The Response Committee provides a forum for the NRT to assess the effectiveness of oil spill and hazardous substance incident reporting and response mechanisms established by the NCP, to provide a feedback loop to On-Scene Coordinator's (OSCs) and RRTs regarding their reports of response actions, and to make recommendations to all levels regarding improvements to the response system. The committee: (1) highlights and summarizes response related lessons learned from OSC reports, (2) identifies gaps in coverage or needs for additional guidance throughout the national response system, and (3) abstracts case history information about technologies or procedures for the purpose of providing useful feedback to RRTs, OSCs and other participants in the response system. The purposes of committee recommendations to the NRT are: (1) to apprise the NRT of response issues of interest or which need to be addressed by the committee through review of reports or research and development activities, and (2) through NRT action, advance technology or otherwise improve response action. The objectives of the committee are to make recommendations to improve overall federal incident response, enhance coordination with state, local, and private responders, and encourage timely updates of NCP, RCP, and Area response plans as needed.