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Captain CousTEAU. Very little. 
Mr. Huaues. Have you ever had occasion to study the New York 
Bight apex we hear so much about? 
Captain CousTEAU. Never, sir. 
Mr. HuGues. One of the statistics that this committee used in 
1977, when we composed the ban on all harmful ocean dumping 
after December 31, 1981, was a General Accounting Office study 
which was furnished to the Congress. The report, forwarded by the 
Comptroller General, dated January 21, 1977, outlined some of the 
substances contained in the sludge. It observed that the sludge con- 
tained cadmium or mercury that exceeded by more than 100 times 
the established safety level. 
Captain CousTEAU. I read this paper. 
Mr. Huaues. I wonder if you have found any areas around the 
globe that contain substances such as—mercury and cadmium—in 
such high concentration in any area? 
Captain CousTEAu. No. We have data about all the heavy metals 
in the Mediterranean and in the southern coast of the Caribbean 
that we took ourselves. We took samples, and they were analyzed 
by the U.N. Intercalibration Laboratory, so we know what we are 
talking about, and we have never had anything of that high a 
level. 
Mr. HuGues. One of the proposals in your draft study, you made 
some comment on phasing out all dumping at the 12-mile site off 
the New Jersey coast and the New York Bight after December 31, 
1982. Do you find that is something that you would support or rec- 
ommend? 
Captain CousTEAu. The 31st of December, 1981, has passed. 
Mr. HuGueEs. 1982. 
Captain CousTEAu. You switched one more year? 
Mr. HuGuHEs. Yes. 
Captain CousTEAvu. That is wise. 
Mr. HuGues. We have a very difficult situation. The fact is that 
we have gone beyond the ban. 
Captain CousTEAu. My answer to this is that we have to be pru- 
dent but realistic. If I had the decision on such an issue, I would 
only recommend a date after I would have made sure that all the 
data would be collected and the alternate technologies would be 
ready before I put the cities in trouble. You have to have a solu- 
tion. 
Mr. Hucues. That is the difficult thing about setting a deadline: 
you have to develop alternatives. Because ocean dumping is so 
cheap, it is often easy for municipalities to let those commitments 
slide, because they have major problems and limited resources. 
Sewage sludge is just one of their problems. 
Captain CousTEAu. Some people have proposed a tax per ton of 
sludge dumped in order to finance the necessary research on the 
alternative techniques. It is the second best solution. The best solu- 
tion would be that the Federal Government takes it over, but if it 
does not, I would favor that one. 
Mr. Hucues. One of the things you touched on, suggested by our 
chairman, was that insofar as the state of the technology, what we 
understand about the long-term impact of dumping, studies have 
shown that many of the marine organisms have accumulated vi- 
