In almost all major marine spills, you would use all three of those countermeasures—or the fourth, that of natural attenuation. You need to look at the net environmental benefit of each of those possibilities. Each of those countermeasures is a trade-off. You may have a sensitive environment such as a bird colony or a habitat where there are fish or shellfish, and you would want to protect that. If the spill occurs, such as this one, in deep water, you may choose to use dispersants that would disperse a great amount of the oil into the water column. It would then be further diluted. You're trading off protecting that sensitive shoreline environment, and looking at the possible consequences of the oil and the dispersant on that marine deep-water community.
On June 15th, 2010. See this statement in context.