up being published in 1984.
In 1984 I was a Canadian Arctic offshore oil and gas policy analyst for the Canada Oil and Gas Lands Administration ( COGLA ), a federal government department, in Ottawa. Among my many duties, I represented COGLA at the annual US/Canada Beaufort Sea Exchange in Anchorage, Alaska. This assignment included a tour of the facilities at Prudhoe Bay, on Alaska's North Slope, where oil was being piped south to the port of Valdez, via the Trans Alaska Pipeline ( TAPS ), for shipment by tanker to ports in Washington State and California.
In 1985 I was contracted by the Circumpolar Affairs Division of the Canadian Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) to research and write a paper entitled "A Study to Develop a Circumpolar Strategy". Here is a link to that 81-page document, the finest of all my consulting reports.
In 1987 I was the Principal Consultant on a review undertaken by KPMG Peat Marwick for the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) of the Government of Canada's Implementation of the Inuvialuit Final Agreement in the Western Arctic. Click here for links to that Report. NB That link will direct you to a page that says "Continue to Post". Clicking on that window will bring you to the Report. That same year I proposed to that same DIAND that I undertake a study for them of the possible impacts of climate change in The North. When I met with the head of the Environment Directorate- Danielle Weatherup,to discuss my idea, I was told "Come back in twenty years!"
Also in 1987 an article I wrote entitled "An Arctic Foreign Policy for Canada" was published in International Perspectives: The Canadian Journal on World Affairs", pps. 11-14. This paper has been cited here, on page 15 pdf.
In 1988 I wrote a discussion paper for the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans entitled "Strengthening Canadian Participation in International Marine Science". Here is a link to that report.
I was also privileged to be a Visiting Scholar in 1988 at the prestigious Scott Polar Research Institute of Cambridge University (SPRI) in Cambridge, England. While there, I was commissioned to write a paper for the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs on institutional mechanisms for circumpolar cooperation. Here is a link to that report, entitled "Multilateral Circumpolar Cooperation: The Institutional Framework". In January, 1989 I also gave a lecture at SPRI on the same topic.
Here is a link to a Submission I wrote to the Tanker Safety Panel in Ottawa in 1988 on behalf of the Canadian Arctic Resources Committee, also based in Ottawa. The submission led to my being hired to work for the Panel full-time, as an in-house Consultant. I ended up researching and writing large parts of the Panel's Final Report, which is available here for free download.
Also in 1988 I published a book review of John Honderich's book "Arctic Imperative: Is Canada Losing the North?", in the Volume XVII, No. 3, May/June edition of International Perspectives: The Canadian Journal on World Affairs, entitled "Holding the Arctic".
In 1989 I published a book review in Polar Record, Volume 25, Issue 152, January 1989, pp. 64-65 entitled "Canada in the Circumpolar North: The North and Canada's International Relations". In the same edition of Polar Record, pp. 60-61, I published an article entitled "Canada Takes Steps at Both Poles".
In 1989 I also participated at the Law of the Sea Institute's 23rd International Conference on the Law of the Sea in Noordwyk, Holland.
1990-1999
During this decade I undertook a number of consulting assignments in Canada and abroad. In Canada, for instance, I was part of a team that reviewed the Canadian Coast Guard's icebreaking and search and rescue operations. Abroad, I undertook a mission for CIDA to a West African fisheries conference in Morocco. I was also part of an EU-financed mission to five-countries in Southern Africa, where we reviewed those countries' ability to control foreign fishing. I also made two short-term missions to The Gambia for The World Bank, where the team I was with reviewed the Bank's Urban Environment Project for the capital, Banjul. Unfortunately, none of the reports from these missions are public. But what follow below are.
Click here for a 1990 Op-Ed piece I wrote for the Financial Post entitled "Changing Environment Procedures".
In 1990 I represented the Tanker Safety Panel at the prestigious Globe 90 Conference, which was held in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from the 19th to the 23rd of March, 1990. Then, between April 29 and May 2 of the same year, I represented the Panel at the Canadian Petroleum Association's 16th Frontier Workshop in Fairmont Hot Springs, British Columbia.
