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the Secretary of State's Advisory Committee on the Law of the Sea and have 

 presented views on U.S. policy regarding the Law of the Sea regime. 



Before addressing tlie substance of the Convention, Mr. Chairman, I would 

 like to express the deep appreciation of my clients for your pervasive interest 

 in, and concern about, marine pollution issues. Too many members of Congress 

 have assigned low priority to the ocean environment ; you and your .staff, on 

 the other hand, have played a significant and influential role in the formulation 

 of U.S. policy. We depend on your objective involvement, and we thank you for it. 



I. Ct^RRENT STATUS OF THE COXVENTIOJf 



As you know, the Convention, which was released in its Fifth and Final Draft 

 version in March of 1973, would (1) establish discharge limitations for oil, 

 chemicals, hazardous substances in packages or containers, sewage and wastes 

 from ships; (2) impose ship design and construction requirements to ensure 

 that such limitations are met ; and (3) provide hopefully, for enforcement against 

 violators by affected '"port" and "coastal" states as well as by "flag" states. 



The United States is now in the process of preparing formal comments on the 

 Fifth Draft of the Convention to be circulated to other IMCO members no later 

 than June 30. The international conference at which the terms of the final Con- 

 vention will be hammered out is scheduled to be convened the beginning of 

 October in London. We understand that it is the intention of the Government to 

 issue an environmental impact statement regarding the proposed Convention 

 prior to August 1;j. Thus, the next few months will be very busy ones during 

 which the final United States negotiating positions for the October confei-ence 

 will be developed and during which, for the first time, the public at large will 

 have an opportunity to become involved in the formulation of United States 

 policy with regard to international regulation of ship-generated pollution.' 



Ship-generated oil pollution is clearly the most important environmental 

 problem treated in the Convention. More than 45% of the annual 5 million 

 tons of oil injected into the oceans from all sources can be attributed to ship 

 operations, including operations of tankers, tank barges and non-oil carrying 

 vessels. If. as is exr>ected, imports of petroleum products grow, the amounts 

 of oil pollution will tend to grow proportionately, and the tbreats to the 

 United States coastline will be magnified. These threats, as this Committee 

 knows well, are not just tho.se associated with massive spills engendered by 

 tanker accidents such as that of the Torrey Canyon, but also result simply 

 from the normal ballasting, deballasting and tank cleaning operations of oil 

 tankers, which account for approximately 70% of tanker-generated pollution. 



The Convention has the potential for substantially reducing the risks of 

 pollution by oil and other harmful substances. In theory, its purpose, as 

 expres.scd in the Preamble, and as expressed in Resolution A.237(A'II) adopted 

 by the IMCO Assembly on October 12, 1971, is to achieve "the complete elimina- 

 tion of intentional pollution by oil and other harmful substances and the minimi- 

 zation of accidental discharge of such substances," by 1975, if possible, but 

 definitely by 1980. However, if it is to achieve this goal it must provide for 

 stringent and broadly applicable international standards. Most importantly, we 

 believe that, if the Convention is to be acceptable to the environmental com- 

 munity, it must establish discharge criteria for polluting substances, reinforced 

 by strict design and construction standards, which will work a real and sub- 

 stantial improvement in the marine environment. As presently proposed, how- 

 ever, the Convention appears to do little more than codify existing conmiercial 

 standards among the major maritime nations, provides no incentive to iniijrovo 

 such standards, and offers insufficient environmental protection. 



With respect to ship-generated oil pollution, there is no question, that the 

 means are available to eliminate the intentional discharge problem. Unfortu- 

 nately, they are not reflected adequately in the fifth draft of the Convention. 

 We believe that, from an environmental standpoint, imposition of a uniform, 

 no-discharge standard for all types of oil, accomplished through the requirement 

 of incoriK) ration of a segregated ballast/double bottom system, is a fundamental 

 refjuirement for an effective Convention. 



In addition to the fundamental need for adequate discharge and design 

 standards, there are two other basic areas of concern which we have about 



^ We are now In the process of preparing comprehensive comments on the fifth draft 

 which should be ready within the next few days, and I request the Committee's permission 

 to submit these comments for the record as an attachment to this testimony. 



