Goal:
- Provide planned, clear, and concise strategies for spill responders to safeguard the natural, cultural, and recreational resources that define our national parks.
- Increase awareness and participation of NPS staff in the contingency planning processes of their Regional Response Team (RRT).
Methods and Products: RPI provides park-specific, detailed documents that communicate parks’ priorities and spill response resources in a format easily adopted as Annexes into region-specific U.S. Coast Guard Area Contingency Plans (ACPs), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Regional Contingency Plans (RCPs), and Geographic Response Plans (GRPs). We coordinate with park staff and partner agencies to combine local knowledge of the ecological, archeological, historical, and recreational resources in a park’s landscape with our expertise in risk assessment, data visualization, and spill response. We identify new priority areas for ACPs, RCPs, and GRPs, describe protection strategies for these areas, and create site plans that include detailed information about the resources present, site logistics, and response actions and considerations. We compile the site plan information into park-specific geodatabase and are collaborating with the NPS Spill Response Program in the design of a web application to present both the data and planning documents through a centralized information hub that will allow users to quickly assess park resources and priorities for planning and response activities.
