[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 124 (Thursday, September 29, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10713-S10714]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 WATER TECHNOLOGY AND INTERNATIONAL AID

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, fresh water is a substance that we as 
Americans assume will be available when and where we want it. However, 
the disruption of water and wastewater services following Hurricane 
Katrina and Hurricane Rita has shown how fragile those assumptions can 
be. The resulting fear, panic and instability are what we rarely 
experience in this Nation. However, as we look around the globe, those 
same fears, sense of panic, and sense of instability is a daily 
occurrence for over 1 billion people across the globe who have little 
or no hope for a speedy resolution of their concerns.
  We must help solve the expanding problems of insufficient clean 
drinking water and inadequate wastewater treatment. These are matters 
of international importance for several reasons. First, we are a member 
of an increasingly international economy, and the expansion or 
contraction of economies the world over affects our industry and 
economy. Furthermore, disease knows no borders and can spread through 
water. Most importantly, we care about the well being of others. All 
these national policy goals are intimately related to adequate water 
and wastewater treatment across the world.
  There are many ways that we can help address this world-wide problem. 
However, lasting solutions require that local individuals and 
institutions have the capacity to maintain and expand their own 
services.

[[Page S10714]]

  This point has been hammered home by a report to be released by the 
Center for Strategic and International Studies and Sandia National 
Laboratories today. The report reinforces what any organization 
addressing international water issues already knows: the local 
community must accept, embrace, maintain and take responsibility for 
the solution to their water issues. There are several initiatives in 
place in our country that are helping local communities across the 
globe in this regard.
  The Department of Energy National Laboratories have tested tools and 
techniques for improving our domestic capacity in the desert southwest. 
The labs have shared that information with institutions around the 
globe to help strengthen local capacity.
  As an example, Sandia National Laboratories' efforts to create new 
technologies to address major U.S. water issues are being applied to 
critical water issues in the strategically important Middle East. 
Ongoing interactions with Iraq, Jordan, Libya and Israel are helping 
address water safety, security and sustainability issues with 
technologies in water management modeling, water quality monitoring and 
desalination.
  Sandia is also working to rebuild Iraq's science and technology 
capacity in collaboration with the Arab Science and Technology 
Foundation and the Departments of Energy and State. Just last week in 
Amman, Jordan, Sandia co-hosted a meeting where proposals developed by 
Iraqi scientists and their international collaborators were reviewed 
and presented to international funding agencies. Two such proposals for 
improving water resources management in Iraq were presented by Sandia 
staff and their Iraqi counterparts.
  Separately, Sandia is working with the United Nations Educational, 
Scientific, and Cultural Organization to develop a proposed planning 
framework for water management in Iraq. This framework will utilize an 
advanced water management model developed at Sandia coupled with 
training of Iraqi water managers and scientists. This proposed 
framework is expected to be presented to Iraq's Ministry of Water in 
November.
  In other areas, Sandia has reached a preliminary agreement with the 
Royal Scientific Society, RSS, in Jordan to pilot test a new technology 
for real-time collaborative development of water management models over 
the Internet. This technology will enable U.S. and Jordanian water 
experts to jointly assemble, test and deploy water management models, 
working in real time while half a world apart. Sandia has also 
developed a proposal with the Jordanians to pilot test real-time water 
quality monitoring technology utilizing Sandia's chem-lab-on-a-chip 
technology.
  In Libya, Sandia is working on a program with the Departments of 
Energy and State to refocus former Libyan weapons scientists on 
development of peaceful technologies that will enable Libya to develop 
a strong, internationally-engaged economy. Water is a very high 
priority for the Libyans, and they are reconfiguring their former 
weapons development laboratory into a facility they have named the 
Renewable Energy and Water Desalination Research Center. Sandia is 
helping identify desalination technologies for use in Libya, with 
particular attention to technologies for treating the brackish water 
that is produced as a by-product of pumping oil and gas.
  Further, Israeli water experts came to Sandia in 2003 to learn about 
water security. The trip led to a series of visits between Israeli 
water security experts, the Environmental Protection Agency's National 
Homeland Security Research Center, and Sandia. These interactions 
resulted in a collaborative proposal to test Sandia's real-time, chem-
lab-on-a-chip water quality monitoring technology in Israel's water 
supply system.
  Congress helped develop these tools by allowing the Department of 
Energy Laboratories to use part of their resources for laboratory 
directed research and development. In the case of Sandia, these seed 
funds have produced sensor technologies to test water for contaminants 
and terror agents, numerical models to help groups jointly manage and 
plan for the future and reduce conflict, water treatment technologies 
that may reduce costs and make impaired water available for beneficial 
uses, and tools to detect and respond to terrorist attacks in our 
municipal drinking water systems. These seed projects have then been 
extended and are coming to fruition under direct funding we have 
provided through the Department of Energy, DOE.
  The work at Sandia National Laboratory does not represent a 
comprehensive list of all the achievements within the DOE. In fact, 
twelve of our national laboratories, all of whom have worked to expand 
and protect water supplies in some way, have worked jointly for three 
years to develop an outline of the ways water and energy resources are 
inter-related. These institutions are now working under DOE direction 
to develop a report to Congress on this interdependency, which I 
believe will help us determine which programs will most effectively 
ensure sufficient water supplies to support our energy needs and 
sufficient energy supplies to meet our water needs.
  Additionally, these national laboratories are now working with both 
Federal and non-Federal institutions around the U.S. to develop a 
technology development roadmap. This effort will clearly identify our 
highest priority investments in research, development and 
commercialization so we can expand our nations' water supplies.
  The success of these investments led us to authorize a new DOE 
program as part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. That program is 
broad. I believe that overall it will help resolve problems related to 
water just as we are working to resolve our energy supply problems. I 
am particularly interested in the technology development aspects of the 
program and therefore plan to introduce a bill soon to instruct the DOE 
to focus attention on technology development and commercialization. A 
similar bill was introduced last Congress in partnership with Members 
from the House, and I have high hope that working together we can pass 
legislation this Congress.
  I must note that DOE efforts are not the only activities that can 
assist the U.S. in addressing international water issues. The Bureau of 
Reclamation has a 30-year history of developing desalination 
technologies that have a significant international impact. The Bureau's 
reputation and capabilities in this area cannot be underestimated, and 
I hope the administration will develop a long-term strategy for use and 
expansion of those resources. Further, I have supported the Office of 
Naval Research's efforts to develop mobile water treatment technology 
for our troops. This technology has proven its worth by being deployed 
to Mississippi in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
  Additionally, my colleague and friend, Majority Leader Frist, 
introduced legislation this spring entitled the ``Safe Water Currency 
for Peace Act of 2005'', S.492, which directs the Department of State 
to develop a cohesive international water development policy and then 
to begin to implement that strategy. This policy effort holds strong 
promise for the future of water as well.
  I believe and remain a champion of the need to look ahead, to see the 
future of water supplies in this nation and the world and to actively 
prepare for that future. I have said before, and I still believe, that 
there is no more important or essential substance to us than water. It 
is the source from which life springs. It also has the potential to be 
the source of incredible conflict at both local and international 
levels. Fresh water supplies are coming under pressure all over the 
globe. Seriously confronting this problem before it leads to tremendous 
burdens on this nation and the world is an endeavor as worthwhile as 
any I can contemplate. The need is great. The goal is good. The 
initiatives I have discussed today, and others like them, can help us 
confront this problem.

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