In 1991 I wrote a book review of Don Hinrichsen's book Our Common Seas: Coasts in Crisis. The review, entitled "International Disaster", is published in Marine Policy, Volume 15, Number 5, September 1991, pp. 378-379.
In 1991 I also spent a month in Mauritania, where I researched, wrote and presented a report ( written in French ) for that country, funded by the German overseas aid agency GIZ, on the subject of marine environmental protection treaties affecting that Northwest African country. Here is a link to that report. And here is a link to my photo album of this very mysterious place.
In April of 1992 I was a Delegate of the Government of Canada to a regional Conference of Atlantic African countries that took place in Casablanca, Morocco. The conference was organised by Canada's International Center for Ocean Development (ICOD), which is now defunct. Click here for a link to my photo album of that trip
On January 6, 1993 I was interviewed on CBC's Newsworld TV network about the MV Braer tanker incident off the United Kingdom's Shetland Islands. Five days later I was interviewed on the same topic on CJAC Radio in Edmonton. Here is a link to that interview.
In 1993 I also published an article in Diplomat & International Canada, November-December 1993, pp. 30-31 entitled "The Exodus of Marsh Arabs from Southern Iraq". In a similar vein, in November of that same year I published an article in Peace and Environment News, Volume, 8, Number 9, p. 8 entitled "Marsh Arabs Fleeing Persecution".
In 1994 I came across an error in an environmental textbook entitled Environmental Science, Fourth Edition, written by G. Tyler Miller, Jr. On page 93 of the book Mr. Miller defined permafrost as "...a thick layer of ice below the soil surface that remains frozen year-round". On June 24 of that year I wrote the publisher, pointing to the fact that permafrost is in fact a perennial frozen layer in the soil. I am happy to report that the error was corrected in the Fifth Edition, and every edition thereafter.
In 1995 I was a Principal Consultant on a Transport Canada review of the Canadian Coast Guard's Icebreaking and Search and Rescue activities. Here is a sample of my contribution to that program review- a brief study of Russia's Northern Sea Route.
Between May 23 and May 26, 1995 I participated in the International Maritime Organisation's Second International Oil Spill Research and Development Forum at IMO Headquarters in London, England.
In 1999 I had two pieces written about my work in the prestigious scientific journal Nature: 1) "Canadian plea for freedom of information"; and 2) "21 Principles for Science: A Declaration of Interdependence for the 21st Century". These articles were a result of a graduate seminar I led at one of my three alma maters- the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, entitled "Science and Technology in International Relations". Here is a link to the Syllabus for this highly successful seminar.
In 1999 I was also invited to participate in the Harvard University International Conference on Biotechnology in the Global Economy Conference, where two of my submissions appeared on the conference website: 1) "The Human Genome as Common Heritage of Mankind" and 2) "A Global Conversation on Biotechnology". My participation in this prestigious conference led to my 2001 peer-reviewed publication in the scientific journal International Journal of Biotechnology entitled "Learning from the 'Terminator' Debacle".
In the late 1990s I was invited to participate in a planning workshop at the International Ocean Institute at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, at which Canada's Ocean Plan for the 2002 United Nations Agenda 21 Initiative was hammered out.
2000 to 2009
During this decade I participated in many international oil spill conferences, including: two sessions of the Pacific States/BC Oil Spill Task Force- one in Victoria, B. C. and the other in Tacoma, Washington; the IMO's 2003 High Density Oil Spill R & D Forum in Brest, France; the 2003 AMOP 26th Technical Seminar in Victoria, B. C. ; and the 2003 International Oil Spill Conference in Vancouver, B. C., Canada, between April 6 and 11.
From October 5 to October 13, 2001 I participated in the 10th Annual Meeting of PICES- the Pacific Marine Science Organization, which took place at the Institute of Ocean Sciences in Sidney, B. C., Canada. Here is a link to the Report from that prestigious gathering.
