233 



Additionally, the emplacement of nearby structures under foreign control could 

 cause apprehension because of potential interference with navigation, fishing, 

 recreation, submarine pipelines and cables, and military exercises. To illustrate 

 how substantial the disturbance might be, let me read to you an excerpt from 

 a description of activities ofE the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the United States. 

 As I read, imagine that a substantial number of foreign controlled drilling and 

 mining facilities were located in the area. 



. . . Around the entire length of the coastline, there is scarcely a square 

 mile that is not being used for some purpose and usually for more than 

 one purpose. The chief tenant is the Department of Defense, but not in every 

 case. There are bombing and gunnery ranges, test and calibration ranges, 

 carrier operating areas, submarine operating areas, torpedo firing ranges, 

 transit lanes, and vast and complicated underwater sound surveillance sys- 

 tems tied to each other and to the shore by a network of cables. On tiie 

 Atlantic and Pacific coasts there are also a great many more commercial 

 shipping routes than in the Gulf, and the number of clear days is meastir- 

 ably less. There are commercial cables, oyster beds, and fishing shoals to be 

 considered and a growing number of privately owned submersible craft op- 

 erating in the relatively shallow waters above the shelf . . . Tlie Continental 

 Shelf and the sea and air above it may give the appearance of being spacious 

 and empty, when in fact they are not. Far from being empty, the Shelf de- 

 serves to be called our Crowded Frontier.^ 

 The potential use of foreign controlled structures for covert espionage and 

 military purposes would also be unsettling to the adjacent coastal nations, par- 

 ticularly those with the least sea-watch capabilities of their own. 



Third, coastal states are likely to be more concerned about pollution hazards 

 from offshore facilities not under their jurisdiction than from facilities they 

 have authority to regulate. The prospect of a break in a high pressure submerged 

 oil pipeline where offshore winds prevail is enough to make any coastal nation 

 uneasy, particularly in view of the Torrey Canyon disaster. And it would not 

 be hard to understand anxiety about a possible rupture in a line such as that 

 currently planned for the Gulf of Mexico, which for a distance of more than 

 30 miles, will carry 150,000 barrels of crude oil per day. Similarly, consider the 

 likely attitude of coastal oystermen toward minerals dredging operations such as 

 those for tin-bearing sands off the coast of Indonesia where a single dredge is 

 capable of picking up and dumping 7.5 million tons of sediments per year. By 

 comparison, the annual average sediment discharge of the Sacramento River is 

 6 million tons. 



Fourth, the vesting in coastal nations of exclusive rights to all the seabottom 

 minerals in areas far offshore could frustrate for a very long time any attempt 

 to share the resources with less developed nations. 



Fifth, the drawing of undersea boundaries on the basis of sea floor topography 

 would result ia great disparities in sea floor ownership. The 200 meter isobath, 

 for example, would confirm a belt of submerged land ownership of 30 miles or 

 less to many nations of the Pacific Coast of North and South America ; over 200 

 miles to Argentina ; perhaps SOO miles to Russia in the East Siberian Sea. North 

 Sea nations recognized this problem by dividing the bottom to give Norway its 

 share based on equidistance rather than by insisting that the Norwegian Deep 

 cut Norway short. 



In addition, there are substantial problems of drawing boundaries based on 

 bottom relief. The Pacific coastal lands off most of North and South America, for 

 example, have much the same irregular relief as upland coastal ranges — high 

 mountains, deep canyons, steep ridges. The plotting of boundaries from such 

 points on land would be a difficult enterprise. To draw international boundaries 

 from such underwater irregularities is likely to be even more difficult and hap- 

 hazardous. Moreover, the delays inherent in the process might deter minerals 

 exploitation because of uncertainty of sovereignty over the lands. 



Sixth, proposals to vest an international body with ownership of ocean bottom 

 minerals will have to address themselves to basic questions of minerals and 

 natural resource management. Since the Department of the Interior has had very 

 wide experience in this field, let me sketch some of the problems to be faced. 



At the outset it will have to be decided whether the international regime will 

 have authority to withhold areas from exploration and development. Under our 



1 U.S. Department of the Interior, Petroleum Production, Drilling and Leasing on the 

 Continental Shelf, May 1966, p. 20. 



