Canada has discovered commercial quantities of oil and gas in the Amalagak region of the Northwest Territory;

Canada is exploring alternatives for transporting the oil from the Amalagak field to markets in Asia and the Far East;

one of the options the Canadian Government is exploring involves transshipment of oil from the Amalagak field across the Beaufort Sea to tankers which would transport the oil overseas;

the tankers would traverse the American Exclusive Economic Zone through the Beaufort Sea into the Chuckchi Sea and then through the Bering Straits;

the Beaufort and Chuckchi Seas are vital to Alaska’s Native people, providing them with subsistence in the form of walrus, seals, fish, and whales;

the Secretary of the Interior has conducted Outer Continental Shelf lease sales in the Beaufort and Chuckchi Seas and oil and gas exploration is ongoing;

an oil spill in the Arctic Ocean, if not properly contained and cleaned up, could have significant impacts on the indigenous people of Alaska’s North Slope and on the Arctic environment; and

there are no international contingency plans involving our two governments concerning containment and cleanup of an oil spill in the Arctic Ocean.

The Secretary of the Interior, in consultation with the Governor of Alaska, shall conduct a study of the issues of recovery of damages, contingency plans, and coordinated actions in the event of an oil spill in the Arctic Ocean.

The Secretary shall, no later than January 31, 1991, transmit a report to the Congress on the findings and conclusions reached as the result of the study carried out under this subsection.