In 2002, following a workshop on the subject at the Institute of Ocean Sciences in Sidney, B. C., Canada, I presented these suggestions to the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans regarding amendments to whalewatching regulations for British Columbia:. Twenty-one years later, the industry is still largely-unregulated, and whatever regulations exist are largely-unenforced.
In the early 2000s I also served as voluntary Incident Commander for the emergency response team in the area of Victoria in which I live- Cadboro Bay.
I Spoke at a Victoria rally against the lifting of BC's offshore oil and gas moratorium on January 12, 2002. The rally was covered by VI Land News.
In 2003 I presented a paper at the Georgia Basin/Puget Sound Research Conference in Vancouver, BC, Canada entitled "Expert Systems for Marine Oil Spill Response Operations". To date this publication has received a total of thirteen citations, including this one from 2008. The most widely-cited part of my paper is the assertion that once a spill occurs only 5-15 percent of it will be recovered. This statement was cited in, for instance, several Environment Canada Proposed Measures for species covered by the Species at Risk Act (SARA), including the Proposed Management Plan for the Offshore Killer Whale ( Orcinus orca ) in Canada, 2009, p. 11, which you can read for yourself here.
Also in 2003, I participated in the prestigious International Oil Spill Conference ( IOSC 2003 ) in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, where I provided a demonstration entitled The Power of Expert Systems for Marine Oil Spill Response . The demonstration was very well received by Conference delegates.
I participated in a panel debate on August 13, 2003 on The A Channel on the topic of the possible lifting of British Columbia's Offshore Oil Moratorium. This was less than seven years before the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Happily, the BC moratorium still holds, and just recently Chevron relinquished its exploration rights in the area.
Here's a link to an interview I did with the late David Grierson on CBC Victoria Radio's On the Island on December 17, 2003 on the subject of the BC offshore oil and gas moratorium.
In the early 2000s I co-developed, with my colleague, Dr. Ian Morrison of Acquired Intelligence, Inc., a prototype Marine Oil Spill Expert System ( MOSES ) called OSCAR- short for On Scene Coordinator's Advisor for Response. I demonstrated this software at Ocean Innovation 2004 on Monday, October 25, in Sidney, B. C, as part of Technology Demonstrations. Here is a link to a two-page flyer I produced in 2006 to explain the concept behind MOSES in general and OSCAR in particular.
On April 29, 2004 Stephen Hume wrote a piece about my work which appeared in the Vancouver Sun under the title "Expert in oil-spill Response Outlines the Risks for B. C.". His article was in response to a PowerPoint presentation I gave at Swan Lake Nature Sanctuary in Victoria on Monday, April 26, 2004 entitled "Environmental Aspects of BC Offshore Oil and Gas Exploration and Production".
I was among those interviewed on May 14, 2004 on the French language Radio Canada TV in Victoria following the local hearings of the Priddle Panel which reviewed the BC offshore oil and gas moratorium issue. Here is a link to my PowerPoint presentation to that Panel on May 13, 2014. Here is a link to the Comments I submitted to the Panel on Oral and Written Briefs that had been submitted to them. Also on that topic, here is a link to the Speaking Notes for my May 13, 2004 presentation to the Priddle Panel in Victoria.
I also made a submission in 2004 to the Royal Society of Canada Expert Panel on BC's offshore oil and gas moratorium entitled "Probability and Consequence", which included this worst case scenario for a marine oil spill in the Queen Charlotte Basin. My submission was referenced in the Royal Society's Final Report of that same year. For the record, Coastal First Nations also included ( without my permission, I might add ) my worst case scenario as part of their submission to the Northern Gateway tanker project review in 2010.
Click here for a 2004 Letter to the Editor of the Times Colonist which I wrote in favour of maintaining the BC Offshore Oil and Gas Moratorium. Years later, after the Deepwater Horizon blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, the provincial Science Advisor personally thanked me for my stance, saying: "You were right!".
