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Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
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THE OIL SPILL RECOVERY INSTITUTE

PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

Committee to Review the Oil Spill Recovery Institute’s Research Program

Polar Research Board

Ocean Studies Board

NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES

THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS
Washington, D.C. www.nap.edu

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
×

THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS
500 Fifth Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20001

NOTICE: The project that is the subject of this report was approved by the Governing Board of the National Research Council, whose members are drawn from the councils of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine. The members of the committee responsible for the report were chosen for their special competences and with regard for appropriate balance.

This study was supported by Contract/Grant No. 01-01-23 between the National Academy of Sciences and the Oil Spill Recovery Institute. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the organizations or agencies that provided support for the project.

International Standard Book Number: 0-309-08514-4

Copies of this report are available from:

Polar Research Board

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Additional copies of this report are available from the
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Cover: Photo of the Prince William Sound in Alaska. Photo courtesy of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council. Design by Michele de la Menardiere of the National Academies Press.

Copyright 2003 by the National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.

Printed in the United States of America.

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
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THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES

Advisers to the Nation on Science, Engineering, and Medicine

The National Academy of Sciences is a private, nonprofit, self-perpetuating society of distinguished scholars engaged in scientific and engineering research, dedicated to the furtherance of science and technology and to their use for the general welfare. Upon the authority of the charter granted to it by the Congress in 1863, the Academy has a mandate that requires it to advise the federal government on scientific and technical matters. Dr. Bruce M. Alberts is president of the National Academy of Sciences.

The National Academy of Engineering was established in 1964, under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences, as a parallel organization of outstanding engineers. It is autonomous in its administration and in the selection of its members, sharing with the National Academy of Sciences the responsibility for advising the federal government. The National Academy of Engineering also sponsors engineering programs aimed at meeting national needs, encourages education and research, and recognizes the superior achievements of engineers. Dr. Wm. A. Wulf is president of the National Academy of Engineering.

The Institute of Medicine was established in 1970 by the National Academy of Sciences to secure the services of eminent members of appropriate professions in the examination of policy matters pertaining to the health of the public. The Institute acts under the responsibility given to the National Academy of Sciences by its congressional charter to be an adviser to the federal government and, upon its own initiative, to identify issues of medical care, research, and education. Dr. Harvey V. Fineberg is president of the Institute of Medicine.

The National Research Council was organized by the National Academy of Sciences in 1916 to associate the broad community of science and technology with the Academy’s purposes of furthering knowledge and advising the federal government. Functioning in accordance with general policies determined by the Academy, the Council has become the principal operating agency of both the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering in providing services to the government, the public, and the scientific and engineering communities. The Council is administered jointly by both Academies and the Institute of Medicine. Dr. Bruce M. Alberts and Dr. Wm. A. Wulf are chair and vice chair, respectively, of the National Research Council.

www.national-academies.org

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
×

COMMITTEE TO REVIEW THE OIL SPILL RECOVERY INSTITUTE’S RESEARCH PROGRAM

MAHLON C. KENNICUTT, II, Chair,

Texas A&M University, College Station

BRENDA BALLACHEY,

U.S. Geological Survey, Anchorage, Alaska

JOAN BRADDOCK,

University of Alaska, Fairbanks

AKHIL DATTA-GUPTA,

Texas A&M University, College Station

DEBORAH FRENCH MCCAY,

Applied Science Associates, Naragansett, Rhode Island

JERRY NEFF,

Battelle Memorial Institute, Duxbury, Massachusetts

JAMES PAYNE,

Payne Environmental Consultants, Inc., Encinitas, California

JAMES RAY,

Shell Global Solutions, Inc., Houston, Texas

WILLIAM SACKINGER,

OBELISK Hydrocarbons, Ltd., Fairbanks, Alaska

Staff

CHRIS ELFRING, Director,

Polar Research Board

DAN WALKER, Senior Staff Officer,

Ocean Studies Board

ANN CARLISLE, Administrative Associate

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
×

POLAR RESEARCH BOARD

ROBIN BELL,

Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Palisades, New York

MARY ALBERT,

Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, Hanover, New Hampshire

RICHARD B. ALLEY,

Pennsylvania State University, University Park

AKHIL DATTA-GUPTA,

Texas A&M University, College Station

GEORGE DENTON,

University of Maine, Orono

HENRY P. HUNTINGTON,

Huntington Consulting, Eagle River, Alaska

DAVID KARL,

University of Hawaii, Manoa

MAHLON C. KENNICUTT, II,

Texas A&M University, College Station (ex-officio)

AMANDA LYNCH,

University of Colorado, Boulder

W. BERRY LYONS,

Byrd Polar Research Center, Columbus, Ohio

ROBIE MACDONALD,

Fisheries and Oceans, Canada, Institute of Ocean Sciences, British Columbia

MILES MCPHEE,

McPhee Research Company, Naches, Washington

ROBERT RUTFORD,

University of Texas, Dallas (ex-officio)

CAROLE L. SEYFRIT,

Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia

PATRICK WEBBER,

Michigan State University, East Lansing (ex-officio)

