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pants are optimistic that they will eventually bring constructive suggestions to the 
Convention on the Law of the Sea. 
The public, too, has made a positive contribution in the act of becoming educated. 
People have abandoned the misconception that the ocean is immense. Of course it is 
known that the oceans cover two thirds of the globe. The average depth, four kilo- 
meters, appears immense on the human scale; but on a world scale it is minute. The 
dimensions of the ocean have been reduced by the dimensions of industry and 
human enterprise. 
Despite these efforts and new awareness, we as citizens continue to face a serious 
situation. Governments are considering an intensification of the dumping of radioac- 
tive wastes. Millions of tons of sewage sludge continue to be dumped into the sea 
each year, with levels of cadmium and mercury that exceed the “safe” amounts. 
Most of this waste is dumped directly onto the continental shelf, where a consider- 
able proportion of marine life reproduces. 
It is true that ocean waters have a certain capacity to cleanse themselves, with 
the help of sunlight, chemical reactions and bacteria, but they have no ability what- 
soever to neutralize some extremely stable toxins. They accumulate timelessly, ever 
adding to the poisons of the sea. Plankton absorbs some of them. Sea creatures feed- 
ing on plankton concentrate the poisons until man, the supreme predator, becomes 
the final victim. 
Ocean dumping, once a tradition with no long-lasting effects or irreversible dam- 
ages for the environment, can no longer be considered an insignificant act, due to 
the formidable changes in man’s activities and industries. 
Major coastal cities throughout the world have a particularly difficult problem. 
They have grown up relying on the ability of coastal waters to accept their discards. 
We must temporarily consider the political and economic difficulties faced by the 
leaders of these cities as they seek reasonable solutions to what is, in reality, a prob- 
lem resulting from relatively recent understanding of the potential harm such prac- 
tices indefinitely might bring about. 
As an internationally focused organization, The Cousteau Society defers to the 
more specific expertise of scientific and public policy interests in these particular 
cases. However, as decisions are made whether to institutionalize such dumping to 
accommodate future growth, the use of the oceans—and indeed, dispersal of wastes 
into any facet of the environment—must be subjected to the same careful consider- 
ations I am outlining here. Continuation of present dumping practices, as with all 
waste dispersal, must be considered a transient solution pending the technological 
and economic availability of alternatives. 
The approach to be taken and the questions to be addressed today are far from 
being completely understood. They require very careful, responsible, as well as prag- 
matic, consideration. 
Dumping practices should be governed by many concerns: How a substance affects 
living marine organisms and their reproductive capacity; how a substance will affect 
the humans that ingest contaminated sea creatures; how a waste will react with 
other chemicals and chemical compounds in the ocean (synergistic effects); whether 
the waste will interfere with the ocean’s ability to produce materials such as phyto- 
plankton, the foundation of its food chain; the impact a waste will have on recre- 
ational areas and other traditional uses. Of utmost and often unpredictable impor- 
tance is the relationship between ocean conditions and the toxicity of a substance 
that might, on its own, be harmless. 
Given the present state of knowledge, no one can answer all of these questions. 
Thus The Cousteau Society takes two firm positions: First, substances capable of 
causing irrevocable damages (non-degradable toxic compounds) should be flatly pro- 
hibited. These substances are enumerated on “black lists’; then, substances produc- 
ing transient consequences perhaps can be tolerated under carefully examined cir- 
cumstances until such time as techniques are developed to recycle them economical- 
ly, to render such products less harmful, or to substitute for them altogether. These 
compounds are comprised in a “gray list’. Both lists are appended to the various 
international conventions addressing ocean disposal of wastes. 
In developing the “black” and “gray” lists, marine experts find that in many 
cases, adequate information is not available today. 
The Cousteau Society supports the spirit expressed in the legislation being offered 
by Congressman D’Amours. This represents continued progress in the right direc- 
ion. 
Those who have discussed waste legislation have offered various suggestions that I 
would like to consider here. Some have proposed postponing the deadline for prohib- 
iting hazardous waste disposal until research better defines how hazardous some 
dumpings can be. We agree that it is essential that research efforts be intensified in 