In the mid-2000s I was a volunteer with Oak Bay Sea Rescue ( RCMSAR Unit 33 ) on the south coast of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. And in the Summer of 2005 I was a volunteer with M3- the Marine Mammal Monitoring Group. We monitored the whalewatching fleet in Haro Strait. I photographed one infraction, which is described in this article. My photo was used as evidence in NOAA's investigation of the incident. I hand-delivered the photo to NOAA's marine mammal enforcement unit in Friday Harbor, on San Juan Island in Washington State.
Click here for a complete list of the fifteen venues where I made PowerPoint presentations over the years, entitled "The Threat of Oil Spills in the Queen Charlotte Basin". Included in the list of institutions where I have delivered these presentations are: the Victoria Natural History Society; Teekay Tankers in Vancouver; the University of Victoria ( on four separate occasions ); Vancouver Island University in Nanaimo; DFO's Institute of Ocean Sciences in Sidney, BC; Environment Canada's Pacific Wildlife Research Centre in Delta, BC; the Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre on the rugged west coast of Vancouver Island, a grassroots group of concerned citizens on Hornby Island, BC,; Oak Bay Sea Rescue in Victoria and the Canadian Wildlife Service in Vancouver. Around this time I was also hired by the BC government to present a PowerPoint presentation to First Nations bands located on Northern Vancouver Island on the same topic, at a two-day roundtable event in Campbell River where various presenters outlined the pros and cons of offshore oil development in the region. And although my presentation is not publicly available, it was similar to this one.
In 2004 I delivered a peer-reviewed paper at the 27rd Arctic Marine and Oil Spill Program (AMOP) Technical Seminar in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada that was co-authored by Dr. Ian Morrison and myself, and entitled "Marine Oil Spill Expert Systems". Here is a link to the PowerPoint presentation I delivered at that Conference.
In 2004 I also made a Submission to Environment Canada regarding the Scott Islands Marine Wildlife Initiative. Here is a link to that Submission.
Here is an Op-ed piece I wrote in 2005 entitled "Why I'm In Favour of Sewage Treatment for Victoria".
After participating in the June 27, 2005 and June 5, 2006 COINPacific Forums in Victoria, I submitted my Comments, entitled "BC North Coast Ocean Technology Opportunities".
In 2005 I submitted comments to Parks Canada regarding the proposed creation of a Southern Strait of Georgia Marine Conservation Area Reserve. Here is a link to that Submission. Eighteen years later this initiative appears to be dead on arrival, largely, it seems, because of the vested interests of the powerful commercial shipping lobby.
In 2005 I also submitted comments to DFO on a Southern Resident Killer Whale Conservation Strategy.
That same year I submitted Comments to regarding the Deltaport Third Berth Expansion Project Comprehensive Study prepared by DFO.
On May 19, 2005 Monday Magazine published a Letter to the Editor in which I called for a revamp of BC Ferries' business model, including it's hopelessly inefficient reservation system. Here is a link to my Letter. Sorry to say that eighteen years later, little has changed.
In September, 2006 I wrote about what it was like to tour an Alaskan supertanker. Click here for the link to that blog post.
Check out my sewage treatment expertise, which included a 2006 Submission to the SETAC Panel reviewing Victoria sewage, paid for by the T Buck Suzuki Foundation, entitled "Is Victoria Sewage Contaminating Southern Resident Killer Whales?" To my immense satisfaction, the Panel recommended sewage treatment for Victoria, and as of January 1, 2022, over the objections of a clique of local ocean scientists largely based at the University of Victoria, the region in and around Victoria has tertiary sewage treatment.
On March 23, 2006, the day the BC Ferries vessel MV Queen of the North sank off Gil Island in northern BC, I was interviewed on that topic by Jo-Ann Roberts of CBC Radio's All Points West. Here is a link to that interview. On March 21, 2007 I was also interviewed on The A Channel TV station, as the first anniversary of the sinking of that ferry neared.
On March 15, 2006 my wife and I both called in to CBC Radio's Vancouver show On the Coast with host Stephen Quinn regrading the Northern Gateway project.
