COST OF LITTER CLEANUP Mrs. HANSEN. Will you also insert in the record the total amount that your bureau has expended in the process of disposing of litter. Mr. GOTTSCHALK. You are talking about the cost of policing up the ground of fish hatcheries and wildlife refuges after public use? Mrs. HANSEN. That is right. (The information follows:) STATEMENT CONCERNING COST OF CLEANUP AFTER VISITOR USE In 1969 the cost of cleanup at Bureau facilities after visitor use amounted to approximately $546,000. It is estimated that the cost in 1971 will be $657,000. COST OF POLLUTION CLEANUP Mrs. HANSEN. Will you also insert in the record the total expenditures of your bureau for research to eliminate pollution. (The information follows:) STATEMENT CONCERNING THE BUREAU CONTRIBUTION TO CLEAN ENVIRONMENTS THROUGH RESEARCH AND MANAGEMENT PROGRAMS Many of the Bureau's research and management programs are concerned with the welfare of fish and wildlife and with the quality of the lands, vegetation, and waters they need to survive. Clean environments are essential. In their efforts to measure and improve many environmental situations, Bureau specialists have developed techniques and knowledge of value to the total pollution abatement effort, for benefit of humans as well as for other living things. A few examples of Bureau programs that have this potential for double payoff include all of our pesticides monitoring, research, and registration efforts; the soil and moisture conservation programs on Bureau lands; the river basin studies reviews of water resource development projects; several marine gamefish studies in bays and estuaries; projects at the fish and wildlife cooperative unit universities; and a wide assortment of fish and wildlife nutrition and disease investigations. A review of the grant-in-aid programs carried out by State conservation departments using Dingell-Johnson and Pittman-Robertson funds also reveals many projects that contribute to our knowledge of environmental quality and pollution control. A recent analysis of Federal funding for environmental quality activities requested by the Bureau of the Budget led us to conclude that almost all of our appropriation could be construed as being used for environmental protection and improvement, and that approximately $110 million would fall in this category. BUDGET BUREAU RESERVES Mrs. HANSEN. Please insert in the record, the total amount of funds that have been placed in reserve by the Bureau of the Budget for your bureau. Mr. GOTTSCHALK. Would you want a total recapitulation of all money in reserve by activity and project? Mrs. HANSEN. Yes. (The information follows:) Of the total of $11,062,000 in Budget Bureau reserve, $1,298,000 has been temporarily transferred to the Bureau of Land Management under authority of section 102, General Provision, of the Interior and Related Agencies Appropriation Act, 1970, for use in partially paying for fire-fighting costs. These funds will be returned to the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife later this fiscal year. In addition to the above items in reserve, $887,000 of the Management and Investigations of Resources, and $800,000 of the Migratory Bird Conservation Account appropriations were placed in Bureau of the Budget reserve, but subsequently have been released. Of the $887,000 originally in reserve from the Management and Investigations of Resources appropriation, $600,000 was for the National Fisheries Center and Aquarium. With the delay in construction of the aquarium, these funds were determined excess and thus would lapse as of June 30,1970. In order to effectively utilize these funds, $100,000 is proposed for use in repairing the existing aquarium-necessary because of its extended use in the Department of Commerce building; $110,000 for fiscal year 1970 increased wage board costs and $390,000 for current year standby pay. By this amount the fiscal year 1970 supplemental request has been reduced. POLLUTION REDUCTION FUNDS Mrs. HANSEN. Concerted emphasis is currently being exerted from numerous sources to reduce pollution of all kinds to make this a better (environment in which to live. Your budget estimate for 1971 is $70.6 million. What portion of your request is related to activities that could properly be classified as "anti-pollution?" Describe for the committee the major types of effort your bureau will make in 1971 in this connection. Mr. GOTTSCHALK. We are involved in the total pollution picture in three specific areas. Mind you, the primary national effort in the field of water pollution is carried on by the Water Pollution Control Administration. We are not very directly at this time involved in the problems of air pollution, although we see the possibility there may be some involvement here that we will be getting into in 1971. But our work consists of these three general areas in the pollution field: WATER POLLUTION First, assisting in the monitoring of pollution outbreaks that involve not just the continual pollution of a stream, but special events in the nature of catastrophes such as the oil spills that we referred to earlier. We are involved in this sort of thing. If there is a major wildlife resource directly involved in an affair of this kind, we conduct, as a part of the surveillance, routine patrols to attempt to identify the threat to wildlife and to do what has to be done to keep these at a minimum. REVIEW OF WATER QUALITY STANDARDS Along with this, our second major area of interest and effort is to review for and with the Water Pollution Control Administration the standards for water quality that are being submitted by the various States. This function of reviewing the standards is an outgrowth of the input which our technical people had in the development of water quality criteria on which the standards were ultimately based. PESTICIDE MANAGEMENT The third general area gets over into the field of pesticide management, and we have had over the years, as Dr. Glasgow indicated, a very deep involvement in this total pesticide picture. He was involved at the time that all of the wildlife interests in the country saw the spectacle of what might happen to the migrating birds that wintered in the South as a result of the fire ant control program using a lot of harsh pesticides. Since that time, we have developed a great deal of know-how and our pesticide program fundamentally comes down to a program of helping to get rational use of chemicals. That means to find chemicals and to find the means of applying chemicals which can be tolerated in the environment without destructive effect. We think there is a rational way to use many of these chemicals if we are selective of the chemical in the first place and then very careful in the manner in which it is applied. So much of our effort today in the total pollution field is in the area of attempting to find better ways of managing the control of pests by chemical and related means. 