Despite powerful opposition, Delaware has chosen conservation over industrial growth. Last week Governor Russell W. Peterson signed a law that stops heavy industry from locating new plants on the state's 125-mile-long ocean, bay and river coastline. The law, first of its kind in the U.S., specifically bans oil refineries, petrochemical complexes, steel mills, offshore bulk-transfer terminals and paper mills—all potential polluters. "Clean" industries (such as jewelry manufacturing and research labs) may settle on Delaware's shoreline, but only after the state planner and a new ten-man control board approve applicants' plans.
"We're keenly disappointed," said an official at Shell Oil, which had proposed...
