[Senate Hearing 111-408]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 111-408
NOMINATIONS TO THE
EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT
AND THE DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE,
SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 12, 2009
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and
Transportation
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SENATE COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION
ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, West Virginia, Chairman
DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas,
JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts Ranking
BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota OLYMPIA J. SNOWE, Maine
BARBARA BOXER, California JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada
BILL NELSON, Florida JIM DeMINT, South Carolina
MARIA CANTWELL, Washington JOHN THUNE, South Dakota
FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi
MARK PRYOR, Arkansas JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia
CLAIRE McCASKILL, Missouri DAVID VITTER, Louisiana
AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas
TOM UDALL, New Mexico MEL MARTINEZ, Florida
MARK WARNER, Virginia MIKE JOHANNS, Nebraska
MARK BEGICH, Alaska
Ellen L. Doneski, Chief of Staff
James Reid, Deputy Chief of Staff
Christine D. Kurth, Republican Staff Director and General Counsel
Paul Nagle, Republican Chief Counsel
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on February 12, 2009................................ 1
Statement of Senator Rockefeller................................. 1
Statement of Senator Hutchison................................... 41
Statement of Senator Isakson..................................... 45
Statement of Senator Nelson...................................... 46
Statement of Senator Martinez.................................... 48
Statement of Senator Begich...................................... 50
Statement of Senator Snowe....................................... 52
Statement of Senator Klobuchar................................... 55
Statement of Senator Vitter...................................... 57
Statement of Senator Cantwell.................................... 60
Statement of Senator Warner...................................... 62
Witnesses
Dr. John P. Holdren, Director-Designate, Office of Science and
Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President........... 1
Prepared statement........................................... 4
Biographical information..................................... 6
Statement of Senator Wyden....................................... 22
Dr. Jane Lubchenco, Undersecretary-Designate of Commerce for
Oceans and Atmosphere, U.S. Department of Commerce............. 23
Prepared statement........................................... 25
Biographical information..................................... 27
Appendix
Hon. John F. Kerry, U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, prepared
statement...................................................... 71
Hon. Barbara Boxer, U.S. Senator from California, prepared
statement...................................................... 71
Response to written questions submitted to Dr. Jane Lubchenco by:
Hon. John D. Rockefeller IV.................................. 72
Hon. Mark Begich............................................. 74
Hon. Barbara Boxer........................................... 76
Hon. Maria Cantwell.......................................... 77
Hon. Daniel K. Inouye........................................ 78
Hon. John F. Kerry........................................... 81
Hon. Kay Bailey Hutchison.................................... 82
Hon. Olympia J. Snowe........................................ 82
Hon. Johnny Isakson.......................................... 86
Hon. David Vitter............................................ 87
Response to written questions submitted to Dr. John Holdren by:
Hon. John D. Rockefeller IV.................................. 90
Hon. Barbara Boxer........................................... 94
Hon. Maria Cantwell.......................................... 95
Hon. John F. Kerry........................................... 97
Hon. Mark Warner............................................. 99
Hon. David Vitter............................................ 99
NOMINATIONS TO THE
EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT
AND THE DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
----------
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2009
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:20 a.m., in
room SR-253, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. John D.
Rockefeller IV, Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV,
U.S. SENATOR FROM WEST VIRGINIA
The Chairman. Let us have our witnesses come.
Now, we are doing something a little different today, and
that is that we are going to do two witnesses at once. This is
not to diminish, obviously, either one of them, because that is
an impossibility just by their nature, but it is simply so that
we can cross-question if we wish and because it saves time and
because we want to get their nominations moving as fast as
possible.
Members should also be aware that on February 26 we will
have hopefully, if the paperwork is done--and it should be--our
Secretary of Commerce before us on February 26. So mark that
down and please be sure to be here for that.
Dr. Holdren, you are in the White House, and so why don't
you make your opening statement?
STATEMENT OF DR. JOHN P. HOLDREN, DIRECTOR-
DESIGNATE, OFFICE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY POLICY,
EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT
Dr. Holdren. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, Senator
Hutchison, Members of the Committee. It is an honor and a
privilege to appear before you as President Obama's nominee for
Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy. That
office has two broad areas of responsibility, and if confirmed
by the Senate, I will give my enthusiastic attention to both of
those.