On July 27, 2006 Leanne Ritchie of the Daily News newspaper in Prince Rupert, British Columbia, wrote an article in which I was widely-quoted, entitled "Feds 'Rewriting History' Over Oil Tanker Moratorium".
In October 2006 I made a presentation to Colwood City Council entitled "The Future of Coburg Peninsula at Esquimalt Lagoon". My submission received a reference in this 2014 Investigation into erosion of the Peninsula, which was submitted to Colwood Council by members of the University of Victoria's Geography Department on April 2nd of that year.
In 2006 I also wrote an article for the Victoria Naturalist entitled "In Search of the Elusive Humpback". The article appears on Pages 4 and 5. It's my account of the week I spent at a whale research station on Gil Island off the North and Central coast of BC, in the Inside Passage.
On 29 May, 2007 I submitted my online Comments to DFO on their proposed Orca Recovery Plan.
On December 3, 2007 I was quoted extensively in this CNET article by Daniel Terdiman on the application of high tech to marine oil spill response efforts.
In the Summer of 2008 I had the good fortune to tour Galapagos. Here is the link to my account of that adventure.
In 2009, after a visit to the Belgian seashore, I wrote the local authorities on the pressing need to preserve the Vosseslag Dunes near Klemskerke. Here is a link to the English version of that letter. And here is a link to the Flemish version.
2010-2019
Here is a link to a 2010 TV interview I did at the time of the BP Deepwater Horizon blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, with Susan McGinnis of Clean Skies TV. Around the same time, I was interviewed by Paul Workman on Daily Planet TV on the Discovery Channel. Also, a Market Watch article was written about my contribution to stemming the flow of oil from the Deepwater Horizon leak. On June 26, 2010 I was quoted in an Associated Press article about the deficiencies of deep sea oil spill R and D. Click here for a radio interview I did on May 3, 2010 with Phil Till of CKNW Vancouver on the subject of both the Deepwater Horizon spill and Northern Gateway tanker project. Here's a link to a similar interview I did with News 1130 Vancouver a month later, on June 3, 2010. And here is a link to a lengthy interview I did on May 4, 2010 with John Carney of KMOX 1120 in St. Louis, MO on the Deepwater Horizon spill. On May 18, 2010 I was also interviewed on KMOX 1120 about the spill, this time by John Grayson. Here is a link to that interview. All together, I responded to twenty-two media enquiries about Deepwater Horizon.
I have provided expert testimony on marine oil spill risks to two tanker review panels in British Columbia, Canada: The Enbridge Northern Gateway project and the Trans Mountain Tanker Expansion Project. Here is a link to my 57-page Expert Testimony to the Enbridge Northern Gateway Joint Review Panel, from September, 2010. Here is a link to my Oral Statement to the same Panel on January 7, 2013. Click here for a video reenactment of my appearance before the Panel. I also submitted a Letter of Comment to the Panel.
Here is a link to a radio interview I did on January 27, 2010 on CHLY 101.7 FM on the threat of oil spills in the Queen Charlotte Basin. The interview was done in preparation for a public lecture I gave that same night on that same topic, at Vancouver Island University in Nanaimo, British Columbia, where I was rudely introduced as follows: "He's not a scientist." Here is a link to that PowerPoint presentation.
On April 2, 2010 I made a Submission to the Capital Regional District (CRD) as to why Haro Woods was not a suitable location for a sewage treatment plant. I am pleased to say that we won that argument, against opposition from the Grand Poobahs, as I liked to call the local officials. For the record, I also wrote a Letter to the CRD (which was also eventually successful), as to why Dockside Green was not a model for sewage treatment in Greater Victoria.
