[Federal Register: June 24, 2002 (Volume 67, Number 121)]
[Notices]               
[Page 42538-42539]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr24jn02-35]                         

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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

 
Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment; Request for 
Comments

AGENCY: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), 
Commerce.

ACTION: Notice of availability of a Draft Damage Assessment and 
Restoration Plan and Environmental Assessment for natural resource 
injuries and service losses associated with the Fort Lauderdale mystery 
oil spill in Florida; Request for Comments.

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SUMMARY: Notice is hereby given that a document entitled, ``Draft 
Damage Assessment and Restoration Plan and Environmental Assessment for 
the Fort Lauderdale Mystery Oil Spill'' (Draft DARP/EA), is available 
for public review and comment. This document has been prepared by the 
state and federal natural resource trustee agencies (Florida Department 
of Environmental Protection, FDEP, and the National Oceanic and 
Atmospheric Administration, NOAA) to address natural resource injuries 
and resource services losses resulting from a mystery

[[Page 42539]]

oil spill in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. This Draft DARP/EA presents the 
trustees' assessment of the natural resource injuries and service 
losses and their proposed plan to compensate for those losses by 
restoring natural resources and services. The trustees will consider 
comments received during the public comment period before finalizing 
the DARP/EA.

DATES: Comments on the Draft DARP/EA must be submitted in writing on or 
before July 24, 2002.

ADDRESSES: Requests for and written comments on the Draft DARP/EA 
should be directed to Catherine Porthouse of FDEP, 3900 Commonwealth 
Blvd, MS 659, Tallahassee, FL 32399, e-mail: 
catherine.porthouse@dep.state.fl.us, or Tony Penn of NOAA, 1305 East 
West Highway, Station 10218, Silver Spring, MD 20910, e-mail: 
tony.penn@noaa.gov. The Draft DARP/EA is also available electronically 
at http://www.darp.noaa.gov.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For further information contact: 
Catherine Porthouse at (850) 488-2974, e-mail: 
catherine.porthouse@dep.state.fl.us, or Tony Penn, at (301) 713-3038 
x197, e-mail: tony.penn@noaa.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On Tuesday morning, August 8, 2000, oil tar 
balls and oil mats were observed on beaches in the area of Fort 
Lauderdale, Florida. Within the next few days, approximately 20 miles 
of high-use recreational beaches, from North Miami Beach northward to 
near Pompano Beach (primarily Broward County beaches), were oiled; some 
were closed for cleaning. The origin of the oil is unknown. The United 
States Coast Guard, the lead response agency for the incident, 
classified the spill as medium, and the trustees have estimated the 
amount of oil stranded on the shoreline to be approximately 15,000 
gallons.
    Natural resources or their services impacted as a result of the 
incident include threatened and endangered sea turtles and their 
habitats, marine surface waters and their biota including fish, birds, 
and recreational use of beaches. Response actions removed the majority 
of the shoreline oil within a few days of oiling. These response 
actions did not prevent natural resource impacts from occurring nor did 
these actions restore or rehabilitate natural resource and service 
injuries that resulted from the incident.
    Natural resource trusteeship authority is designated according to 
Sec. 1006(b) of OPA, Executive Order 12777, October 22, 1991 (56 FR 
54757), and subpart G of the National Oil and Hazardous Substances 
Pollution Contingency Plan, 40 CFR part 300. Federal trustees are 
designated by the President, and state trustees by the Governor. Acting 
on behalf of the public as trustees for the living and non-living 
resources in the coastal and marine environments of Florida, the United 
States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Florida 
Department of Environmental Protection, are responsible for assessing 
injuries to trust resources resulting from oil spill incidents, and for 
developing and implementing a plan for the restoration, rehabilitation, 
replacement, or acquisition of the equivalent of injured natural 
resources and their services.
    Pursuant to Section 1002(a) of OPA, each party responsible for a 
vessel or facility from which oil is discharged, or which poses a 
substantial threat of a discharge of oil, into or upon the navigable 
waters of the United States or adjoining shorelines, is liable for 
natural resource damages from incidents that involve such actual or 
threatened discharges of oil. The measure of damages to natural 
resources is the cost of restoring, rehabilitating, replacing or 
acquiring the equivalent of the injured natural resources, compensation 
for the diminution in value of those natural resources pending 
restoration, and the reasonable costs of assessing such damages. All 
recoveries for the first two elements are to be spent implementing a 
restoration plan developed by the trustees.
    In this case, there is not an identified responsible party to pay 
damages. When there is not a responsible party, the Federal Oil Spill 
Liability Trust Fund is available to pay claims for the costs of 
assessing natural resource damages and for developing and implementing 
restoration plans.
    The trustees quantified injury to sea turtles, fish and 
invertebrates, seabirds, and recreational beaches for inclusion in a 
claim for restoration costs. Subject to public comment, the trustees 
determined that their preferred alternative to address injuries and 
losses of sea turtles is a combination of active primary restoration 
(to return sea turtle resources and services to baseline) and 
compensatory restoration (to compensate for interim losses pending 
recovery to baseline). The recommended primary restoration would 
consist of augmenting lighting ordinance enforcement activities that 
would return sea turtles to baseline by preventing mortality of turtle 
hatchlings due to disorientation. The recommended compensatory 
restoration would also augment lighting ordinance enforcement, which 
would provide additional turtle hatchlings to compensate for the 
interim turtle losses. The compensatory component of the enforcement 
project would be of sufficient scale to provide compensatory ecological 
services approximately equivalent to those that will be lost from the 
injured turtles pending recovery to baseline.
    No primary restoration actions are considered necessary for the 
fish and invertebrate, and seabird injuries. However, the trustees have 
identified projects as compensation for an acute kill of fish, 
invertebrates, and seabirds. The trustees would create mangrove habitat 
in order to provide the fish and invertebrate biomass that was lost.
    To replace the estimated bird losses, the trustees have identified 
projects aimed at saving birds from future injury. The trustees would 
install signs at a fishing pier advising anglers not to cut their lines 
and demonstrating how to free birds from fishing lines and hooks, which 
would prevent entanglement and provide seabird rescue in the event of 
entanglement.
    The impacted recreational beaches were returned to baseline 
conditions through incident response actions, however there was a 
period of lost use during the response phase. The recommended 
compensatory restoration projects are to plant sea oats to build dunes, 
construct dune walkovers, provide handicapped carts, and provide shade 
areas that together would maintain beaches for future use, provide 
access to the beach, and improve the quality of the beach experience.

    Dated: June 12, 2002.
Jamison S. Hawkins,
Deputy Assistant Administrator for Ocean Services and Coastal Zone 
Management.
[FR Doc. 02-15866 Filed 6-21-02; 8:45 am]
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