Executive Calendar

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. CASSIDY. Madam President, I am joined on the floor by my colleague Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, who has recently visited coastal Louisiana and will share his observations following my remarks. He will speak objectively about that which we in Louisiana see not only objectively but emotionally.

We see our coastline melting away, and with the loss of that coastline, increasing vulnerability to hurricanes coming off the gulf, as well as a loss of villages, beautiful oak trees as salinity kills their roots, whole communities, and ways of life. I shall elaborate because Louisiana's coastal erosion impacts local businesses, communities, and I would say even our entire Nation.

Some of the Nation's most important trade, energy, and commercial fishing assets are associated with South Louisiana. Now, every Senator gets up and is proud of his or her State, and they will make statements such as that, but these statements are objectively true.

By tonnage, 5 of the 25 largest ports in the country are located in South Louisiana and along the Mississippi River. Twenty percent of the Nation's waterborne commerce moves through Louisiana. Approximately, 11,000 vessels use the lower Mississippi annually. If you think of a map of our country, from Wyoming to Pennsylvania, that is the territory of our country drained by the Mississippi and its tributaries. If you are shipping goods from Ohio to South America, most likely you are sending it down the Mississippi. The prosperity of the farmer along the Missouri River can depend upon the navigation of the lower Mississippi. It is truly a nation-impacting resource, but coastal erosion threatens the flow of commerce that is essential and vital to all of these areas.

Approximately, 20 percent of the Nation's oil supply originates off the coast of Louisiana, and countless oilfield service companies are located in South Louisiana to process that energy. Companies like Cheniere, Tellurian, Sempra, and others are investing billions in liquefied natural gas facilities, demonstrating the value of the United States but of Louisiana, in particular, in the global LNG market.

By the way, the workers who work in these rigs or work in these industries may live in Louisiana, but sometimes they will live far inland. I saw a map where somebody commuted from Montana, coming down by airplane, working for a month, and then going back to Montana. So the folks who work in our energy industry may come from any part of our country. Coastal erosion puts this energy infrastructure in jeopardy, threatening our Nation's energy security.

Louisiana has the largest commercial fishing industry in the lower 48, harvesting and selling shrimp, crawfish, crabs, and oysters to restaurants and grocery stores around the country. Coastal erosion puts this industry and the livelihoods of the workers who depend upon it in jeopardy.

For these reasons, among many more, I fight in Congress to protect the Louisiana coastline. Senator Whitehouse frequently has a floor chart when speaking on the environmental issues and says: ``Time to wake up.'' Everyone in Louisiana is very awakened to this crisis.

Our State has developed its Coastal Master Plan to help restore and maintain our coast. I think Senator Whitehouse will refer to that. We may not be able to save every parcel of land, but it is imperative that we work to protect the vulnerable marshland, as we can, and, in turn, the businesses and communities from the effects that we see today.

By the way, oftentimes we only hear about industry and environmental organizations attacking one another, but in Louisiana, we found that without one, the other cannot survive. We have found that the environmentalists and the energy industry have a way to coexist and to work for the betterment of the other. One example is that the State receives revenues from offshore energy production and other grant programs to protect and restore our coastline. Louisiana's constitution mandates that these dollars go to coastal restoration, creating a unique partnership where the royalty payments from the energy industry fund the environmental restoration upon which my State's future depends.

Projects funded with this revenue include the Mid-Barataria and Mid- Breton diversion projects, designed to direct more sediment from the Mississippi River to rebuild marshland lost due to coastal erosion, in part because the Mississippi River was previously leveed. Other projects seek to protect vulnerable marshland from further losses by controlling saltwater intrusion in the Houma Navigation Canal or the Calcasieu River ship channel. However, more needs to be done to protect Louisiana's coastline and the impact upon the United States' economic and energy security.

In a previous Congress, I introduced legislation in the House and now in the Senate to amend the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act to provide more offshore energy revenue to energy-producing States in the gulf to fund coastal restoration and other environmental protection projects. Most recently, in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act bill and in another bill, there was an increase to the current cap on GOMESA dollars for fiscal years 2020 and 2021. I am currently working on another version of revenue-sharing legislation for the Gulf States, which I plan to introduce later this spring.

As part of that effort, working with Senator Whitehouse's staff, we have been working on legislation to create a revenue-sharing program with the Federal and State governments for offshore wind to fund coastal resiliency efforts, an issue important to us and probably about 80 percent of America's population that I roughly judge lives within 100 miles of the coastline.

I look forward to working with Senator Whitehouse and other colleagues to ensure that the coastal restoration needs important to Louisiana and to the United States are met. Again, I so appreciate Senator Whitehouse's coming to visit and learn more about coastal Louisiana. I look forward to working with him on our mutual interests to protect our environment and our communities.
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source