One of them is policy for science and technology, meaning
policies for strengthening the research and development
enterprise in the public and private sectors, for science and
technology education and training, and for fostering the
conditions under which advances in science and technology can
be translated into economic, environmental, and security
benefits for society at large.
The other side of the office's responsibilities are science
and technology for policy, which means ensuring that insights
from science and engineering are available to our elected
leaders as they shape economic policy, defense policy, health
policy, environmental policy, and so on.
OSTP has the challenge of covering both of those broad and
demanding domains in the White House, in interaction with other
Executive Branch agencies, and in interaction with the
Congress, with a modest staff and budget. And that means we
need to recruit very high caliber people both for the
professional staff and for the volunteer but senior advisors on
the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology,
and it means that we have to use that in-house talent to reach
out to and draw on the advice of the wider science and
engineering communities.
I would like now, if I may, to offer a few brief thoughts
about the major challenges facing our country at the
intersection of science and technology with the economy, the
environment, and with national security, and about how the work
of OSTP relates to those challenges.
American investments in science and engineering have driven
much of the economic growth that our country has enjoyed for
the past half century, by most accounts 50 to 85 percent of it.
Two-thirds of our productivity gains in the recent decades are
directly attributable to scientific and technological advances,
and in today's time of economic crisis, we have to resist the
temptation to reduce our investments in these foundations of
our prosperity.
In this connection, I want to give special mention to the
importance of R&D in our space program. Maintaining and
expanding our capabilities in space is sometimes regarded as a
luxury that we should do less of in the face of more pressing
earthbound concerns. I think that would be false economy. Space
is crucial to our national defense. It is crucial to civil as
well as military communications and geopositioning. It is
crucial to weather forecasting and storm monitoring, crucial to
observation and scientific study of the condition of our home
planet's land, vegetation, oceans, and atmosphere, and it is
crucial to scientific study and exploration looking outward. As
with the rest of our fundamental and applied research
enterprise, investments in space are a bargain.
In concert with helping to nurture the R&D enterprise in
general, OSTP has an important function in promoting the
translation of the results of R&D into new products and
services that benefit Americans through widespread application.
This country has long demonstrated a high capacity for turning
novel ideas into new businesses and improved services.
Fostering this capacity for translating science and technology
into widespread benefit is going to be crucial in rebuilding
our economy, as well as in addressing our most pressing
challenges in energy, environment, health, and national
security.
Development of new technologies and providing incentives
for their widespread adoption is going to be particularly
crucial at the demanding intersection of energy, national
security, and climate change. Providing the affordable and
reliable energy that our economic well-being requires, while
also addressing the dangers of global climate change and over-
dependence on imported oil, are challenges demanding the utmost
in collaboration among the relative Executive Branch agencies,
the Congress, and the private sector.
Information technology has been a key driver of our
productivity growth in recent decades, and it has fundamentally
changed the way people worldwide communicate and work. But we
have just seen the beginning of what can be achieved.
Information technology has vast potential to improve health
care, to increase energy efficiency, to monitor climate and
other environmental conditions, and to manage the immense
amounts of data from scientific efforts from the Human Genome
Project to the Large Hadron Collider.
Better use of existing and new information technologies is
also going to be a key ingredient to improving K-12, college,
and university education in this country and not just to
produce the future cohorts of scientists, engineers, and
mathematicians that we are going to need. It is also going to
be key in upgrading the country's entire workforce and
providing Americans with the tools they need to participate
successfully in our democracy in an era where science,
technology, and information are becoming ever more important.
I want to mention finally the crucial roles that science
and technology play in our country's capacity to deal with
threats to our security both at home and abroad. Those include
the need to address complex new challenges (asymmetric
conflicts, urban operations, cyber threats, potential terrorist
access to weapons of mass destruction), as well as all the
familiar but continuously changing challenges (nuclear and
biological weapons, ballistic missile and missile defense
technology, scientific intelligence gathering, among others).
The superb research done in the Defense Advance Research
Projects Agency and other parts of the defense research
establishment has contributed to United States security for
generations, and I regard it as a continuing obligation of OSTP
to help see that this continues.
