Climate Change

Floor Speech

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here once again, actually now for the 40th time, to urge my colleagues to wake up to the threat of climate change.

I am very pleased to be joined today by our colleague Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii, who is a champion of renewable energy and energy efficiency. As Hawaii's Lieutenant Governor, he coauthored his State's net metering rule, which encourages renewable energy, and he led the design of the State's Renewable Energy Portfolio, which is on track to be No. 1 in the Nation. He has pushed commonsense ways to boost energy security and battle climate change, and it is no wonder he has been called Hawaii's ``Ambassador of Energy.''

We are here today in the wake of a hearing last week in the Committee on Environment and Public Works. The premise of that hearing was simple--``Climate Change: It's Happening Now.'' Disappointingly, again, allies of the fossil fuel industry attempted to discount or downplay that straightforward call to action.

Of the climate scientists on hand, everyone--even the minority witnesses--agreed that carbon dioxide causes climate change. That is physics 101. And all but one agreed that climate change is a real problem. The only academic who did not, Dr. Roy Spencer, is affiliated with the industry-backed George C. Marshall Institute and the Heartland Institute.

Regrettably, Dr. Spencer played a tried-and-true trick of the climate deniers: deselecting data that does not support your conclusions. Scientists around the world have been collecting high-quality surface temperature data for more than 100 years. To Dr. Spencer, however, the only data that matters are satellite and balloon readings of atmospheric temperatures in the tropics. Why ignore data outside the tropics? Why ignore surface temperature data? Why ignore ocean data, when the oceans cover two-thirds of the globe? Well, when you look at all the data, it shows the Earth warming at a much faster rate than his data in isolation.

Other minority witnesses played similar games.

Ms. Furchtgott-Roth, who is not a climate scientist, testified. She appears to be a sort of all-purpose witness-of-all-trades for the Republicans on topics that range from job training to health insurance to constitutional law, even to Samoan fisheries. She claimed that climate change has stopped.

Well, if you look at the past decade, you can convince yourself that climate change has stopped. Actually, on this chart I have in the Chamber, you can convince yourself that climate change has stopped five different times. But when you look at the whole picture, the only conclusion is that the Earth is getting warmer. The past 10 years were warmer than the 10 years before that. In fact, the past 10 years were warmer than any other 10 years in recorded history.

The continued, now-near-fraudulent denial of climate change is pernicious. Dr. Jennifer Francis of Rutgers called out in her testimony what she calls ``climate misleaders.'' She explained--and I will quote her--

These are people who [are] deliberately ignoring and misconstruing the science in an attempt to convince [lawmakers] and the public that either human-caused climate change isn't happening, or that it's nothing to worry about.

Well, I am sure Senator Schatz is aware that observations around the world, including in his home State, show climate change is indeed real and already happening.

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, tide gauges in Newport, RI, show an increase in average sea level of nearly 10 inches since 1930. That is a big deal for Rhode Islanders when we think about how devastating our great hurricane of 1938 was and what worse would now befall us with 10 more inches of sea for storms to hammer against our shores.

Those measurements show that the rate of sea level rise is also increasing. This matches reports that since 1990, sea level has been rising faster than the rate predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Part of what has caused sea level rise is ocean warming, as described by Senator Schatz.

When fluids get warm, including ocean water, they expand and therefore rise. During last week's EPW hearing, we heard about the heat, significant amounts of heat, that oceans are now absorbing. Even if atmospheric warming had hit another temporary level, the ocean is still warming, and ocean warming hits ocean ecosystems.

Dr. Margaret Leinin testified at the hearing last week about a study that showed economically important species such as cod, haddock, yellowtail, and winter flounder shifting northward over the last four decades. The study suggests that the fish are moving to locations within their preferred temperature range.

Scientists have begun to tease out how what seem like small changes in average temperature are important to fish and other animals in the ocean. In Narragansett Bay, we have a continuous temperature record going back to 1959, along with data on what is living in the water. We know water temperature is rising. One study found on average winter temperatures are up almost 4 degrees since the 1960s in Narragansett Bay, and that is not good for the winter flounder.

