Book Description

In accordance with the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA) and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the federal and state natural resource trustee agencies (Trustees) have prepared a Final Programmatic Damage Assessment and Restoration Plan and Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (Final PDARP/PEIS). The Final PDARP/PEIS considers programmatic alternatives, composed of Restoration Types, to restore natural resources, ecological services, and recreational use services injured or lost as a result of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill incident. The OPA natural resource damage assessment regulations guided the Trustees' development and evaluation of programmatic restoration alternatives. The Final PDARP/PEIS also evaluates the environmental consequences of the restoration alternatives under NEPA. This document shows that the injuries caused by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill incident affected such a wide array of linked resources over such an enormous area that the effects must be described as constituting an ecosystem-level injury. Consequently, the Trustees' preferred alternative for a restoration plan employs a comprehensive, integrated ecosystem approach to best address these ecosystem-level injuries. Specific restoration projects, to be selected in subsequent planning phases and evaluated under OPA and NEPA, will take place primarily in the northern Gulf of Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.