Walter B. Parker Act, which was signed into law in 1980 by U.S. President Jimmy Carter. On March 24, 1989, the Exxon Valdez oil tanker struck Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound, spilling an estimated 260,000 to 750,000 barrels of crude oil. The Exxon Valdez oil spill was a major environmental disaster for the state. Governor Steve Cowper, who held office at the time of the spill, appointed Walter Parker as the chairman of the Alaska Oil Spill Commission in 1989. The Alaska Oil Spill Commission was created by the Alaska state government to investigate the causes of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
Prudhoe Bay oil spill 6 inch layer of chunks of live, frozen tundra that were taken from a donor site and transplanted to the spill site Government environmental officials said it could take up to a decade for the tundra vegetation to return to normal. BP decommissioned the entire 34-inch transit line and replaced it with a 20-inch line, containing pig launch and recovery sites. The Alaska oil spill had a major impact on BP as it was a loss to its image as well as a financial loss. On March 15, the U.S. Transportation Department ordered BP to test its three low-pressure lines