Water Resources Development Act of 2007--Motion to Proceed
WATER RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT ACT OF 2007--MOTION TO PROCEED -- (Senate - May 10, 2007)
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Mr. GRASSLEY. I thank the Chair.
Mr. President, it is a pleasure to see this bill out here again as it was last year, passing the Senate, I think unanimously. I had thoughts that maybe we would never see this bill again in this new Congress, such a needed bill as it is. We have not passed a water resource development bill since 2000. Usually Congress, before that period of time, had been reauthorizing every 2 years or authorizing for the first time on a regular basis.
This bill is important to the entire country, but we each represent our respective States. So I see the necessity of this bill from how it enhances the economy of the upper Midwest, Iowa being in the upper Midwest, benefiting very much from it, not only because of where we are geographically located, but we are such a breadbasket for the world as well. For Iowa, the Enhanced Navigation Capacity Improvement and Ecosystem Restoration plan for the upper Mississippi and the Illinois water systems being included in this Water Resources Development Act is vital to the economy and to the ecology of the upper Midwest and particularly to the Mississippi River, with its triple purpose of environment, recreation, and commerce.
Of course, Iowa has the Mississippi River as our eastern boundary. Iowa and the Nation rely on the river to move many of our goods, both domestically and internationally, moving goods into our State that are needed for production as well as moving finished product and raw product out of Iowa, not only agricultural products, which maybe you think about most often, but other products beyond agriculture.
For the United States as a whole, our inland waterway system plays a major role in our Nation's economy. More than a billion tons of commerce is moved domestically through our inland waterways with a value of $300 billion. Of the $300 billion, the upper Mississippi and the Illinois River system contribute significantly. The value of that part of our inland waterway system is $12 billion per year. Approximately 60 percent of that $12 billion a year is involved with bulk agricultural exports moving from the farms to the river, down the river, both upper Mississippi and Illinois River, out into international commerce. Navigation on these rivers supports over 400,000 jobs, including 90,000 high-paying manufacturing jobs.
The United States enjoys a comparative advantage in corn production worldwide. My State of Iowa is the leading corn-producing State of the Nation. But the United States as a whole has a comparative advantage to the rest of the world. The per-ton cost for transporting corn in the United States is lower than in lots of other countries. That gives us a tremendous advantage beyond our productive capability. Our Nation must not allow its transportation infrastructure to continue to deteriorate. I believe one of the most important reasons for this legislation, at least as it relates to the Mississippi and Illinois, is there has been deterioration of the system on the one hand and, on the other hand, it has not been expanded in the most efficient way handle the enhanced commerce, the enhanced tonnage that goes up and down the river today compared to decades ago when this system was first set up.
Because of that, we have to be concerned not only with this deterioration and maintenance but with the expansion of it because our international competitors are making major investments in their transportation systems.
I had the good fortune, a year ago about now, to travel to Brazil with a codel I headed, to look at the transportation of agricultural products from the inland of Brazil to the ocean into world commerce. As far as some of their infrastructure is concerned, it is very inferior to ours because when traveling in rural Brazil, last year, we ran over more potholes--and I suppose in that area, like in rural Iowa, you would call them mud holes--than you can count.
But Brazil has made significant investments in river infrastructure as compared to their surface transportation. They are realizing they have to get the stuff to the river if they are going to get it into world commerce, so they are spending a lot in resources now on surface transportation to move it from the farm to the ocean. When that happens, I am telling you, we are really going to be at an economic disadvantage with Brazil because of what they are doing on the Amazon, because Brazil already has made significant investments in its river infrastructure.
In the Chamber, I have a map of Brazil, and it happens that where the two arrows are depicted on the map is where we stopped--at those locations on the Amazon River. At the eastern location, you can see there is a city called Santarem. It is 400 miles in from the Atlantic Ocean, which is about the same distance from New Orleans to Memphis. They have a brandnew facility there for loading oceangoing ships--not using barges, the way we do, and then taking them out to the ocean and loading from the barges onto oceangoing ships. They have oceangoing ships going all the way up the Amazon River to that point--400 miles. They get the efficiency of loading right onto the oceangoing ships, to give them an advantage. It is a very modern loading facility.
Now, there are also new facilities for barges farther up the river--another 200 miles up the river--where they can load onto barges and move their production into the world commerce. Barges traveling that far into the mainland are going to help Brazil become very competitive with our own farmers.
Then again, let me repeat, once they figure out how to get their railroad--they do not have much of a railroad system for commerce to move bulk--when they get railroads in place, when they get their highways in place, they are going to be a real challenge to us.
Let me say, I ought to give them more credit than I have. From the standpoint of what they can produce, at least with soybeans, they are outproducing the United States, as of a couple years ago, when, for the first time, we were no longer the world's leading producer of soybeans. So they have that capacity to produce. Where we are more competitive at this point is getting our stuff to market. But you can see they are concentrating on that. That is why we need to concentrate on this legislation to get our dam-and-lock situation on the upper Mississippi and the Illinois River in a position so we can do that.
