Finance committee  It's almost a political question.

Finance committee  I have concerns. Sometimes I feel that we'll get to a point where we can no longer afford the risks. We're drilling in the Orphan Basin now. That's 2,000 metres deep in an area where icebergs occur. It's just upping the ante. How far we are prepared to go, I don't know. I would

Finance committee  Thank you. I have this luxury of being present in the room. We all burn gas these days, many of us eat fish, some of us go whale watching, so there has to be some kind of balance and compromise, in my mind. I think we're stuck with offshore oil, and that means we're stuck with s

Finance committee  No, my parents chose Zedel. You got it right.

Finance committee  There will be impacts, and the degree is hard to judge.

Finance committee  It was in Norway where it was demonstrated that fishing catch rates were decreased in association with seismic surveys.

Finance committee  I find the problem, and this is political, but you guys are into that....

Finance committee  I don't have to answer that, right?

Finance committee  It's one line in Bill C-38 about the Coasting Trade Act. It has implications for the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board, as to how offshore projects are regulated. My impression is that a full and thorough debate is hard to have when this issue comes up as

Finance committee  Lovely. The intention of the present legislation is to provide easier access for oil companies to seismic survey vessels, but if it has the desired effect, the concern is that you'll have more seismic survey operations and significantly more environmental impact and a cumulative

Finance committee  Yes. We'll get to that in a second. Mr. Chairman, committee, thank you for the invitation to present here. By introduction, I'm a physics professor at Memorial University, and my research areas are physical oceanography and sonar systems. My goal is to provide a bit of backgroun