Not So Fast: Some Progress in Spill Response, but US Still Ill-Prepared for Arctic Offshore Development

In 2009, the U.S. Department of the Interior, Minerals Management Service (MMS) published a paper entitled, Arctic Oil Spill Response Research and Development Program – A Decade of Achievement. 1 The MMS paper summarizes 31 projects completed by the agency’s Arctic Oil Spill Response Research (OSRR) program during the period of 1997-2008, related to oil spill response in the arctic. This WWF report reviews the MMS research program paper, examines the advances that have been made in the overall ability to clean-up oil in the Arctic Ocean and highlights the biggest remaining challenges (both technological and non-technological) to oil spill clean-up.