CRS-5 Canal Zone Code, tit. 2, sec. 411, 64 Stat. 1038. Tolls set by Panama "whose action in such matter shall be final and conclusive." Panama Railway Labor Act, 45 U.S.C. 153 (m), 48 Stat. 1191-1192. Awards of National Railroad Adjustment Board in employee grievances "shall be final and binding upon both parties to the dispute, except insofar as they shall contain a money award." Union Pacific Railroad Co. v. Price, 360 U.S. 601 (1959); Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Ry. Co. v. Burley, 325 U.S. 711 (1945). Act of June 25, 1910, ch. 431, sec. 1, 36 Stat. 855, 25 U.S.C. 372. Ascertainment by Secretary of Interior of legal heirs of intestate Indian "shall be final and conclusive." Hayes v. Seaton, 270 F. 2d 319 (D.C. Cir. 1959); Heffelman v. Udall, 378 F. 2d 109 (10th Cir. 1967); Hallowell v. Commons, 239 U.S. 506 (1916). Adjusted Compensation Act, ch. 157, 43 Stat. 121, as amended by Act of July 3, 1926, ch. 751, sec. 310, 44 Stat. 826. Decision of Director of Veterans Bureau on claims for payment of adjusted compensation, and other decisions within his jurisdiction made "final and conclusive." United States v. Williams, 278 U.S. 255 (1929). Sugar Act of 1948, 7 U.S.C. 1136. The facts constituting the basis for any payment, or the amount thereof authorized to be made under this subchapter, officially determined in conformity with rules or regulations prescribed by the Secretary, shall be reviewable only by the Secretary, and his determinations with respect thereto shall be final and conclusive. (Aug. 8, 1947, ch. 519, title III, sec. 306, 61 Stat. 932). Mario Mercado E. Hijos v. Benson, 231 F. 2d 251 (D.C. Cir. 1956). Act of March 3, 1885, ch. 335, 23 Stat. 350. Provided that determination Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, ch. 268, sec. 301, 58 Stat. 286. Findings of boards of review concerning discharge or dismissals from service were "to be final subject only to review by the Secretary of War or the Secretary of the Navy, respectively." Gentila v. Pace, 193 F. 2d 924 (D.C. Cir. 1951). Rev. Stat. sec. 2930. Appraisals by customs official made "final." George Costell George Costello [Whereupon, at 12:30 p.m., the committee was recessed for lunch, to be reconvened at 2 p.m.] AFTERNOON SESSION Senator FANNIN. The hearings will come to order. I am afraid we may have another vote very shortly, but we will proceed as fast as we possibly can. I understand that we have a panel now and you may proceed as you desire as far as the way in which you are going to handle your panel. STATEMENTS OF DR. CHARLES CICCHETTI, VISITING ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS AND ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES; DR. A. MYRICK FREEMAN, VISITING ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS, UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN; JOHN DIENELT, ATTORNEY, ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE FUND; THOMAS B. STOEL, JR., NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL; DR. ROBERT CURRY, ENVIRONMENTAL GEOLOGIST, UNIVERSITY OF MONTANA Mr. DIENELT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is John Dienelt. I am one of the attorneys who represent the Wilderness Society, the Environmental Defense Fund, Inc. and Friends of the Earth in the litigation challenging the proposed trans-Alaska pipeline. With me are four experts who have investigated various aspects of the TAPS proposal and the alternative all-land pipeline route through Canada. They are Thomas Stoel, who is a former staff member of the President's Oil Import Quota Task Force in addition to being one of plaintiffs' attorneys in the litigation; Dr. Charles Cicchetti, professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin; Dr. Myrick Freeman, professor of economics at Bowdoin College; and Dr. Robert Curry, professor of environmental geology at the University of Montana. We are pleased to accept the committee's invitation to present testimony on S. 970, S. 993, and S. 1565. Senator FANNIN. You can digest your statement if you so desire and your complete statement will be made a part of the record. Mr. DIENELT. I will begin by stating the position of the Wilderness Society, Environmental Defense Fund, Inc., and Friends of the Earth on development of North Slope oil and gas and on the bills which are the subject of this hearing. In the course of the pipeline litigation, I have had occasion to study the public statements of the Canadian Government on the acceptability of a pipeline through Canada and to explore the availability of information on proposed gas and oil pipelines from Canadian sources. I will, therefore, also discuss those subjects. The experts will compare various aspects of the trans-Alaska pipeline and the Canadian alternative. Mr. Stoel will deal with national security issues; Dr. Cicchetti and Dr. Freeman will deal with economic and consumer questions; and Dr. Curry will focus on environmental