Now, South America has more virgin land that has not been under production, and they are converting 17 million acres of virgin land into agricultural production. The long-term results of these efforts on producers in the United States, if we do not keep our transportation system on the Mississippi River and Illinois River up to date and expanded, would be to reduce farm income by $562 million a year, increase the foreign trade imbalance by $245 million, and to have a loss of sensitive global environmental habitat.
Therefore, we must invest in major improvements to all of our transportation infrastructure. Currently, every mode of transportation is near or at maximum capacity. If we do not make these investments in our roads, in our rail, in our water, U.S. agriculture, U.S. industry, and the working men and women are going to pay the price.
According to the Congressional Research Service, in 2005, U.S. exports of goods and services totaled $1.2 trillion, compared to $1.1 trillion in 2004 and
just a little over $1 trillion in 2003. Also, our Nation relies on many imported goods that come to the United States. Many of these goods travel by our inland waterways. It is also forecast that both our exports and imports will continue to grow in the coming years. We must be able, then, to efficiently and economically move these goods.
Nearly two-thirds of all grain and soybean exports are moved through the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers. According to one study, unless the Army Corps of Engineers modernizes the lock-and-dam system on the upper Mississippi and Illinois Rivers, the cost of transporting corn would rise 17 cents per bushel. As a result, corn and soybean exports would decline by 68 million and 10 million bushels per year respectively. The decline in corn and soybean exports would reduce farm income by $246 million. Loss from lower prices and decreased interstate corn demand would equal $316 million. So these figures highlight how important barge transportation is to farmers and to the overall U.S. economy.
In addition, there are many environmental benefits to river transportation. According to the EPA, towboats emit 35 to 60 percent fewer pollutants than locomotives or trucks. Barges operate at 10 percent of the cost of trucks and 40 percent the cost of trains, while releasing 20 times less nitrous oxide, 9 times less carbon monoxide, 7 times less hydrocarbons, and burning 10 times less fuel. And you can see this comparison right here, shown on this chart--with barges on the left, hopper cars or trains in the middle, and then trucks and semis on the right--you can see the massive number of semis it takes to do what one 15-barge tow would do. This chart shows 15 railcars or 58 semitrucks being needed to replace each barge loaded, diverted off the upper Mississippi river system. A 15-barge tow equates to 870 semitrucks. EPA also estimates that the Nation currently saves $100 million to $300 million in air pollution abatements by moving bulk commodities by barge on the upper Mississippi river system.
In these times of high fuel prices, and with the need to conserve energy, 1 gallon of fuel in a towboat can carry 1 ton of freight 2 1/2 times farther than rail and 9 times farther than trucks.
The Minnesota Department of Transportation estimates shifting from barge to rail results in fuel usage, emissions, and probable accident increases of 331 percent, 470 percent, and 290 percent respectively--for fuel usage, emissions, and probable accidents. Shifting traffic from barges to trucks increases fuel use by 826 percent, emissions by 709 percent, and probable accidents by almost 6,000 percent. Furthermore, shifting the 245 million tons from our rivers would add an additional 9.4 million trucks each year. That would add more than 169 million tires in our landfills.
For these reasons, I have been working with several of my Senate colleagues for so many years now on getting the initial authorization for lock-and-dam modernization and enhanced environmental restoration on these rivers signed into law. So I am very pleased this committee included these important initiatives in the Water Resources Development Act and that a bipartisan group of Senators is advocating for this very important modernization.
The lock system on the upper Mississippi River was built in the late 1930s. Many of the lock chambers are only 600 feet long and cannot accommodate 1,100-foot barge tows. These structures require modern tow configuration to ``double lock'' in order to make the pass-through. This adds up to mounting delay times, increased costs to shippers, increased harm to our environment by higher emissions and higher sediment suspension in the river channels, loss of jobs, and lower wages.
By the year 2020, if we do not make the much needed improvements in these locks, $562 million will be lost in farm income per year. This amount does not even take into account the huge cost of increased delays and congestion on our rail system and our road system. Also, keep in mind that $1 invested in this navigation project yields $6 in national benefit. That is a pretty good return on the investment of taxpayers' money.
We realize the authorization for the lock-and-dam improvements is just a first step in a lengthy process of improving the lock-and-dam system on the upper Mississippi, but it is an important and necessary project for our Nation. So I urge all of my colleagues to vote for this balanced legislation for the good of our country.
I yield the floor.
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Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I thank Senator Grassley so much for his endorsement of this important bill.
It was interesting, I say to the Senator, that just as you came to the floor, I was handed the letter from the Corn Growers saying how much they support our legislation. And we add to that the letters from the American Public Works Association, the Associated General Contractors of America, the National Waterways Conference, the American Farm Bureau Federation. We have the Carpenters Union. We have many unions.
This is one of those bills that have broad support. But I am just very glad the Senator came down to express his support.
Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a second?
Mrs. BOXER. I am happy to yield.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, let me verify, not only from the National Corn Growers Association, as you read from their letter, but I can tell you, from the town meetings I had during the Easter break and also during the February break, from the grassroots of my State, farmers, including members of the Corn Growers Association, came to my meetings and on an individual basis backed up what their national organization stands for. So I think it is very much a national consensus of an organization, but it is also an understanding with the family farmers as to the importance of this legislation.
I thank the Senator for inserting those letters in the Record.
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