Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA)

Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) is the US legal and technical process by which trustees quantify injury to natural resources from an oil discharge or hazardous-substance release and pursue restoration. Under the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, NOAA trustees apply 15 CFR Part 990; under CERCLA, Department of the Interior trustees apply 43 CFR Part 11. Federal, state, and tribal trustees act for the public to make the environment whole, returning resources and lost services to baseline and compensating for interim losses. The polluter funds restoration; the Deepwater Horizon settlement directed about $8.8 billion to NRDA restoration.