considerations. The Wilderness Society, Environmental Defense Fund, Inc., and Friends of the Earth are not opposed to well-planned development of North Slope oil and gas. But we believe there is a better way than the trans-Alaska pipeline proposal to transport the petroleum resources of the North. On the basis of our examination of the alternatives, we believe an all-land common corridor for oil and gas delivery, from the North Slope through Canada to the lower 48 States is likely to be superior to the trans-Alaska plan. Regrettably, however, the Interior Department has not sought or developed the information on the Canadian route which is necessary for a fully informed choice among the alternatives in the national interest. The oil companies decided, in early 1969, to focus their efforts on an Alaskan pipeline route even though their own studies indicated that both the Alaskan and Canadian routes were feasible. The Department of the Interior accepted this decision and concentrated its own efforts on study of the Alaskan proposal. Secretary Morton, in fact, several times stated to this committee that his Department was essentially excluding the Canadian alternative from consideration because the oil companies did not want it. Thus, in April 1971, he stated flatly: The scope of our work here is to deal with the applications on our desk. Hearings, Senate Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, 92d Congress, first session, 454, April 29, 1971. Although this passive approach was pointedly challenged in committee by Senator Gravel, the Secretary returned the next year with the same explanation of the Department's focus on the Alaskan route. Only 11 days before release of the final impact statement, the Secretary stated: We have no formal discussions going on with any element of the Canadian Government. The prime discussions have been between the Canadian Government and the applicants***. The only way, Canadian Government expressions of interest in all all-land route, could change the plans is if a Canadian alternative was developed, and we had an application which we could consider of an alternative route through Canada. This could very well change the plans of the present applicants, but we have to remember that this is not a government project." Hearings, Senate Committees on Public Works and Interior and Insular Affairs, 92d Congress, second session, 404-405, March 9, 1972. There is no better reflection of the result of the Interior Department's refusal to examine the Canadian alternative in depth than the fact that the series of highly pertinent questions which this committee posed in connection with this hearing have yet to be given satisfactory answers. It is for this reason that we support S. 1565, which was introduced by Senator Mondale. That bill provides for an unbiased study by the National Science Foundation of all aspects of the Canadian alternative within an acceptable time frame. On the basis of information which has been developed by Canadian sources and is available from them and on the basis of repeated statements of interest in an oil pipeline which have been made by the Canadian Government, we believe that a comprehensive study can be undertaken within the timeframe set forth in the Mondale bill and that, at the end of that study, Con gress will have sufficient information on which it can reach a fully informed choice between the Alaskan and Canadian alternatives. In a number of statements, Secretary Morton and other representatives of the administration have insisted that the Canadian alternative oil pipeline is not feasible. They have asserted that it would take several years longer to develop because it has not been adequately studied and because of delays in securing Canadian Government approval. They have also asserted that the Canadian alternative would be disadvantageous to the United States in any event because of onerous conditions which would be placed by the Canadian Government upon approval of it. These assertions are largely undocumented speculation for, as I have pointed out, the Interior Department has not made a thorough examination of the alternatives. Statements of the Canadian Government and the reported progress of study of Canadian oil and gas pipeline routes, in fact, strongly suggest that these assertions are baseless. Before discussing these assertions in detail, however, I would like to stress one significant fact which bears on these, as well as other issues concerning the feasibility of the Canadian alternative, such as the possibility of environmental opposition to a Canadian pipeline or difficulty in resolution of Canadian native claims issues. The fact is that a gas pipeline will be built through Canada to the lower 48 States. Let's compare that to what will happen if an amendment to the Mineral Leasing Act takes place and the controversy goes back to the courts for further litigation under NEPA. I don't believe there is