POURING COLD WATER ON TROUBLED OIL

More legislation was demanded by all who ignored the fact that the US Coast Guard is already empowered to bar any tanker from US ports if it deems it unsafe or manned by an insufficiently trained crew.

"Ecological holocaust" was the leitmotif of a flood of environmentalist propaganda. Time brought a special preview of "Tommorrow's Disaster," the type of supertanker disaster that every red-blooded environmentalist is hoping and praying for. And the inevitable cry of conspiracy went up.

We are not much given to conspiracy theories, but twelve incidents in 25 days does seem on the unnatural side. Yet who would benefit from foul play? Not the oil or shipping companies, but those who are already wallowing in the accidents: the sham-environmentalists, the Seafarers' Union (which priced itself out of the market); the apostles of bureaucracy and government regulation, including the "consumer advocates."

But there are other points, which are not idle speculation. In the first place, why does oil have to be brought to US shores in such astronomical quantities? Because domestic oil is kept in the ground by governmental price-fixing; because there is no incentive to conserve energy for the same reason; because domestic construction of energy facilities is being obstructed by the legalistic guerilla tactics of the small-is-beautiful crowd.

Why did half the incidents happen in rivers and estuaries? Because the US still has no deepwater oil ports, another energy facility obstructed by the friendly people aiming to keep your rivers clean.

Why did most of the incidents involve Liberian tankers? Because ships of US registry are routinely put out of business by government regulation and union blackmail. (Nor are US tankers particularly safe they rank 8th in safety.)

There have been ten oil spills involving greater tonnages than the Argo Merchant in the last decade. None of them left any permanent damage; none of them came close to the worst oil spiller of them all, Mother Nature, who seeps large quantities of oil into the sea.

But Mother Nature is also the best cleaner of them all. By the time you read this, she will have evaporated, oxidized, bio-degraded and dissipated most of the Argo Merchant's oil. Discussing these mechanisms, P. Abelson writes in Science (14 Jan. 1977): "Incidents of this kind should be avoided, and the perpetrators should be forced to pay for any demonstrable damage. But talk of an ecological catastrophe thus far is only talk. It has no factual basis."