The UK will be hauled before the European court of justice for failing to provide safe habitats for harbour porpoises, the European commission said on Thursday.

 

Harbour porpoises resemble bottlenose dolphins, with small rounded heads, flat foreheads and a black-lipped mouth that curves upwards, as if smiling.

 

The mammals are endemic to the North Atlantic, but their numbers have been falling in the Baltic, Mediterranean and the east of the English Channel.

 

Mortalities from fishing net accidents in areas such as the Celtic Sea, west of Cornwall, have cast doubt on the species’ sustainability, and the commission has awarded them an “unfavourable” conservation status.

 

Under EU law, the UK should have drawn up a list of conservation areas for the porpoises, but has so far formally proposed just one small site in the Skerries and Causeway conservation area, in Northern Ireland.

 

A second “special area of conservation” was created in the Inner Hebrides and Minches last weekend after warnings from conservationists that Scotland was lagging in conservation efforts.

 

The commission noted the move in the Hebrides and Minches, but said: “The [UK’s] continued failure to propose and designate sufficient sites leaves the areas where the species occurs in greatest densities without the protection required.”

 

Potential damage to porpoises from offshore windfarm construction, oil and gas exploration and fishing, has not been adequately assessed, the commission judged.

 

At loud levels, underwater noise can injure or even kill porpoises, but it is more likely to lead them to abandon an area.

 

A WWF report on Friday will say that an eight decibel reduction in noise from offshore windfarms – by means such as “bubble curtains” – could cut the chance of porpoise population declines by 96% .

 

Earlier this year, the government designated 23 new areas as marine conservation zones, in an extension of a claimed “blue belt” across one-fifth of the UK’s waters.

 

A UK government spokesperson said: “We are committed to protecting our marine environment, which includes appropriate protection for harbour porpoise.That is why we already have two Special Areas of Conservation for this important species, and earlier this year consulted on another five possible sites.”

 

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) argues that it is difficult to identify suitable habitats for the porpoises, but this is disputed by conservationists.

 

Melissa Moore, the policy chief at the Marine Conservation Society said: “There are large areas where you have harbour porpoises feeding and breeding in which protected sites need to be established. The UK has consulted and should be in the process of designating them.” (The Guardian)

 

 

PHOTO: Harbour porpoises are at risk from fishing nets, oil and gas exploration and the construction of offshore windfarms.

CREDIT: Graham Mitchell / Barcroft Media.