In September, 2010 I sailed through the Great Bear Rainforest. Here is a link to my own collection of videos from that adventure, which included an up-close encounter with a Spirit Bear. ( A link to my photo album of the same trip is included towards the end of this website ). The following year I pitched the idea of a Great Bear IMAX film to Diane Roberts of West Eagle Films, which had been involved in a number of films using this groundbreaking Canadian technology. Subsequently, West Eagle Films approached Ian McAllister ( who I had introduced myself to briefly at a presentation of one of his books in Victoria some years ago ) about producing such a film. On April 10, 2014 it was announced in the British Columbia Legislature that Diane and her company were "...about to start production on an IMAX 3-D film called "Land of the Spirit Bear.". An IMAX film entitled Great Bear Rainforest: Land of the Spirit Bear, was released in 2019. When it hit the theatres, McAllister told a reporter in Victoria that West Eagle Films' "...legendary IMAX director David Douglas would sit with ( him ) in the Victoria theatre, going over test shots on the big screen and coaching ( him ) on large format filmmaking". Needless to say, I am extremely proud of the role I played in the evolution of the idea of creating an IMAX film of the Great Bear. Obviously I am not the only one to have thought of this, but I am amongst those who pursued the idea. I just couldn't come up with the funding. You can watch the film here, on Vimeo, for free.
On September 10, 2010 I was quoted, without my consent, I might add, in a Globe and Mail sponsored content advertisement about a new class of tugboat being introduced on the BC coast.
On May 6, 2011 I was quoted in an article on the Tar Sands Express website regarding Enbridge's Northern Gateway project
On November 16, 2011 the Tyee published an article by me entitled "Quiet Shift in Feds' Criteria for Approving Northern Gateway". Two days later I was quoted in a Financial Post article on the same topic.
Click here for a 2012 piece Stephen Ewart wrote in the Calgary Herald about my views on a possible VLCC supertanker terminal at Deltaport, south of Vancouver.
Click here for the transcript of a radio interview I did with Stephen Quinn, host of CBC Radio's "On the Coast" show in Vancouver, BC, on Wednesday, July 25, 2012 regarding BC's aspirations for a "World Class" marine oil spill response regime. Click here for the Transcript of a similar radio interview I did with Jo-Ann Roberts, host of CBC Radio's "All Points West" show in Victoria, BC, on Thursday, July 26, 2012.
Click here for a November 12, 2012 interview I did with David Lennam of CBC Radio Victoria's program All Points West regarding Victoria sewage treatment.
On November 21, 2012 I argued the Yes side in a debate on Greater Victoria sewage treatment held in Oak Bay. Here's a link to a Time Colonist story noting the event that was to occur later that day. Happy to report that this is one public policy issue I helped win, against fierce opposition. Not only that: The powers that be ended up choosing the very site, at McLoughlin Point in Esquimalt, that my wife and I had produced a YouTube video on in July of 2013.
On January 13, 2013 I was quoted in a Mining.com article on the likelihood of a tanker oil spill from the Norethern Gateway project.
I was the subject of an article entitled "A Significant Risk" in the February, 2013 issue of Focus Magazine, as well as a January 12, 2013 Vancouver Sun article by Larry Pynn entitled "Tankers too Risky on BC's North Coast, Oil-Spill Consultant Says", about my marine oil spill prevention and response critique of Northern Gateway's marine transportation Quantitative Risk Assessment, plus an April 29, 2004 Vancouver Sun article by Stephen Hume entitled "Expert in oil-spill response outlines the risks for B.C.", which was about a presentation I gave on the threat of oil spills in the Queen Charlotte Basin. Click here for a typed version of that same article.
Here is a link to a CBC podcast from c. 2013 on the Enbridge Northern Gateway tanker project, which includes my thoughts ( and Paul Pacquet's as well ) on the possibly catastrophic impacts of a project-related marine oil spill. Here's a link to a similar interview I did in January, 2013 with Eric Stansfield of CFKR radio in Kelowna, BC.
Here is a Re-enactment of my August 14, 2013 sewage treatment presentation to the Capital Regional District Board in Victoria, BC, Canada. Here is a link to my Speaking Notes for that presentation. And here's a link to a story the publisher of Focus Magazine, David Broadland, a staunch opponent of sewage treatment for Greater Victoria, wrote on the controversy surrounding that meeting, after I had spoken with him about it over the phone.