OSTP's role in the security domain has an international
cooperation dimension as well and appropriately so, given the
existence of many security problems that can more readily be
addressed through multilateral agreements and cooperation
rather than unilateral action. Nuclear nonproliferation is a
prime example, but arms control agreements and mechanisms more
broadly continue to be an important element of our national
security portfolio. Science and technology are essential
elements of improving our capacity to verify existing arms
control agreements, as well as to help decide what additional
ones are in our national interest.
In conclusion, while our country clearly faces immense
challenges in the economic, environmental, health, and security
domains, among others, it is equally clear that science and
technology can be key ingredients in turning those challenges
into opportunities. But the pace of the advances we need for
these purposes cannot be taken for granted. How quickly or
slowly we get them is a substantial part a matter of policy.
The Office of Science and Technology Policy can play a crucial
role, in cooperation with the other Executive Branch agencies
and the Congress, in making it possible for us to reap these
rewards sooner rather than later.
If the Senate confirms me for the position of Director of
OSTP, I would hope to work particularly closely with the
members of this Committee, which has long been a source of
bipartisan support for the efforts needed to maintain America's
leadership across the frontiers of science, engineering, and
innovation.
I thank you for your attention. I will be pleased to try to
answer any questions you have.
[The prepared statement and biographical information of Dr.
Holdren follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. John P. Holdren, Director-Designate, Office
of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President
It is a singular honor and privilege to appear before this
Committee as President Obama's nominee for Director of the Office of
Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) within the Executive Office of the
President. I contemplate the opportunity of serving in this capacity,
if confirmed by the U.S. Senate, with a mixture of pride and humility.
I am proud to have been nominated by President Obama to work with
him and the Congress to sustain and strengthen our world-leading
science and engineering enterprises, which are so crucial to our
economic prosperity, our security. and the quality of our environment,
and to ensure the science and technology advice our policy-makers need
is always the best it can be.
But I am also humbled by the magnitude of these tasks, as well as
by the responsibility to live up to the standard set by the
extraordinary line of distinguished scientists who have served in
similar roles under Republican and Democratic Presidents since MIT's
Vannevar Bush served as President Roosevelt's science and technology
advisor in World War II.
Science and technology policy consists of two major strands: policy
for science and technology--namely, the policies related to
strengthening the research and development enterprise in the public and
private sectors, to science and technology education and training, and
to fostering the conditions under which advances in science and
technology are translated into economic, security, and environmental
benefits for society at large; and science and technology for policy--
meaning the use of insights from science and engineering in the
formation of those parts of economic policy, defense policy, space
policy, health policy, environmental policy, agricultural policy, and
so on, where such insights are needed to help shape sensible policies.
OSTP has the great challenge of covering this wide and critically
important terrain in the White House, and in interaction with other
Executive Branch agencies and the Congress, with a modest staff and
budget. This requires recruiting very high-caliber people both for the
professional staff and for the volunteer but very senior advisors on
the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST),
and using the connectivity of the staff and PCAST to draw on the advice
and analysis of the best of the rest of the science and engineering
communities. Making all of this work well is a task that, if confirmed,
I would give great attention.
Besides efficiency in the use of the available human resources, a
further key challenge for OSTP is carrying out its responsibility to
ensure the science and technology advice the President and Congress
receives, whether from inside or outside the government, is as
objective and accurate as the state of the relevant fields permits,
regardless of the political implications. If confirmed, I will consider
this one of my highest obligations, which would extend to working with
the Federal agencies that generate and process scientific and
technological information to be sure the best technical judgments of
the scientists and engineers working there are never censored or
distorted for ideological reasons.
I would like to briefly offer some thoughts about major challenges
facing our country at the intersection between science and technology
and the economy, the environment, and national security, and how the
work of OSTP relates to addressing these challenges.
American investments in science and engineering have driven most of
the innovations that underpin our economy today. A wide variety of
studies conclude that between 50 and 85 percent of the growth of the
U.S. economy over the past half-century--and two-thirds of our
productivity gains in recent decades--are directly attributable to
scientific and technological advances. In today's time of economic
crisis, we must resist the temptation to reduce our investments in
these foundations of our prosperity.