NOAA scientists working in Rhode Island found that winter flounder incubated in warmer water are smaller when they hatch than those incubated in colder water. Juvenile winter flounder need time to settle to the bottom of the bay and to grow larger before abundant bottom feeders such as the sand shrimp arrive. It looks like warmer water brings the shrimp in earlier while the flounder are still small enough to eat, making them easier prey.

So the evidence is that warmer waters load the dice against winter flounder in Narragansett Bay, and the fisherman who relied upon this fishery paid the price. Catches are down to less than one-tenth of what they once were. Fishermen in Hawaii are paying the price as well.

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. As the Senator from Hawaii said, it is not just Hawaii, it is not just Rhode Island actually, it is all of our States that will be affected. Dr. Leinin, who testified at our EPW hearing, is from Florida Atlantic University. She highlighted how sensitive Florida will be to climate change.

In her testimony, Dr. Leinin said:

The Caribbean/Florida region has shown sea surface temperature increases of about ..... [2 degrees Fahrenheit] per decade concurrent with losses of viable coral reef area of between 5.5 percent and 9.2 percent per year. Western Atlantic reefs have the highest percentage area affected by bleaching of any reefs worldwide.

Not so great for Florida's diving and snorkeling economy. Dr. Leinin pointed out that Florida's population ``is heavily concentrated, with almost 14 million people living along our coast. In South Florida, Miami, the seventh largest city in the country, the Florida Keys, coastal and inland portions of Broward County, the Florida Everglades and Ft. Lauderdale are all below 2 feet in elevation.''

The effects of sea level rise that we discussed for Hawaii and Rhode Island appear to be more evident in Florida. Dr. Leinin told us: Although sea level rise has only risen these few inches in 50 years, that rise has been sufficient to prevent drainage systems from working during lunar high tides and during storms. The streets of Miami Beach are now routinely flooded at peak high tide. The addition of storm surges to these higher sea levels means that drainage systems no longer work reliably, causing seawater to move into storm sewer systems forcing water inland.

So South Florida is ground zero for sea level rise. As Senator Schatz said earlier, this is one of the effects of climate change. Sea level rise has not stopped or slowed down, especially not in South Florida. It is time to wake up and get to work slowing these changes where we can, and adapting our communities to their inevitable effects.

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, Rhode Island is preparing for climate change. We are doing it in commonsense ways. Along our coasts, we are identifying areas that are vulnerable to sea level rise. The University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography is a world leader in measuring and understanding the effects of climate change on our waters.

Rhode Island's Department of Health, with a grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is preparing us for the health effects associated with climate change. But it is not enough for individual States to have to act alone. That is why Senator Schatz and I, along with our colleagues in the House, Representatives Waxman and Blumenauer, have put forward a discussion draft for a fee on carbon pollution.

It is clear when we consider the damage climate change will cause, indeed already has begun to cause, there is a social cost of carbon pollution. It is not factored into the price of fossil fuel.

That is a market failure, and our approach would correct that market failure.

We wish to discuss with our Democratic and Republican colleagues how best to implement this solution, what the price should be, how fast it should rise, and how to return the proceeds back to Americans. A market solution like this should be right up Republicans' alley. This is why Republicans such as Art Laffer and George Shultz are talking about it.

A fee on carbon can reduce emissions. One option, to use the proceeds to reduce taxes, should be attractive to our Republican colleagues.

To give one example, with the majority of the carbon pollution fee proceeds, setting a little reserve aside for the lowest income people, putting the rest of it to work lowering corporate income taxes, and just with that you can reduce the top of the American corporate income tax rate from 35 to 28 percent, that is a pretty considerable value to those businesses that are still considering paying the top rate, and that should be worth something during negotiations.

As I have said before in these talks, it is time to wake up. It is time to get to work.

I wish to thank my friend Senator Schatz for his leadership in the effort to protect Americans from the harms of climate change.

I turn to him now for his final remarks and welcome Senator Blumenthal, who will be joining us in this colloquy.

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