The White House Office of Management and Budget today released its FY2024 budget proposal.
Among other things, the budget includes the following:
- $26 million to develop the Conservation and Stewardship Atlas to “inform conservation decisions”
- $87 million to support national marine sanctuaries and marine protected areas “as part of the Administration’s America the Beautiful Initiative,” with funding that would “expand critical conservation work and support the designation process for additional sanctuaries”
- $60 million for expanding offshore wind permitting activities at NOAA for use of “the best available science to help meet the Administration’s [30 gigawatts by 2030] deployment goal while protecting biodiversity and promoting sustainable ocean co-use”
- $154 million for the Bureau of Economic Analysis, that would among other things be used to fund research on environmental-economic statistics (Natural Capital Accounting initiative)
Regarding the funding request to develop the Conservation and Stewardship Atlas, the U.S. Geological Survey’s budget justification noted that provision of requested funds would enable USGS to “accelerate delivery of the Atlas by 2026.”
As to the administration’s Natural Capital Accounting initiative, the Commerce Dept.’s Bureau of Economic Analysis’s congressional budget submission noted that the request includes ~$8.6 million and 10 full-time positions (14 total) to develop a U.S. System of Environmental Economic Accounts to “systematically measure the contribution of environmental-economic activities to U.S. economic growth, employment, incomes, and productivity” and in turn provide “a more robust analysis and understanding of climate-related issues” through an “an entirely new economic account system requiring substantial new source data.”
BEA further noted that natural capital accounts “would show changes in quantities, or volumes, due to natural growth, discoveries, extraction, and depletion and can also be linked to traditional national balance sheet information,” and that support for this program “will directly impact the government’s ability to monitor and drive growth in the environmental industry and understand the implications of economic decision-making on the environment.”
