NATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHIC PROGRAM LEGISLATION 455 



Mr, Casey. I think that is true. I think some of the gentlemen who 

 have appeared before this committee have the feeling that possibly 

 everything would be taken away from them. I do not think that would 

 be true. 



Dr. Kavanagh. I do not have that feeling. We have had the ex- 

 perience of dealing with other agencies and we find they want us to 

 remain active in parts of their activities which involve nuclear energy. 



Mr. Casey. You are in the water desalination program. The In- 

 terior Department is also concerned with that, is it not ? 



Dr. Kavanagh. Yes, we work very closely with the Department of 

 the Interior. Our interests are in the possible application of nuclear 

 energy to making large reactors which would provide heat to desali- 

 nate water, possibly in combination with the production of electrical 

 power. 



Mr. Casey. Was that particular problem assigned to you by the 

 Interior Department ? 



Dr. Kavanagh. No, sir. I would say from what I know of its 

 development that it developed on our initiative, but with discussions 

 and agreement with people in Interior. 



Mr. Casey. By the same token, you do not feel the Interior Depart- 

 ment should be excluded, do you ? 



Dr. Kavanagh. No, sir, we work together. 



Mr. Casey. Of course, they have a problem to solve and your 

 agency is one that is in the forefront of the new energy field, atomic 

 energy, and you dovetail right into the overall problem we have of 

 trying to get water to the people. 



Dr. Kavanagh. That is ri^ht, sir. 



Mr. Casey. Doctor, I think your comments have been very con- 

 structive and very helpful. 



Dr. Kavanagh. Could I say one more thing, Mr. Chairman ? Since 

 we prepared the statement and made the general comment on the 

 security feature, we have been studying it even more carefully, and 

 we have found two details which I think could be described as flaws 

 in the actual provisions in these bills. As I said, they were taken from 

 the Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958. 



Apparently, in copying it something was left out in the first part, 

 one of the first phrases in these new bills. Let me read one. This 

 happens to be S. 944. It says : 



The Atomic Energy Commiasion may authorize any of its employees or em- 

 ployees of any contractor or prospective contractor, licensee or prospective licensee 

 of the Atomic Energy Commission * * * under subsection 145b of the Atomic 

 Energy Act * * *. 



There are some words left out between the words "Atomic Energy 

 Commission" and "under subsection 145b." In the Space Act itself, 

 at that point it says "or any other person authorized to have access 

 to restricted data by the Atomic Energy Commission." 



The subsection referred to is not the one under which we license 

 people, as would be indicated by the oceanography bills. The omission 

 of those words, in fact, does change the meaning. So, if you do put 

 this in, that ought to be corrected. 



The other problem is that the Space Act inserted a statement that 

 people certified under this provision would be able to exchange infor- 

 mation with people in the Defense Department, because otherwise they 



