Precontact Archaeology on the Outer Continental Shelf: Site Identification Practices and the Regulatory Environment

Summary

One of the regulatory responsibilities of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), Office of Renewable Energy Programs is to identify submerged precontact sites and protect them through avoidance or mitigation under the auspices of the National Historic Preservation Act. But submerged precontact sites on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) aren’t exactly easy to identify. BOEM is tasked with establishing scientifically rigorous and defensible guidelines for developers to conduct archaeological site identification surveys while addressing stakeholder concerns and incorporating essential traditional cultural knowledge. This presentation will examine some of the ways in which BOEM Renewable Energy Program archaeologists have sought to address the challenges of regulatory-driven archaeology on the OCS, and how these solutions may be incorporated into site identification practices in the future.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2014   •
• Academia, Consultancy and Government (I): An Introspective Look at Underwater Archaeology in Practice

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): SYM-17,02