442 NATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHIC PROGRAM LEGISLATION 



My information, which I think can be confirmed, also from the appro- 

 priate agency of the Department of the Interior, is that there is 

 consideration now of the lease of a piece of land in 1,000 fathoms 

 of water for drilling to an oil company. 



So, I think we can afford to invest heavily in investigation of the 

 Continental Shelf, and we will also make money by doing sio as a 

 government, quite aside from the effect of this on the economy. 



I point out another realization that has come to us from working 

 with the science of the sea in the postwar period, that is, the intimate 

 relationship between air and ocean in the formation of climate. Most 

 of the energy which drives the lower atmosphere, which creates the 

 wind which transports waters from the ocean inland for rain comes 

 into the lower atmosphere from the ocean. Most of this energy, while 

 it derives ultimately from the sun, is stored in the energy reservoir 

 of the ocean and transported hither and thither by the ocean and 

 radiates back into the atmosphere to provide the great energies re- 

 quired for the movementof these air masses and moisture. 



This has been recognized recently by Presidential Order No. 2 of 

 1965 setting up the Environmental Science Service Administration 

 in the Department of Commerce. I thing this was a tremendously 

 important step, but only a first step, and that further amalgamations 

 of activity of this nature within the Federal Government structure will 

 })e required, as I will point out a little further down the line, before 

 we can adequately predict both land and ocean climate. 



We require to know the ocean better. We require to understand 

 ocean climate better in order to understand the air climate. In order 

 to know what is going to happen weatherwise in the interior of the 

 continent, we must know what is going on in the South Pacific, and 

 so forth. 



I could expand on that to a considerable extent, but will just make 

 the flat statement this morning. 



Let us come from the general consideration of the problems down to 

 what we are talking about — the legislation. Do we have an effective 

 apparatus within the executive branch of the Government to improve 

 our posture in these matters ? I think the answer is clearly "No," or 

 we would not be considering such a variety of legislation to attend 

 to this problem. We have our ocean activities split into about 22 

 bureaus and offices in 5 executive departments and 3 independent 

 agencies. They report by rather roundabout mechanisms to approxi- 

 mately 32 committees and subcommittees of Congress. 



I do not think it would be practically possible to devise a worse ad- 

 ministrative mess for handling a subject than this, and I have left 

 aside the additional factor that we carry on ocean activities as well 

 through about 25 international agencies in a substantial manner, which 

 are scarcely integrated at all into these agencies to which I have just 

 referred in the executive branch. 



We have correlation effectuated, to the extent that it is, by the 

 Interagency Committee on Oceanography, Before saying anything 

 about ICO, I want to state clearly that I am well acquainted with the 

 people involved, from the chairman down, and admire them tre- 

 mendously. I think we haA^e a group of ocean-acquainted people that 

 cannot be beat, to my knowledge, in the world, and I am acquainted 



