NATION IN BRIEF : ALASKA : Exxon Unveils New Spill Cleanup Plan

Exxon Corp. unveiled plans for a second season of oil spill cleanup, employing up to 1,100 workers to attack oil left on Alaska shores from last year’s Exxon Valdez spill, but Gov. Steve Cowper said the plan doesn’t go far enough. Exxon said it will put eight teams into the field, moving from shore to shore, retrieving oily debris, picking up oiled vegetation, collecting tar balls, removing oil hardened into asphalt, tilling sediments, spot washing and applying a chemical fertilizer designed to stimulate growth of oil-eating microorganisms, a process called bioremediation. But Cowper charged “a few of the most important aspects of the 1990 response aren’t a part of this plan,” singling out the rock washing and bioremediation plans as inadequate.