On October 7, 2013 I participated in a luncheon Roundtable in downtown Victoria with NDP Leader Tom Mulcair and Victoria MP Murray Rankin on BC marine environmental issues. Here is a link to a photo from that lunch, with yours truly in the middle on the right.
Here is a link to a December 13, 2013 TV interview I did on Global TV's BC1 on the subject of the then newly-released Tanker Safety Panel Report.
On January 15, 2014 I was quoted in a Times Colonist article about Trans Mountain's marine oil spill recovery plan. NB The company was called Kinder Morgan at the time. That same day I was quoted in a Cortes Currents article regarding the marine oil spill risks associated with the same project.
Click here for a January 30, 2014 piece I wrote for the benefit of Victoria sewage naysayers, including Dr. Andrew Weaver, MLA, who I met with in person to discuss it. It is entitled "Fun with Figures", and it debunks the idea of a Dockside Green-style, distributed sewage treatment system for the Capital Regional District, which includes Greater Victoria.
On November 16, 2015 I was quoted in Grist about the Northern Gateway tanker project. This article came on the heals of a Vancouver Sun article that had quoted me about the same project two days earlier. Then, on November 23, 2015 I was quoted by Esquire about the BC North Coast oil tanker moratorium.
On Monday, November 23, 2015 I made a Presentation to Saanich Council in an attempt to save a large grove of trees on private land off Watkiss Road from the chainsaw. I have lost count of the number of submissions my wife and I have made to various Saanich Councils over the years, on a wide range of issues, including tree preservation, development variances, maintaining the EDPA ( Environmental Permit Development Area ), sewage treatment, dogs on leashes, preservation of trees on Tyndall and Finnerty Avenues, building a private tennis club on park land, redesigning Cadboro Bay Beach, the Local Area Plan for Cadboro Bay, etc. On most occasions, we made our presentations at public meetings. Here is a link to a story the Saanich News published on February 14, 2019 about our attempt to save those trees on Finnerty.
As for the Trans Mountain Tanker Expansion Project, here is a link to my January 21, 2019 Argument-in-Chief to the Reconsideration Panel, in my capacity as an Intervenor. Previously, I had submitted these comments on the proposed Terms of Reference for the Reconsideration Panel, as well as these comments on the spatial limits of the project review, plus the original Application to Participate as an Intervenor, which was accepted because of my tanker safety and marine oil spill expertise, as well as my proximity to the tanker route through Haro Strait, which is also critical habitat for endangered Southewrn Resident Killer Whales, something I also know a thing or two about.
Click here for my Comments on the Proposed Conditions for the Roberts Bank Terminal 2 Expansion Project, which I oppose, because of the potentially catastrophic impact the increasing shipping activity associated with this project could have on endangered Southern Resident Killer Whales, whose critical habitat the Project encroaches on. I also commented on the same topic in 2014. Here are my 2005 comments on a related topic..
Here is a link to an interview I did on CBC Radio Vancouver's On the Coast on April 9, 2015, with host Gloria Macarenko, on the topic of the MV Marathassa oil spill in Vancouver's English Harbour. Then, on April 10, 2015 I was interviewed by talk show host Terry Moore of CFAX 1070 about the same English Bay incident. Finally, on April 28, 2015 Heather Libby of the Narwhal quoted me in an article she wrote about the Marathassa spill.
On March 18, 2015 I made a presentation entitled The Risks of Tanker Spills along the BC Coast to the University of Victoria Commerce Students' Society. Click here for a link to this PowerPoint presentation.
On April 25, 2016 I was quoted in a Financial Post article on the proposed BC North Coast oil tanker moratorium.
On December 7, 2016 I was quoted in a Globe and Mail article comparing and contrasting the risks of tanker oil spills from the Northern Gateway and Trans Mountain projects, the first being on BC's north coast and the second on the south coast.
