National Ocean Policy 5 Years Later

In July of 2010, the Obama Administration ordered the creation of a National Ocean Council to oversee the implementation of his National Ocean Policy (NOP) to connect the decision making processes of state and federal agencies in a collaborative and streamlined process, while creating an opportunity for citizen, private industry, and eNGO advisory input.

Clean Ocean Action has tried to ensure that NOP offered a true participatory process for the communities whose livelihoods depend upon a clean ocean and bear the brunt of the many uses of our ocean and coastal area. Since the inception of NOP, COA has remained outspoken in support of the citizens who live in these areas, and for the health and wellbeing of the ocean itself.

So what has been accomplished on the 5 year anniversary of the NOP? Our blog has a more in depth analysis, however, the short answer is this: even as cooperation and collaboration between agencies has improved, and the body of science and research for which to make decisions has grown, the participatory process we advocated for so stridently is deficient to say the least. The actions of the Obama Administration speak louder than any policy could. The waters of the mid-Atlantic have been opened to oil and gas exploration, the Arctic has been opened to oil drilling, and offshore LNG terminals threaten our coastlines. There is a continued push for development in the most fragile and vulnerable portions of our coastal areas, and the ocean ecosystem we take for granted is showing multiple signs of collapse. COA will continue to engage the policymakers and bureaucracy it encounters throughout the NOP process, and advocate loudly on behalf of the oceans’ health, first and foremost.