[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 65 (Thursday, May 12, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2941-S2942]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. WHITEHOUSE (for himself, Ms. Snowe, Mr. Rockefeller, Mr. 
        Nelson of Florida, Ms. Landrieu, and Ms. Stabenow):
  S. 973. A bill to create the National Endowment for the Oceans to 
promote the protection and conservation of the United States ocean, 
coastal, and Great Lakes ecosystems, and for other purposes; to the 
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I rise this afternoon to discuss an 
important piece of bipartisan legislation that I am introducing today 
with my friend and fellow New Englander, Senator Snowe, to establish a 
national endowment for the study, conservation, and restoration of our 
Nation's oceans, coasts, and Great Lakes.
  Let me begin with a particular thank-you to our original cosponsors: 
the chairman of the Commerce Committee, Senator Rockefeller of West 
Virginia; the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Senator Inouye 
of Hawaii; my colleague from the great State of Michigan, Senator 
Stabenow; and two colleagues from the Gulf of Mexico region, Senator 
Bill Nelson of Florida and Senator Landrieu from Louisiana.
  As any Rhode Islander can tell you, the ocean is central to our 
State's way of life. I tell colleagues that Rhode Island's coast is one 
of the most beautiful places on Earth. But we don't call Rhode Island 
the Ocean State just because it is beautiful. We are the Ocean State 
because from our earliest days we have relied on the ocean and our 
beloved Narragansett Bay for trade, for food, for recreation, and for 
jobs in the shipbuilding, shipping, fishing, and tourism industries.
  And we are not alone--across America, our oceans and coasts directly 
provide over $130 billion to our country's gross domestic product, and 
support 2.3 million America jobs. But one impact goes far beyond that.
  Our coastal zone areas generate nearly 50 percent of our Nation's 
gross domestic product and support more than 28 million jobs.
  In part, it is Americans' love of and reliance on the oceans that 
drives the need now to protect and restore them. Coastal America is 
experiencing a huge population boom, leading to more and more 
construction that puts significant pressure on our natural coastline 
and our wetlands.
  Worldwide demand for seafood grows at a pace that our fish stocks 
cannot keep pace with, and our demand for energy leads us ever deeper 
into the ocean in search of fuel.
  There is an old adage, that nothing focuses the mind like a crisis. 
If this is true, it must be time to focus on taking care of our oceans, 
because I believe that our oceans are facing what can be characterized 
as nothing less than a crisis. Our oceans are facing an array of 
threats, from marine debris aggregating in gyres the size of Texas, to 
whales so full of bio-accumulative toxins that they constitute swimming 
hazardous waste.
  These are just a few of the headlines from just the past year:
  This spring, we have watched in horror as Japan, already suffering 
from a terrible earthquake and tsunami--and our hearts go out to them--
battled to keep the Fukushima Nuclear Plant intact. Leaks from the 
plant have sent harmful levels of radiation into the ocean.
  In July of 2010, the Midwest experienced its largest oil spill ever, 
after a leaking Michigan pipeline poured oil into the Kalamazoo River 
and thence into the Great Lakes.
  Last June, the journal Science published a literature review by 
researchers from the University of Queensland

[[Page S2942]]

and UNC Chapel Hill, revealing mounting evidence that:

       Rapidly rising greenhouse gas concentrations are driving 
     ocean systems toward conditions not seen for millions of 
     years, with an associated risk of fundamental and 
     irreversible ecological transformation.

