The National Ocean Policy Study: A Model for the Future?

Publication Date: January 2003

Publisher: Library of Congress. Congressional Research Service

Author(s):

Research Area: Environment

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Abstract:

The Oceans Act of 2000 (P.L. 106-256) created a Commission on Ocean Policy that is currently deliberating. In June 2003, the Commission is due to present to the 108th Congress a wide-ranging report and recommendations for congressional action. In creating the Commission, the Oceans Act set in motion a process that sought to replicate a process of the late 1960s, when the Commission on Marine Science, Engineering, and Resources produced the Stratton Commission Report (named for Commission Chairman Julius Stratton). The 1969 report, Our Nation and the Sea: A Plan for National Action, portrayed a broad vision of a comprehensive federal approach to ocean topics that garnered widespread public attention, and many subsequent marine policy initiatives can be traced back to this report.

Responding to heightened public and political interest in ocean affairs galvanized by the Stratton Commission Report and other events that transcended congressional organization, the U.S. Senate, on February 19, 1974, adopted S.Res. 222, entitled Authorizing a National Ocean Policy Study (NOPS). This measure authorized the Senate Committee on Commerce (now Commerce, Science, and Transportation) to undertake a full, complete, and comprehensive analysis of national ocean policy and federal ocean programs.

NOPS was active from 1974 through 1994. During this time, NOPS activities, either solely or jointly with other Senate or House committees or subcommittees, resulted in the release of 89 publications in the form of congressional hearings or committee prints. The topics ranged across such issues as: outer continental shelf oil and gas development and the coastal zone; Law of the Sea; tankers and the marine environment; Soviet ocean activities; coastal effects of offshore energy development; fishery conservation and management; world energy outlook; renewable ocean energy resources; polar resources and polar oceans research; coastal zone management; federal ocean programs; global environmental change research; marine mammal protection; environmental satellites; global warming; weather services and research; and seafood safety and quality assurance. Many of the topics that NOPS addressed likely would not have been addressed with the same breadth in the more traditional congressional structure.

This report discusses the pros and cons of reviving some form of NOPS to address the complex and varied oceans issues likely to come before the 108th Congress. The report provides historical background and is unlikely to be updated.