Marine Mammals; Incidental Take of Northern Sea Otters During Specified Activities; Seward, Sitka, and Kodiak, Alaska

Fish and Wildlife Service, Interior.

Notification of receipt of application; proposed rule; availability of draft environmental assessment; request for comments.

We, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, in response to a request under the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, as amended, from the U.S. Coast Guard, propose to issue regulations for the nonlethal, incidental, unintentional take by harassment of small numbers of Southcentral Alaska, Southeast Alaska, and Southwest Alaska stocks of northern sea otters ( Enhydra lutris kenyoni) during pile driving and marine construction activities in Seward, Sitka, and Kodiak, Alaska. Incidental take of northern sea otters may result from in-water noise generated during pile driving and marine construction activities occurring for a period up to 5 years. This proposed rule would authorize take by harassment only, and no lethal take would be authorized. If this rule is finalized, we will issue letters of authorization for the incidental take of northern sea otters, upon request, for specific activities in accordance with the final rule for a period up to 5 years. We request comments on these proposed regulations.

Comments on these proposed incidental take regulations and the accompanying draft environmental assessment will be accepted on or before July 23, 2025. Comments submitted electronically using the Federal eRulemaking Portal (see ADDRESSES , below) must be received by 11:59 p.m. eastern time on the closing date.

Information collection requirements: If you wish to comment on the information collection requirements in this proposed rule, please note that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is required to make a decision concerning the collection of information contained in this proposed rule between 30 and 60 days after publication of this ( printed page 26487) proposed rule in the Federal Register . Therefore, comments should be submitted to OMB, with a copy to the FWS Information Collection Clearance Officer, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, (see “Information Collection” section below under ADDRESSES ) by August 22, 2025.

Document availability: You may view the application package, the associated draft environmental assessment, comments received, and other supporting material at https://www.regulations.gov under Docket No. FWS-R7-ES-2024-0195, or these documents may be requested as described under FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT .

Comment submission: You may submit comments on the proposed rule and draft environmental assessment by one of the following methods:

• Electronic submission: Federal eRulemaking Portal at: https://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments to Docket No. FWS-R7-ES-2024-0195.
• U.S. mail: Public Comments Processing, Attn: Docket No. FWS-R7-ES-2024-0195, Policy and Regulations Branch, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, MS: PRB (JAO/3W), 5275 Leesburg Pike, Falls Church, VA 22041-3803.

We will post all comments at https://www.regulations.gov. You may request that we withhold personal identifying information from public review; however, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so. See Request for Public Comments for more information.

Information collection requirements: Written comments and suggestions on the information collection requirements should be submitted within 60 days of publication of this notice to https://www.reginfo.gov/​public/​do/​PRAMain. Find this particular information collection by selecting “Currently under Review—Open for Public Comments” or by using the search function. Please provide a copy of your comments to the FWS Information Collection Clearance Officer, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 5275 Leesburg Pike, MS: PRB (JAO/3W), Falls Church, VA 22041-3803 (mail); or [email protected] (email). Please reference “RIN 1018-BI08” in the subject line of your comments.