487 



Prepared Statement of Kelly Rigg 



On behalf of the 400,000 Greenpeace supporters in the 

 United States, I vrould like to thank you for the opportunity 

 to testify today. First, I will address the topic of the 

 Georges Bank Biological Task Force and Monitoring Progran with 

 respect to its role in the Outer Continental Shelf (CCS) planning 

 process, and secondly I will address the issue of balancing 

 environmental risks with fluctuating resource potential esti- 

 mates. 



The Georges Bank Biological Task Force and Monitoring Pro- 

 gram was established as the result of the first round of the 

 struggle to protect Georges Bank from irrprudent development under 

 lease sale 42, and was designed to determine the effects and 

 inpacts of drilling on tracts leased under that sale. Our limi- 

 ted knowledge of the environmental properties existing out on the 

 Bank was to be expanded to include the various mechanisms trans- 

 porting the pollutants created by exploratory drilling into 

 the sediments and tissues of the flora and fauna found in the 

 lease sale area. Indeed, the studies were designed only to look 

 at the actual iirpacts of drilling; predrilling baseline data 

 was collected shortly before drilling began, and studies were 

 meant to examine very specific possible effects. Sane of the work 

 in progress being conducted in laboratories under other studies 

 programs were discontinued in light of the new program. Osten- 

 sibly, the Georges Bank Biological Task Force was to uncover new 

 information in order to allow more informed decision-making, 

 providing better resource management. But this method of studying 

 the biological characteristics has encountered severe shortcomings. 



The most fatal flaw in the way the program is now designed 

 concerns the timing of the studies with respect to the OCS planning 

 process. We are only now seeing the results of the studies done 

 during the first year of drilling under lease sale 42. Obviously, 

 studies were not corrpleted before lease sale 42 was held, and 

 had lease sale 52 not been fought and prevented, the studies 

 would not have been oonplete before that sale was held. And now, 

 with the planning for lease sale 82 in full swing, the outcone of 

 the studies will not have been included in this planning process 

 either. With lease sales scheduled to take place every two years, 

 it is obvious that Interior has never had any intention of actually 

 using these studies to develop wise resource managanent policies. 

 Undoubtedly, though, the Department of Interior will proceed with 

 its accelerated leasing plan for the North Atlantic, and use the 

 preliminary conclusions from these studies, which to date have 

 found no substantial damage, as a justification for continuing on 