U.S. scientific leadership requires both creating an environment
that encourages private investment in research and development while
maintaining strong and balanced Federal research programs that support
the promising areas of R&D that are too far from obvious application,
too uncertain in outcome, too costly, or too related to public as
opposed to private goods to attract private funding.
In this connection, I want to give special mention to the
importance of R&D in our space program. Maintaining and expanding our
capabilities in space is sometimes regarded as a ``luxury'' we should
do less of in the face of more pressing earthbound concerns. But that
would be false economy. Space is crucial to our national defense; to
civil as well as military communications and geo-positioning; to
weather forecasting and storm monitoring; to observation and scientific
study of the condition of our home planet's land, vegetation, oceans,
and atmosphere; and to scientific study and exploration looking
``outward'' that is increasing our understanding of the physical
universe and our place in it.
I also want to note the importance of the sustainability and
predictability of the Federal investment in science and engineering.
The ``boom and bust'' cycles that have characterized much Federal
support in these domains over the past forty years are inefficient and
disruptive of scientific progress.
In concert with helping to nurture the R&D enterprise in general,
OSTP has an important function in promoting the translation of the
results of R&D into new products and services that benefit Americans
through widespread application. This country has long demonstrated a
high capacity for turning novel ideas into new businesses and improved
services in domains ranging from medical diagnostics, to instant access
to information, to entertainment. Fostering this capacity for
translating science and technology into widespread benefit will be
crucial in rebuilding our economy as well in addressing our most
pressing challenges in energy, environment, health, and national
security.
Development of new technologies and providing incentives for their
widespread adoption will be particularly crucial at the demanding
intersection of energy, national security, and climate change.
Providing the affordable and reliable energy that our economic well-
being requires while addressing the dangers of global climate change
and over-dependence on oil from politically fragile regions are
challenges demanding the utmost in collaboration among the relevant
Executive Branch agencies, the Congress, and the private sector.
While climate change is the most demanding of all environmental
challenges in terms of what will be required of science and technology
in order to bring it under control, there are many other environmental
problems we dare not neglect: air quality, water quality, toxic
substances in our soil and foods, the condition of the forests on our
territory and the oceans on our borders, and biodiversity, to mention
some of the most important.
I know this Committee is well aware that bringing science and
engineering to bear on solving these problems and thereby improving the
environmental component of human well-being can also be a boost to the
economy, not a drag, by virtue of the jobs and investment associated
with these efforts.
Information technology has been a key driver of our productivity
growth in recent decades and has fundamentally changed the way people
worldwide communicate and work. But we have just seen the beginning of
what can be achieved. Information technology has vast potential to
improve health care, increase energy efficiency, monitor climate and
other environmental conditions, and manage the immense amounts of data
from scientific efforts from the Human Genome Project to the Large
Hadron Collider.
Additionally, we can and should use existing information
technologies--and the better ones yet to come--to bring the U.S.
Government into the 21st century by streamlining internal operations,
cutting costs, increasing information security, and making Federal
agencies more responsive to inputs from outside the government.
Better use of the existing and new information technologies will
also be a key ingredient in the improvement of K-12, college, and
university education in this country, not only to produce the future
cohorts of scientists, engineers, and mathematicians we will need, but
also to upgrade the country's entire workforce and provide Americans
with the tools they need to participate successfully in our democracy
in a milieu where science, technology, and information are becoming
ever more important.
Last, but certainly not least, I want to mention the crucial roles
that science and technology play in our country's capacity to deal with
threats to our security both at home and abroad. These include the need
to address complex new challenges--asymmetric conflicts, urban
operations, peacekeeping missions, cyber threats, and potential
terrorist access to weapons of mass destruction--as well as all of the
familiar but continuously changing challenges such as those associated
with nuclear and biological weapons, ballistic-missile and missile-
defense technology, and scientific intelligence gathering. The superb
research done in the Defense Advance Research Projects Agency and other
parts of the defense research establishment has contributed to U.S.
security for generations, and I regard it is a continuing obligation of
OSTP to help see that this continues.
