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I know that there are problems in connection with drilling offshore. 

 Every time I travel home. I fly over platforms in the Cook Inlet. Those 

 platforms are pumpinc^ oil to be sent to the industrial establishment 

 of this country, basically. If we pump oil from our Cook Inlet, which 

 is full of salmon, and we have taken the attendant risks of energy 

 production for the good of the Nation, then I think the people on the 

 Atlantic coast have to look at this, also. Where is the oil going to come 

 from? They have to look at it from the positive point of view of 

 whether we can get oil out of the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf 

 safely. Are there methods by which we can extract it without creating 

 unwarranted hazards to the people on the Atlantic coast? 



This assumes that someone should make a full investigation of the 

 environmental hazards attendant to this study. What about the posi- 

 tive side? Does the Senator not think that the National Academy of 

 Sciences could sa.y what could be done to overcome the hazards ? 



Mr. Pell. If the Senator from Alaska would like to modify the 

 amendment by inserting that phrase, it would be acceptable, or he may 

 prefer the amendment as originally submitted. 



Last Friday, in Boston, I had the honor of addressing a thousand 

 people interested in the marine and fishing industry, fishery resources, 

 from all over the country. Those on the Atlantic coast had very real 

 worriers about the impact of offshore oil drilling, and it was brought 

 up time and again in the course of the discussion. 



The amendment simply proposes a study by an independent group. 

 Such a study could do a great deal to help settle the fears in the minds 

 of many people in my part of the country. 



Mr. Stevens. I appreciate that concern. My State is the richest Sta/te 

 in t^rms of fishery resources. We have the constant problem in terms 

 of difficulties in developing other resources at the same time we ex- 

 amine the energy resources off shore. 



The courts have said that this Nation cannot develop the Louisiana 

 offshore leases at this time. The California development is stalled. At 

 the present time we have been stalled in the development of Alaska's 

 oil and gas resources. Yet, we have declining energy resources through- 

 out the interior of the United States. 



Naturally, anyone in the position of looking at this energy deficit — 

 which is not just creeping but which is overcoming us almost at the 

 speed of a rocket — is looldng at the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf 

 and saying. "Is it possible that there are oil not gas resources that could 

 be recovered without undue risk to the United States?" If the Senator 

 wants to study it from the positive point of view, in terms of whether 

 or not oil and gas resources are there and can be recovered safely. I 

 am in agreement. 



Mr. Pell. I assure the Senator from Alaska that we, too, have needs 

 for power in the Norltheast. We find ourselves crucified by the oil 

 import quota, system now, which prevents us from purchasing inex- 

 pensive foreign fuel oil. We have a stake in trying to get cheap power. 

 We have the most expensive power in the country because of the 

 crucifixion of our part of the country on the cross of oil import quotas. 



I hope that, just as the Senator from Alaska wanted a study con- 

 cerning his area, the Senator from Alaska could agree, as a matter of 

 comity, that this study be made for our part of the country. 



