The U.S. House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis Majority Staff today released a report on “Solving the Climate Crisis: The Congressional Action Plan for a Clean Energy Economy and a Healthy, Resilient, and Just America.”
The 547-page report features 12 pillars, including one to “Protect and Restore America’s Lands, Waters, Ocean, and Wildlife” that includes a goal to protect 30% of all U.S. land and ocean areas by 2030, including through “high-value protection designation and direct[ing] federal land management agencies to work collaboratively with tribes, state governments, private landowners, and local communities.”
The report also calls on Congress to formally authorize state-established regional ocean partnerships as well as codify a National Ocean Policy that builds on the now-superseded 2010 National Ocean Policy to “include[] strong interagency and tribal coordination in the form of the White House-level Ocean Policy Committee…[and] strengthen the prior National Ocean Policy by prioritizing ocean stakeholder engagement and focusing on ocean health, conservation, and climate change mitigation and resilience.”
Other recommended ocean-related congressional actions in the Plan include the following:
- Encourage U.S. Interior Dept. to take a regional approach to offshore renewable energy planning and leasing and require that such development avoids and minimizes environmental impacts and conflicts with ocean wildlife, ecosystems, cultural resources, and other marine activities to the maximum extent practicable through thoughtful siting, appropriate precautions, and committing to understanding and protecting marine life
- Prohibit new offshore oil and natural gas leasing, codify and strengthen drilling safety standards for existing wells, prohibit “high-intensity” seismic testing outside the Gulf of Mexico and Cook Inlet, implement reporting requirements for failures of critical safety systems, improve monitoring of pollution near wells, and strengthen bonding and reclamation requirements for all offshore oil and gas development
- Implement a royalty rate of no less than 18.75% for all offshore oil and gas production, regardless of water depth, end royalty relief for offshore oil and gas development,
- Provide loan guarantees for public-private partnerships to upgrade coastal grid infrastructure for offshore wind projects and direct FERC to break down barriers to interconnection of offshore wind facilities and develop a cost allocation methodology for offshore wind transmission facilities
- Amend the Title XI loan guarantee program to include wind turbine installation vessels to incentivize the manufacture of vessels that will be needed to service a growing offshore wind industry
- Prohibit funding R&D programs for the commercial development of methane hydrates for natural gas
- Consider establishing 11th national standard on climate change resilience and impacts under Magnuson-Stevens Act for regional fishery management councils and establish additional tools and requirements to ensure the impacts of climate change are fully considered and integrated into the management process
- Direct NOAA to provide research, capacity, and management recommendations to fisheries management councils on how to adapt to a changing climate and tools for incorporating climate change consideration into management plans
- Support and invest in increased scientific understanding of the impacts of climate change on the ocean, wetlands, and other blue carbon ecosystems, including through reauthorization of National Oceanographic Partnership Program
- Expand and sustain funding to federal agencies to support robust climate science research, observations, monitoring, and modeling activities
- Establish Ambassador at Large for Arctic Affairs to lead policy formulation and development and represent United States in international diplomatic negotiations on Arctic issues
- Increase funding for NOAA to expand research on the ocean carbon cycle, including the effects of declining marine mammal and fish populations on blue carbon sequestration
- Expand Coastal Barrier Resources Act nationwide to identify and protect more biologically sensitive areas vulnerable to sea level rise, storm surges, and hurricanes and to increase habitat for aquatic and coastal species
- Review and, where applicable, update laws to establish that confronting climate change and conserving and restoring natural systems should be an essential mandate for all U.S. natural resource agencies
- Increase funding for the National Coastal Zone Management Program, NOAA’s National Estuarine Research Reserve System, and the National Sea Grant program
- Direct NOAA to identify and monitor marine mammal species and populations that will be harmed by climate change impacts and develop and implement a conservation management plan for each such species
- Increase federal research, monitoring, forecasting, mitigation, and adaptation efforts for ocean and coastal acidification
- Reauthorize the Coral Reef Conservation Act and establish grant program to support development of State Coral Reef Action Plans
- Reauthorizing Harmful Algal Bloom and Hypoxia Research Control Act and increase grant funding for HAB mitigation and response
- Provide long-term extension of the Section 48 tax credit for offshore wind energy projects and longer-term extension of tax credit for marine and hydrokinetic energy resources, with direct pay option for clean energy tax credits
- Reauthorize and expand U.S. Energy Dept. research, development, and demonstration of offshore wind and marine and hydrokinetic energy technologies
- Increase funding for U.S. Transportation Dept.’s Maritime Environmental and Technical Assistance Program
- Ensure that qualifying shipping fuels are eligible for credits under the Renewable Fuel Standard or a future Low Carbon Fuel Standard
- Fully fund the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund and continue to allow fees to pay for projects to increase the resilience of U.S. ports and harbors
- Ensure that future investments in U.S. ports and harbors, including Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund expenditures on waterside infrastructure improvements, prioritize long-term climate resilience
- Expand federal Earth observation activities, including ocean networks, to support real-time hazard monitoring, short-term weather forecasting, and long-range projections of climate risk
