	Introduction

Thousands of oil and chemical spills of varying size and magnitude occur in the United States each year. When a spill occurs, state and local officials located in proximity to the incident generally are the first responders and may elevate an incident for federal attention if greater resources are desired. The National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan—often referred to as the National Contingency Plan (NCP) for short—establishes the procedures for the federal response to oil and chemical spills. Congress later enacted the Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972 (often referred to as the Clean Water Act) to provide explicit statutory authority for the federal response to discharges of oil or hazardous substances into or upon U.S. waters within the contiguous zone and the adjoining shorelines. The 1972 amendments also explicitly directed the preparation of the NCP to carry out these authorities. The report discusses the federal statutes that authorize the NCP and related executive orders; mechanisms for reporting incidents to the federal government; the framework under which federal, state, and local roles are to be coordinated; funding mechanisms for federal response actions, including liability for response costs and related damages; and circumstances under which the NCP may be integrated within the National Response Framework (NRF) to address multifaceted incidents, such as major disasters or emergencies. Statutory Response Authorities

Since its inception in 1968, the NCP has been revised on multiple occasions to establish regulatory procedures for implementing the federal statutory authorities that Congress has expanded over time to respond to incidents involving a discharge of oil or a release of a hazardous substance. The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980 established the Superfund program and expanded the authorities of the President to respond to releases of hazardous substances into the environment more broadly than Section 311 of the Clean Water Act. Executive Orders

Several executive orders have delegated the President's response authorities under the above statutes to the federal departments and agencies tasked with implementing the NCP. Coordination of the Federal Response

The NCP established the National Response System (NRS) as a multi-tiered framework for coordinating the federal response to a discharge of oil or a release of a hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant. The NCP established 13 Regional Response Teams. Through its National Pollution Funds Center, the U.S. Coast Guard administers the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund to finance the costs of responding to a discharge of oil. These two trust funds differ in terms of how the monies are made available to carry out a response. National Response Framework

The National Response Framework (NRF) is the federal government's broader administrative mechanism that is intended to coordinate the array of federal response plans. However, the NRF itself is not an operational plan that dictates a step-by-step process for responding to a specific type of hazard, nor is the NRF codified in federal regulation like the NCP. Situations in which the application of the NCP through the NRF may occur include
a major disaster or emergency declared under the Stafford Act, when state and local authorities are overwhelmed and federal assistance is requested; an incident to which a federal agency is responding under its own authority and requests support from other federal agencies to respond to aspects of the incident that involve the discharge of oil or release of hazardous materials; or an incident for which the Department of Homeland Secretary determines that it should lead the response because of special circumstances.
Thousands of oil and chemical spills of varying size and magnitude occur in the United States each year. When a spill occurs, state and local officials located in proximity to the incident generally are the first responders and may elevate an incident for federal attention if greater resources are desired.
The National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan, often referred to as the National Contingency Plan (NCP), establishes the procedures for the federal response to oil and chemical spills. The scope of the NCP encompasses discharges of oil into or upon U.S. waters and adjoining shorelines and releases of hazardous substances into the environment. The NCP was developed in 1968 and has been revised on multiple occasions to implement the federal statutory response authorities that Congress has expanded over time. Three federal environmental statutes authorized the development of the NCP: the Clean Water Act, as amended; the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980, as amended; and the Oil Pollution Act of 1990.
Several executive orders have delegated the presidential response authorities of these statutes to federal departments and agencies that implement the NCP. The lead federal agency serves as the On-Scene Coordinator to direct the federal response. Generally, EPA leads the federal response within the inland zone, and the U.S. Coast Guard serves as the lead agency within the coastal zone. However, a response to an incident occurring on a federal facility is coordinated by the federal department or agency that administers the facility. The NCP established the National Response System (NRS) as a multi-tiered framework to coordinate 15 federal departments and agencies on the National Response Team in providing specialized resources and expertise and involving state and local officials and other nonfederal entities.
Although the framework of the NRS is the same for responding to discharges of oil or releases of hazardous substances, the NCP establishes separate operational elements for responding to each type of incident, and these elements differ in some respects. The source of federal funding to carry out a response also differs. The Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund finances the federal response to a discharge of oil, and the Superfund Trust Fund finances the federal response to a release of a hazardous substance. Monies spent from these trust funds may be recouped from the responsible parties under the liability provisions of the Oil Pollution Act and CERCLA, respectively.
For multifaceted incidents (major disasters or emergencies), the NCP also could be invoked under the National Response Framework (NRF) to address an aspect of an incident involving a discharge of oil or release of a hazardous substance. The NRF is a broader administrative mechanism for coordinating the array of federal emergency response plans. However, the NRF itself is not an operational plan that dictates a step-by-step process. The NRF instead merely may apply the NCP as the operational plan to respond to an oil or hazardous substance incident.
This report discusses the authorities, relevant executive orders, and federal emergency response framework of the NCP, and identifies the funding mechanisms to carry out a federal response.