Proceedings: Twenty-Fourth Gulf of Mexico Information Transfer Meeting, January 2007

摘要

In meeting its mission to manage energy and minerals resources on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), the Minerals Management Service (MMS) administers an Environmental Studies Program (ESP) to gather and synthesize environmental and social and economic science information to support decisionmaking concerning the offshore oil and gas program. The Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act established policy for the management of the OCS natural gas and oil leasing program and for the protection of marine and coastal environments. Section 20 of the Act authorizes the ESP and establishes three general goals for the program: to establish the information needed for assessment and management of environmental impacts on the human, marine, and coastal environments of the OCS and the potentially affected coastal areas; to predict marine biota impacts that may result from chronic, low-level pollution or large spills associated with OCS production, from drilling fluids and cuttings discharges, pipeline emplacement, or onshore facilities; and to monitor human, marine, and coastal environments to provide time series and data trend information for the identification of significant changes in the quality and productivity of these environments, and to identify the causes of these changes.