Continuation of Non-Lethal Trial of SMART Drumline for an Additional 12 Months

Overview

The purpose of the proposal aims to continue to catch, tag, relocate and release white sharks to better understand their movements following release.  A range of tiger sharks and mako sharks will also be satellite and acoustic tagged as part of this proposal.

This proposal is for the continuation of the SMART (Shark Management Alert in Real Time) drumline trial for an additional 12 months (until May 2021).

The trial extension will provide additional data to assist in determining the effectiveness of the SMART drumline as a non-lethal shark hazard mitigation option.

The trial will continue with the use of the 10 drumlines positioned 500 m offshore along an 11.5 kilometre stretch of coast near Gracetown, south-west Australia.

The initial proposal is from February 2019 to May 2020 and information on this proposal is available from http://www.epa.wa.gov.au/proposals/non-lethal-trial-smart-drumlines.

White sharks are listed as ‘Vulnerable’ and are protected by both State and Commonwealth legislation.

Why your views matter

At this initial stage of the EIA process, comment is simply sought on whether or not the EPA should assess a proposal and, if so, what level of assessment is considered appropriate.

What happens next

Following the seven day public comment period and consideration of any comments received, the EPA will decide whether or not this proposal requires environmental impact assessment and, if so, what level of assessment will be applied.

The EPA's decisions on level of assessment are released each Monday on the EPA's website.