  In my home State of Rhode Island, the Narragansett Bay has witnessed 
a 4-degree increase in average annual winter water temperature, causing 
what amounts to a full ecosystem shift.
  And of course, in April 2010, we witnessed the horrific explosion of 
the Deepwater Horizon, the tragic loss of life, and the unfolding of 
the largest environmental disaster our country has ever seen. The Gulf 
of Mexico, and the people who depend on this ecosystem for their 
sustenance and livelihoods, are still struggling to recover.
  We are now 13 months beyond the Deepwater Horizon explosion. Lives 
are still shattered; livelihoods reliant on the gulf ecosystem are 
still threatened. But we are within the window of action. It is not too 
late to provide for short-term restoration of the gulf coast to enact 
legislation that reduces the risk of future oilspills, and as my 
cosponsors and I seek to provide dedicated funding to study, protect, 
and restore the marine and coastal ecosystems within the United States' 
boundaries.
  The National Endowment for the Oceans is our proposal to meet this 
last challenge. The Endowment would make grants available to coastal 
and Great Lakes States, local government agencies, regional planning 
bodies, academic institutions, and nonprofit organizations so these 
entities could embark on projects to learn more about and do a better 
job of protecting our precious natural resource. Projects that allow 
researchers to hire technicians, mechanics, computer scientists and 
students. Projects that put people to work relocating critical public 
infrastructure jeopardized by sea level rise. Projects that solve 
resource management problems and restore our natural ecosystems. 
Projects that protect jobs by restoring commercial fisheries habitat, 
and creating new fisheries gear for sustainable and profitable fishing.

  The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration received $167 million 
for coastal restoration projects under the Recovery Act. More than 800 
proposals for shovel-ready construction and engineering projects came 
in, totaling $3 billion worth of work. But NOAA could only fund 50 of 
the 800.
  The National Endowment for the Oceans would help us move forward with 
these projects and others that protect our oceans and drive our 
economy. As I stand here today, more than a year after the beginning of 
the oilspill in the gulf, and in the face of mounting evidence that our 
oceans and coasts are truly facing a crisis, I understand the feelings 
of concern and frustration. But, again, I believe it is not too late.
  In fact, I believe the time is now to pass legislation that will help 
to restore the gulf ecosystem. The time is now to pass legislation that 
will reduce the risk of future oilspills. And it is time now to provide 
dedicated funding for the study, restoration, and protection of our 
Nation's ocean and coastal resources.
  We need to put the stewardship of our natural resources, our ocean 
resources, at the forefront of our national agenda. The National 
Endowment for the Oceans, as I said, is bipartisan. I thank Senator 
Olympia Snowe for her leadership in this effort. This legislation is 
science based, with much of the money made available through a 
competitive grant program. This legislation is cost effective, 
coordinating existing efforts of Federal, local, and private programs, 
reducing duplication of research efforts, and crossing political 
borders to ensure that every dollar is spent with the greatest possible 
effect.
  Finally, this legislation is appropriately paid for with revenue 
generated from the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, a portion of 
royalties from Outer Continental Shelf energy development, and fines 
and damages collected for violations of Federal law off our coastline. 
Put simply, a small portion of the revenue we extract from our oceans 
and great waters will be reinvested to now protect the long-term 
viability of those oceans and great waters.
  The ocean provides us with great bounty, and we will continue to take 
advantage of that, as we should. We will fish, we will sail, and we 
will trade. We will dispose of waste. We will extract fuel and 
construct wind farms. Navies and cruise ships, sail boats and 
supertankers will plow the ocean surface. We cannot change how reliant 
we are on our ocean. What we can change is what we do in return.
  We can for the first time give back. We can become stewards of our 
oceans, not just takers but caretakers. The oceans contain immense 
potential for new discoveries, immense potential for new jobs, and 
immense potential for new solutions to the emerging oceans crisis. But 
to meet the demands of this moment, we must respond to the challenges 
before us. We must heed the alarm bells that are ringing from the 
arctic seas to our tropic oceans, from the top of the food chain to the 
bottom, alarm bells indeed are ringing.
  I urge my colleagues to join Senator Snowe and myself in support of 
the National Endowment for the Oceans. Let ours be the generation that 
tips the increasingly troubling balance between mankind and our oceans 
a little bit back toward the benefit of our oceans for the long-term 
benefit of mankind.
                                 ______