42-423 0-70-pt. 2- 3 THERMONUCLEAR POLLUTION Mrs. HANSEN. In the March 2, 1970, issue of the Washington Post, an article appeared on thermal pollution at the Florida Turkey Point plant. Governor Kirk made the statement: I wish to point out to the participants of the Nation the utter foolishness of allowing the AEC the right to grant construction permits for sites such as Turkey Point without paying any attention to the ecological impact of the future operation. The experts must solve this riddle insuring adequate electrical power for south Florida and preserving Biscayne Bay. The tons of cooling water returned to Biscayne Bay via canal dug in the Coral Basin Swamp, the water in the summertime is warm before it goes into the electric plant and several degrees warmer when it comes out. Severe damage has occurred to the aquatic plant and animal population of lower Biscayne Bay due to the presence of heated effluence from the Turkey Point plant. What is your bureau doing about thermal pollution? Mr. GOTTSCHALK. We have a small staff in Florida that maintains a type of surveillance on things of this kind that are affecting the environment, but in this particular case, Madam Chairman, we do not have an on-going program related to Turkey Point. We have been conducting research through our Sandy Hook Marine Laboratory to determine the effect of heated water in general on aquatic life. But this does not apply directly to what is going on at Turkey Point. Mrs. HANSEN. This is just the beginning of your thermal nuclear pollution problem. The committee has requested for the last 3 years information on this problem. In fact, last year the committee appropriated $200,000 to the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries to be used on the Columbia River to work with the AEC to find solutions to the thermal pollution problem. Mr. Wyatt and I have the problem of increasing power needs in the Northwest. There is an ever-escalating desire of the sportsmen and the commercial fisheries people to use the waterways of the Northwest for the fullest possible fish potential. Unfortunately the $200,000 appropriated for this project was placed in reserve by the Bureau of the Budget. Therefore, there will be no answers this year or next year on the thermal pollution problem because of the action taken by the Bureau of the Budget. Mr. GOTTSCHALK. I would like to quote at this point from my general statement. I did not highlight this quote but it bears directly on what you are saying, in fact supports it completely. There is an innate danger, however, in delaying the acquisition of land, or of facts, or in postponing needed maintenance: there is the virtual certainty that some work in the future will be sbstantially more expensive by virtue of the inadequacies of things done today. Mrs. HANSEN. You are so correct. We are not beginning to tackle the thermal pollution problem on as broad a front or in as great a depth as we should. FLORIDA THERMONUCLEAR PROBLEM Dr. GLASGOW. May I make a comment on the Florida problem? Dr. GLASGOW. The Justice Department now has under consideration a request to file an injunction to stop the digging of the canal to prevent the destruction of it. Mrs. HANSEN. I am quoting from the same Washington Post article on thermal pollution: The silence of Justice at the Washington end about Hickel's request for legal action raised doubts if the administration really had any intent in the cracking down. Dr. GLASGOW. I think that subsequent action will reveal that there is a serious intent. AEC AND INTERIOR INVOLVEMENT Mrs. HANSEN. Dr. Glasgow, Mr. Gottschalk, and Commissioner Meacham, you are not going to stop thermonuclear power development. It is therefore mandatory that you develop some techniques with AEC, to prevent thermonuclear pollution. The people of the United States will have little patience if they wake up some morning and find a stream with dead fish floating on top. Time has run out on you. Mr. WYATT. Equally important, Madam Chairman, and consistent with what you are saying, is the real danger in the emotional upsurge over the environment. This raises the possibility that there will be stoppage of construction of thermonuclear plants, which is going to mean in some areas, including our area, a very real possibility of brownouts and blackouts. So we must have some real firm answers as to whether or not there is heat pollution by reason of these plants and what the real effect is of a very expensive cooling tower that is proposed with some of these plants. And secondly, whether there is any real measurable radiation that goes into the water from the plants because there is a great deal of disagreement over both of these factors. TURKEY CREEK POINT PLANT COOLING TOWER Mr. WYATT. I wonder if either of you gentlemen know if there is a cooling tower in connection with the Turkey Point plant, and secondly, whether or not there is any measurable radiation being found in the water being discharged from the plant. Mr. GOTTSCHALK. I cannot respond to the latter. I know as of now there is no cooling tower involved there. Dr. GLASGOW. It was my impression that cooling towers would interfere with the radar protection for Homestead Air Force Base. Mrs. HANSEN. I again quote from the Washington Post article on thermal pollution: A wide variety of fish and other marine life was killed in June 1969, hot water from the plant damaged 670 acres of the bay. Mr. Wyatt and I take a very dismal view of impounding funds that will give the answers to the thermal pollution problems. AEC INVOLVEMENT UNDER THE FISH AND WILDLIFE COORDINATION ACT Mr. GOTTSCHALK. If I may make a further comment to relate to this whole question of thermonuclear power and our involvement in it, Madam Chairman, it is that the Atomic Energy Commission does not come under the purview of the Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act. |