Council resumes Washington efforts on escorts issue
By STAN JONES, Director of External Affairs
Efforts by the citizens’ council to get federal legislation that would preserve double tug escorts in Prince William Sound moved to the back burner for much of the summer as Congress took its August recess.
Now, with Congress having reconvened on Sept. 8, the council’s Legislative Affairs Committee is back at work on the escorts issue with plans being developed for a trip to Washington by council representatives this fall, possibly by mid-October.
The purpose would be to visit the offices of the Alaska Congressional delegation and other members of Congress to urge them to move the legislation this fall.
The legislation has been before Congress since mid-May, when it was introduced by Alaska Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Mark Begich. Congressman Young is expected to help attach a similar provision to legislation in the House.
The bill, known as S. 1041, would amend the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 to place double-hulled tankers under the same double-escort requirement that already applies to single-hull tankers.
The key passage of the bill says, “The requirement...relating to single hulled tankers in Prince William Sound, Alaska...shall apply to double hulled tankers...”
The Oil Pollution Act requires double escorts for single-hulled tankers, but is silent on the question of escorts for double-hulled tankers. The Act also requires a phase-out of single-hulled tankers by 2015, leading to the council’s concern the escort system might be discontinued or cut back without legislation to preserve it.
Double-hulled tankers, which have several feet of protective space between their two hulls, can prevent or reduce some oil spills, but are not a cure-all. The Coast Guard estimated a double hull on the Exxon Valdez could have cut the oil outflow from its grounding on Bligh Reef in 1989 from 11 million gallons to 4.4 million gallons, which would still have been a catastrophic spill.
The council expects the escorts language to be attached to another bill rather than being passed by Congress as a standalone measure.