OCEAN STUDIES BOARD

NANCY RABALAIS (Chair),

Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, Chauvin

ARTHUR BAGGEROER,

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge

JAMES COLEMAN,

Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge

LARRY CROWDER,

Duke University, Beaufort, North Carolina

G. BRENT DALRYMPLE,

Oregon State University, Corvalis

RICHARD B. DERISO,

Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla , California

EARL DOYLE,

Shell Oil (Retired), Sugar Land, Texas

ROBERT DUCE,

Texas A&M University, College Station

WAYNE R. GEYER,

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Massachusetts

D. JAY GRIMES,

University of Southern Mississippi, Ocean Springs

MIRIAM KASTNER,

Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California

CINDY LEE,

State University of New York at Stony Brook

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
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RALPH S. LEWIS,

Connecticut Geological Survey, Hartford

BONNIE MCCAY,

Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey

JULIAN P. McCREARY, JR.,

University of Hawaii, Honolulu

JACQUELINE MICHEL,

Research Planning, Inc., Columbus, South Carolina

RAM MOHAN,

Gahagan & Bryant Associates, Inc., Baltimore, Maryland

SCOTT NIXON,

University of Rhode Island, Narragansett

JON SUTINEN,

University of Rhode Island, Kingston

NANCY TARGETT,

University of Delaware, Lewes

PAUL TOBIN,

Xtria, Chantilly, Virginia

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
×

Preface

The Oil Spill Recovery Institute (OSRI) is a small organization based in Cordova, Alaska, but it has a large task. Established as part of the Oil Spill Prevention Act of 1990, it was charged to identify and develop methods to deal with oil spills in Arctic and subarctic environments and work to better understand the long-range effects of oil spills on the natural resources of Prince William Sound and its adjacent waters, including the environment, economy, and people. It is a small program, disbursing about $1 million each year. But it works in a critical and challenging area: helping the nation prepare for oil spills in cold regions.

The committee conducted this review much like a visiting committee review of a university program. Our nine members traveled to Alaska in February 2002 to gain an understanding of the program, its mission, and its research and technology projects. We talked frankly with the Advisory Board, scientists, and staff about the accomplishments and challenges of the program. We distributed a call for input by email and received comments from others who knew the program, and this information, although anecdotal, gave the committee broad insights into how the community perceives the OSRI program and helped us formulate our conclusions. We reviewed as many documents as we could in the time available to us: the Grant Policy Manual, sample calls for proposals, sample proposals, meeting minutes, and many other reports. Finally, we sent numerous sets of questions to the OSRI staff as we dug deeper into the program, to be sure that we understood what they did and how they did it. We then held two writing meetings, where we reviewed materials, deliberated, and wrote the final report. This report is not intended to be a

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Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
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project-by-project review of OSRI activities, but instead is a broad assessment of the program’s strengths and weaknesses, with special emphasis on whether the activities supported are addressing the OSRI mission, whether the processes used are sound, and whether the research and technology projects are of high quality.

Many people provided important information to our committee as we prepared this report. In particular, the committee would like to thank Dr. Gary Thomas, Director of the Oil Spill Recovery Institute, for his insights. Special thanks go to Ms. Nancy Bird and the other OSRI staff for their diligence and patience in responding to our requests for information. We also want to thank Dr. John Calder, current chair of the OSRI Advisory Board, for his leadership and all of the members of the Advisory Board and the Scientific and Technical Committee for their input.

On behalf of the entire committee, I want to express our appreciation to the Polar Research Board’s staff, Chris Elfring and Ann Carlisle, and Dan Walker from the Ocean Studies Board. Their guidance kept us on track. Finally, let me add a word of thanks to the committee’s members. This was a talented and thoughtful group, and they showed an exceptional ability to work together as a team. We hope that our report and recommendations provide the guidance requested as OSRI moves into its second five years of existence.

MAHLON (CHUCK) KENNICUTT, II, Chair

Committee to Review the Oil Spill Recovery Institute’s Research Program

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
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Acknowledgments

This report has been reviewed in draft form by individuals chosen for their diverse perspectives and technical expertise, in accordance with procedures approved by the NRC’s Report Review Committee. The purpose of this independent review is to provide candid and critical comments that will assist the institution in making its published report as sound as possible and to ensure that the report meets institutional standards for objectivity, evidence, and responsiveness to the study charge. The review comments and draft manuscript remain confidential to protect the integrity of the deliberative process. We wish to thank the following individuals for their review of this report:

Karl Turekian, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut

Amanda Lynch, University of Colorado, Boulder

Edward Brown, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls

Judy McDowell, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Massachusetts

Mike Castellini, University of Alaska, Fairbanks

Cort Cooper, Chevron Petroleum Technology, San Ramone, California

Merv Fingas, Environment Canada, Ottawa, Ontario

Terri Paluszkiewicz, National Science Foundation, Arlington, Virginia

Although the reviewers listed above have provided many constructive comments and suggestions, they were not asked to endorse the conclusions or recommendations nor did they see the final draft of the report

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
×

before its release. The review of this report was overseen by Dr. Garry Brewer of Yale University. Appointed by the National Research Council, he was responsible for making certain that an independent examination of this report was carried out in accordance with institutional procedures and that all review comments were carefully considered. Responsibility for the final content of this report rests entirely with the authoring committee and the institution.

Suggested Citation:"Front Matter." National Research Council. 2003. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute: Past, Present, and Future Directions. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10643.
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As a result of the 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill in Prince William Sound, Congress passed the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA 90), and within that legislation, the Oil Spill Recovery Institute (OSRI) was born. This report assesses the strength and weaknesses of this research program, with emphasis on whether the activities supported to date address the OSRI mission, whether the processes used are sound, and whether the research and technology development projects are of high quality

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