As President of Worldocean Consulting Ltd, I was accepted to present a paper entitled "Marine Oil Spill Aspects of the Enbridge Northern Gateway Project" at the International Oil Spill Conference ( IOSC 2017 ) in Long Beach California, USA, May 15-18, 2017. Click here for the Abstract of my paper. In light of the Government of Canada's decision to formalise a crude oil tanker ban on BC's north coast, where Northern Gateway was slated to take place, I withdrew my paper from the Conference agenda.
2020-2024
Click here for a Saanich News article from June 4, 2020 in which I am quoted on a topic dear to my heart- derelict boats washing ashore in Cadboro Bay. And here's a link to my YouTube Playlist of fifty-eight videos of similar incidents on Caddie Bay Beach and neighbouring Oak Bay. One such video, of a schooner that grounded in Cadboro Bay in 2023, has gone viral, with 427,588 views to date.
Click here for a Vancouver Province article I co-authored with Dr. Peter Ross on the 2021 ZIM Kingston container ship incident. Click here for an interview I did with Gregor Craigie, host of CBC Victoria's "On the Island" radio show, on the same topic. And here is a link to a TV interview on the same topic that I did with CBC Vancouver TV, plus another one with Chek News in Victoria. And the CBC used a photo and video of mine in a ZIm Kingston story they posted on December 3, 2021. My YouTube video clip of the Zim Kingston on fire went viral, and a screengrab from that video was picked up by major news agencies around the world, including Agence France Presse.
Click here for an article in The Tyee about my success in getting oil tankers banned in BC's Active Pass in 2021. Here is a link to the Pacific Pilotage Authority's ( PPA ) Notice to Industry instructing pilots not to take tankers through the Pass. I was also interviewed on this topic by Gregor Craigie, host on CBC Victoria Radio's On the Island show, about the same incident, in May 2021. Here is a link to that interview. PS As a result of my intervention to the PPA, two coastal pilots rather than just one are now required for fully-laden tankers in Boundary Pass.
Click here for the exciting story of how my photos and videos of a Grey Whale in Haro Strait in January, 2022 quickly led to it being named Grey Whale CRC 2440. And click here for my writeup of my February 2, 2022 Encounter with The Haro Strait Grey. Lastly, on January 27, 2022 Ocean Wise published an article on their website about my 'discovery' of CRC 2440.
On 16 March, 2022 one of my "Great Blue Hole Over Victoria" videos was featured on The Weather Network. On June 10 of the same year Tyler Hamilton also wrote a story about the Great Blue Hole after I alerted him to the phenomenon. His posting also included a link to one of my YouTube Great Blue Hole videos. Here is a link to my Playlist of them.
Most recently, I was interviewed on Global BC TV regarding the August 13, 2022 sinking of the fishing vessel MV Aleutian Isle in Haro Strait. Here is a link to that broadcast. Here is a link to a similar interview on the same topic by Chek News. Finally, here's a link to a CBC story on the same topic in which I am quoted.
On January 16, 2023 I was quoted by Justine Hunter in a Globe and Mail article about two recent incidents off the BC coast involving deep-sea vessels.
I am on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SalishSeaFuture and Skype. My Skype name is geraldgraham
See my professional profile on Ocean Expert.
Check out my BC Marine Environmental Policy blog.
Please subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@GeraldFGraham. I need 287 additional Subscribers before Google will pay me royalties for the revenues my 605 videos generate for the company. And while you while you are on my site, check out my Best Whale Videos Playlist.
Also, read from an extensive selection of my publications and PowerPoint presentations on Scribd. Many of them are not listed on this webpage.
Finally, here are some links to photo albums of various adventures I have had around the world over the years, including sailing halfway though the Northwest Passage, trekking on Baffin Island, sailing through the Great Bear Rainforest along the coast of British Columbia, cruising the Galapagos Islands, climbing Mount Kenya and safariing in Africa, scaling a 10,000 foot peak in the Canadian Rockies, completing a one-day, 245 kilometer bike race between Ottawa and Montreal, and running 26.2 miles from Hopkinton, MA to Boston, MA during the 1989 Boston Marathon ( a grueling but successful journey that I wrote about here ).
Email address: worldoceanconsulting (at) live.com