Oil spill governance in the United States oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico suggest more can and should have been done in this area. Evidence of this fact is present in the recommendations and investigations present in the January 2011 report by the recently established National Oil Spill Commission. A further sign of lack of proper governance is implicit in the action of the federal government to rename and reform the Minerals Management Service (MMS) into the now Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement. The 1989 "Exxon Valdez" oil spill served as a major focal point in oil spill governance and reform. Prior to
Morris J. Berman oil spill of hours after the spill. As mentioned earlier, despite the overall success of Puerto Rico's oil spill response plans there were still some areas for improvement. For example, there were some mechanical failures with some skimmer boats, inappropriate use of oil soaking materials, and an insufficient number of properly trained personnel. There were also problems with communication between agencies as well as some organizational issues during the cleanup process. The Berman spill served as a field test of how well the plans set forth by the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 worked, and provided many examples on how future spill