Data Management Plan

In 1972, Congress enacted the Marine Protection, Research, and Sanctuaries Act (MPRSA, also known as the Ocean Dumping Act) to prohibit the dumping of material into the ocean that would unreasonably degrade or endanger human health or the marine environment. Virtually all material ocean dumped today is dredged material (sediments) removed from the bottom of waterbodies in order to maintain navigation channels and berthing areas. Other materials that are currently ocean disposed include fish wastes, human remains, and vessels.

Ocean dumping cannot occur unless a permit is issued under the MPRSA. In the case of dredged material, the decision to issue a permit is made by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, using EPA's environmental criteria and subject to EPA's concurrence. For all other materials, EPA is the permitting agency. EPA is also responsible for designating recommended ocean dumping sites for all types of materials.

Process Steps:

• 2016-07-01 00:00:00 - + Go to http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=041c73386957857db786d54eb03d9021&node=se40.25.228_115&rgn=div8 and record all ocean disposal info into a spreadsheet including lat/long data + Import sheet into ArcGIS, convert to xy coordinates, and export as a point feature class + Convert point feature class to polygon by connecting corner coordinates and joining attribute info + Project features recorded in NAD27 to NAD83 and replace in main feature class so that all features will be in NAD83 + Go to http://encdirect.noaa.gov/ and download the following at full extent: Approach_Dumping_Ground_point, Approach_Dumping_Ground_area Coastal_Dumping_Ground_point, Coastal_Dumping_Ground_area General_Dumping_Ground_point, General_Dumping_Ground_area Harbour_Dumping_Ground_point, Harbour_Dumping_Ground_area Overview_Dumping_Ground_point, Overview_Dumping_Ground_area + Import all of these layers into a single geodatabase + Union this feature class with the CFR feature class and merge and combine features where overlap occurs, giving the CFR features the most importance + Data was obtained from the Ocean Disposal Database manager (justin.l.wilkens@usace.army.mil) via email in a spreadsheet + Import sheet into ArcGIS, convert to xy coordinates, and export as a point feature class + Convert point feature class to polygon by connecting corner coordinates and joining attribute info + Union this feature class with the CFR feature class and merge and combine features where overlap occurs, adding in the status info from the ODD + Add the service http://rsc-agisu.usace.army.mil/s1arcgis/rest/services/National_Admin/USACE_Placement_Areas/FeatureServer to the ArcMap session + Select by attributes WHERE "PLACEMENTTYPE" = OCEAN and export into a new feature class + Union this feature class with the CFR feature class and merge and combine features where overlap occurs + Compare between all layers, removing duplicates, and compare to NOAA_RNC continuous raster at ArcGIS on egisws02.nos.noaa.gov\RNC as a guide + For features that had no data in the size field, the data were split up and projected into their respective UTM zones, geometry calculated in square nautical miles, and data added back to the main feature class + Delete all superfluous fields. + Check geometry and project data into WGS 1984 Auxiliary Sphere