any lawyer who has been involved in the litigation who believes that the amount of time delay would be less than a year and that 1-year time delay assumes that the environmental groups who haven't lost yet, lose. If we win the delay could be considerably longer and in fact a Canadian alternative could come on line sooner as a result of this body's decision to approve it than an Alaska line could be developed after the litigation finally terminates. I would now like to turn to questions of timing from the Canadian side. The consortium which plans to build the gas pipeline has indicated that it will file applications this year. From the U.S. end, we hear nothing but optimism regarding the progress of plans for that pipeline and cooperation between our Government and Canada with respect to it. Let me, for example, quote Secretary Morton at his press conference of September 13, 1972. He said: We are going to *** work and stimulate and motivate a consortium to get together and put the money up to build a cold gas pipeline, which through Canada is the logical way for it to go. Interior Department Transcript of Secretary Morton's press Conference of September 13, 1972, at 38. No reason is apparent why the practical problems of implementation of a gas pipeline through Canada should be so simple and the practical problems of an oil pipeline through Canada so difficult. In fact, if the feasibility of an oil pipeline through Canada is studied in an objective manner, as the Mondale bill provides, we believe the conclusion will be that the optimistic expectations for a gas pipeline apply equally for the oil pipeline. I will now turn to a more detailed consideration of the public record with respect to the feasibility of the Canadian alternative. 95-290 - 73-7 First, and perhaps most important, is the question of the attitude of the Canadian Government toward an oil pipeline through Canada. The Canadian Government, on this point, has maintained a clear, consistent, and explicit attitude of encouraging construction of both an oil and a gas pipeline through Canada for the delivery of North Slope oil and gas to the lower 48 States. This position has been confirmed in official guidelines for pipeline development and by frequent statements of responsible Government officials from July of 1968 to the present. The understandable reasons for this attitude by the Canadian Government are: 1. Canada's desire to open up its own arctic oil and gas resources. 2. Insofar as an oil pipeline is concerned, Canada's desire, frequently expressed to our Government, to avoid the serious environmental and economic damage to the coastal waters of British Columbia that would be caused by the marine leg of the Alaska pipeline proposal. The Canadians expressed formal interest in a pipeline from the North Slope as early as a month after the discovery of oil in Prudhoe Bay. In March 1971, Joe Greene, then Minister of Energy, Mines, and Resources, reiterated their interest: I think we can assure the U.S. oil companies and the U.S. Government * * * that there will be no unnecessary roadblocks at the Canadian end and the Canadian Government side. On February 3, 1972, Robert Howland, Chairman of the National Energy Board which would conduct hearings on approval of permits for a pipeline, addressing the Government-sponsored Northern Pipeline Conference in Ottawa, confirmed: The Government is on record as being desirous of allowing pipelines under appropriate conditions to be constructed in the North. * The progress of research, both in the public as well as the private sector has been such that the Government has indicated on several occasions its willingness to examine and discuss any proposals relating to the transport of Alaskan petroleum resources through Canada to market in the United States. In March 1972, the Minister of Energy, Mines, and Resources, MacDonald personally delivered a letter to Secretary Morton: As has been stated publicly on several occasions, we expect to be in a position by the end of this year to be able to appraise any applications that might be received from companies wishing to build pipelines in the North. The progress being made by industry is such that I would anticipate our being able to act early in 1973 to process expeditiously one or more applications to build an oil and/or a gas pipeline originating at Prudhoe Bay and traversing Canadian territory to southern markets. On March 1, 1973, Jean Chretien, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, which would also pass on a pipeline proposal, stated in the House of Commons: We as a government have said to the Americans many times that we oppose the shipping of oil along the British Columbia coast, and that we would prefer to have an oilline on the ground because there is much less danger of pollution with a pipeline than with a ship. Finally, on March 18, 1973, Minister MacDonald in an interview on national television in Canada, said: |