Slick Policy : Environmental and Science Policy in the Aftermath of the Santa Barbara Oil Spill / Teresa Sabol Spezio.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Spezio, Teresa Sabol, author.

Series:

History of the urban environment.

History of the urban environment

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Science and state--United States--History.

Science and state.

Oil spills--California--Santa Barbara Channel--History.

Oil spills.

Environmental policy--United States--History.

Environmental policy.

Pacific Ocean--Santa Barbara Channel.

United States.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xix, 282 pages) : illustrations, maps.

Place of Publication:

Pittsburgh, Pa. : University of Pittsburgh Press, [2018]

Summary:

In January 1969, the blowout on an offshore oil platform off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, and the resulting oil spill proved to be a transformative event in pollution control and the nascent environmental activism movement. It accelerated the advancement of federal government policies and would change the way the federal government managed environmental pollution. Over the next three years, Congress worked to pass laws such as the National Environmental Policy Act and the Clean Water Act, and revolutionized the way that the United States dealt with environmental pollution. At the same time, scientists developed methods to detect chemical pollution that had been discharged into rivers and streams by industrial facilities. Slick Policy presents an original and in-depth history of the 1969 Santa Barbara spill. Teresa Sabol Spezio provides a background of water pollution control, government oversight of federally-funded projects, and chemical detection methods in place prior to the spill. She then shows how scientists and politicians used public outrage over the spill to implement wide-ranging changes to federal environmental and science policy, and demonstrates the advancements to offshore oil drilling, pollution technology, and water protection law that resulted from these actions.

Contents:

Preface : "wasn't that a mighty storm" : the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969

Introduction : the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969

part 1. Pre-1969 environmental and science policy

1. Coastal waters and oil drilling

2. Smell, taste, sight , disease : pollution detection until the mid-1960s

3. Federal environmental policy?

4. Who is in charge of water pollution control?

part 2. The spill

5. The Santa Barbara spill : the first ten days

part 3. Post-spill environmental and science policy

6. From an "amorphous concern" to a national movement

7. Conflict over a pismo clam : changes in pollution detection

8. Edmund Muskie : the clean water champion.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 257-269) and index.

Description based on online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on May 18, 2021).

ISBN:

9780822983361

0822983362

OCLC:

1035556827