462 



ophy in our laws and our policy that the ocean is definitely not the 

 place to dump, if for no other reason than we don't know what's 

 going to happen there. It is an environment in which things tend 

 to move around and combine and react in a way that we truly 

 don't understand. Therefore, the policies have been aimed at land 

 disposal as an area that we know something about. 



That's a rough estimate of Government policy as contained in 

 the statutes passed since 1970. My view is that as we learn more 

 about the dangers of land disposal, and the kinds of things that can 

 occur with land disposal, whether it's related to ground water 

 pollution, which is a serious problem that we are slowly awakening 

 to, then the ocean itself will be looked at, for no other reason than 

 the uncertainty of what will happen. Let me put it another way: 

 We may know more about the problems in land disposal than we 

 know about the problems of ocean disposal and it will come to be 

 looked upon as a better medium, for no other reason than that. 



In other words, uncertainty, and how we resolve questions of 

 uncertainty, may end up having people focus on the ocean. There 

 are really two schools of thought in this debate. We have debated 

 this issue, and we sponsored a conference just this summer. There 

 will be articles coming out in a journal from Woods Hole which 

 will set out the two points of view. 



One will say that yes, we can dump more in the ocean; the other 

 will say no, we can't. That debate I believe may very well carry 

 itself into a national debate involving legislation. I think the in- 

 creased interest in ocean disposal is simply reflective of the chang- 

 ing view of where we are going to put all this stuff we don't want 

 around. I perceive the ocean will be looked upon as a disposal 

 place. 



Mr. Studds. I do, too. I think it's clear that is happening. 



We had an agency, as you just heard, scurrying about preparing 

 regulations looking toward the permitting of the future ocean 

 dumping of low-level wastes. I was just fishing for the sense if that 

 was entirely for reasons with respect to the environmental conse- 

 quences of land disposal, or whether there are other related politi- 

 cal consequences of land disposal. 



Mr. Walsh. I think it's a combination. Congressman, of what we 

 know scientifically, of economic issues, of regulatory issues, of polit- 

 ical questions. Obviously, Three Mile Island has changed every- 

 body's attitude toward whether they want any wastes in their back 

 yard. South Carolina and Washington State are now being very 

 dubious about something that they didn't seem to be concerned 

 about previously. 



Mr. Studds. Although they're clearly perfectly logical places for 

 such things. [Laughter.] 



Mr. Walsh. In any event, our pitch from NOAA — and I personal- 

 ly believe this very strongly — is that it would be a mistake not to 

 do the research and try to understand what's going to happen, 

 because in the face of uncertainty a lot of bad decisions can and 

 will be made, paralleling the one people made 100 years ago that 

 open sewers were fine and healthy. 



Mr. Studds. Please don't keep reminding us of that. 



