Archives West Finding Aid

Ph.D student of University of Washington.

Gilbert Marek Zemansky worked during the last half of 1974 and first quarter of 1975 as a pipeline monitor for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. He was reponsible for monitoring construction of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline system (TAPS) for compliance with state environmental laws. This was the impetus for his dissertation. The materials were gathered over an eight year period, 1975-1983, through extensive research efforts including three lawsuits (violation of freedom of information laws). The original intent in gathering them was to influence government policy implementation during the ongoing project. With the project oever, the research's historical and academic value became important, because it documents an important case study in water quality regulation during construction of, at the time, the largest private construction project in history and the first major petroleum pipeline to be built in the arctic region of North America.