89 



would serve only to delay completion of the process of upgrading 

 present practices. 



This kind of review process would perhaps make more sense and 

 be more constructive where it is proposed to designate a brand new 

 ocean dump site which was never dumped at before and was not 

 simply taking the place of a nearby historical dump site. 



Point five, something more needs to be done to redress the imbal- 

 ance created by the so-called balancing analysis mandated by a 

 single judge at the lowest level of the Federal judiciary in the city 

 of New York litigation. The problem is that the ocean is usually so 

 much cheaper than any competing disposal alternative that any 

 analysis that gives a premium to economic cost will invariably 

 favor ocean dumping. 



The ocean will lose every time. The user fees incorporated in the 

 Hughes-Forsythe proposals represent a commendable effort to ad- 

 dress this. But even if a sufficient fee schedule were enacted into 

 law it would still remain politically attractive in many cases to 

 avoid antagonizing voters by use of land-based disposal, instead of 

 going to the ocean which harbors very few voters. 



We would therefore advocate strongly an amendment which 

 would make clear that the dominant factor to be considered in as- 

 sessing the suitability of sludge or any other waste for ocean dump- 

 ing is the resultant harm to the environment and human health. 

 An alternative's costs should play a decisive role only where all 

 other factors were equal. 



Harmful ocean dumping must once again become a last rather 

 than a first resort disposal option. 



Six, there needs to be an amendment prohibiting or significantly 

 constraining the ocean dumping of contaminated sewage sludge 

 from sources not currently engaged in this practice. Fully 96 per- 

 cent of all U.S. sewage sludge is currently managed or disposed of 

 by means other than dumping or discharge into the ocean. We 

 ought to be encouraging pretreatment and other steps to decon- 

 taminate sludges in the first place and sound management rather 

 than dumping or dispersal in the second instance. 



Finally, as we testified on May 12 in indicating our support for 

 the Breaux-Forsythe hazardous waste bill, H.R. 1700, ocean dump- 

 ing and dumping in landfills are short-term palliatives. They solve 

 nothing but merely transfer risks and costs to those downstream or 

 down current and to the future. It is far less costly in the long run, 

 both economically and environmentally, to deal effectively with 

 contaminated wastes at the very outset once and for all. 



In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, EPA Administrator William Ruck- 

 elshaus, when he first held that position a dozen years ago, told 

 this committee that in administering the ocean dumping law EPA 

 would be guided by the objective of "terminating all ocean dump- 

 ing which is damaging to the marine environment," including the 

 expeditious discontinuation of sewage sludge ocean dumping with 

 no new sources of such dumping allowed. 



These objectives and the concerns which motivated them were 

 appropriate in 1971 and they remain so now. 



Thank you. 



[The statement of Mr. Kamlet follows:] 



28-914 O— 84 7 