The ``national security'' and ``international affairs'' aspects of
OSTP's role in the security domain are, of course, tightly intertwined,
not least because there are many security problems that either can only
be solved or are most easily solved through multilateral agreements and
cooperation rather than unilateral action. Nuclear nonproliferation is
a prime example, but arms-control agreements and mechanisms more
broadly continue to be an important element of our national-security
portfolio. Science and technology are essential elements of improving
our capacity to verify existing arms-control agreements, as well as to
help decide what additional ones are in our national interest, and OSTP
has a role to play in that.
Another aspect of OSTP's responsibilities in the global arena
relates to international research partnerships in science and in the
technologies needed to address challenges that can only be surmounted
by multilateral collaborations, such as climate change, oil-import
vulnerabilities, and the condition of the world's oceans. The cost and
complexity of cutting-edge accelerators, telescopes, and certain
experimental energy technologies (such as the ITER fusion experiment)
are good reason in themselves for sharing the costs and risks
internationally. I have been involved in international cooperation on
fusion and other energy technologies since 1971, and if confirmed by
the Senate I will be most eager to put the insights derived from that
experience to good use in OSTP.
In conclusion, while our country clearly faces immense challenges
in the economic, environmental, health, and security domains, among
others, it is equally clear that science and technology can be key
ingredients in turning those challenges into opportunities. It is
likewise true that in science itself we are on the threshold of
remarkable new discoveries about the universe, about how our own planet
and its living systems work, and about how we learn, think, and
remember. And we are on the verge of huge advances in computing and
other information systems, in biotech, in nanotech, in greentech, and
in the intersection of these domains.
But the pace of these advances is not automatic. How quickly or
slowly we get them is in substantial part a matter of policy. The
Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the
President can play a crucial role, in cooperation with the other
Executive Branch agencies and the Congress, in making it possible for
us to reap these rewards sooner rather than later.
If the Senate confirms me for the position of Director of the
Office of Science and Technology Policy, I would hope to work
particularly closely with the members of this Committee, which has long
been a source of steady, bipartisan support for the efforts needed to
maintain America's leadership across on the frontiers of science,
engineering, and innovation.
I will be pleased to try to answer any questions you may have.
______
a. biographical information
1. Name (Include any former names or nicknames used):
John Paul Holdren (John P. Holdren, John Holdren).
2. Position to which nominated: Director, Office of Science and
Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President.
3. Date of Nomination: January 20, 2009.
4. Address (List current place of residence and office addresses):
Residence: Information not released to the public.
Office 1: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs,
John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, 79
JFK Street, Cambridge, MA 02138.
Office 2: Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard
University, 20 Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA 02138.
Office 3: The Woods Hole Research Center, 149 Woods Hole Road,
Falmouth, MA 02540.
5. Date and Place of Birth: March 1, 1944; Sewickley, PA (Allegheny
County).
6. Provide the name, position, and place of employment for your
spouse (if married) and the names and ages of your children (including
stepchildren and children by a previous marriage).
Spouse: Cheryl E. Holdren, self-employed biologist/author and
volunteer for various community organizations in Falmouth, MA.
She works from a home office at 11 Old Colony Place, Falmouth,
MA 02540.
Children: John Craig Holdren, age 42; Jill Virginia Holdren,
age 40.
7. List all college and graduate degrees. Provide year and school
attended.
SB, Aeronautics and Astronautics, 1965, MIT.
SM, Aeronautics and Astronautics, 1966, MIT.
PhD, Aeronautics and Astronautics/Theoretical Plasma Physics,
1970, Stanford.
8. List all post-undergraduate employment, and highlight all
management-level jobs held and any non-managerial jobs that relate to
the position for which you are nominated.
Lockheed Missiles and Space Company, Palo Alto, CA.
Associate Engineer, Performance Analysis, summer 1965.
Senior Associate Engineer, Re-Entry Aerodynamics, summer 1966.
Consultant, Re-Entry Physics, 9/66-6/67.
Stanford University
Research Assistant, Institute for Plasma Research, 7/69-6/70.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Physicist, Theory Group, Magnetic Fusion Energy Division, 7/70-
6/73 (on leave 1/72-6/73).
Consultant to the Magnetic Fusion Energy Division and the Laser
Division, 6/74-10/94).
California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA.
Senior Research Fellow, Division of Humanities and Social
Sciences and Environmental Quality Laboratory, 1/72-6/73.
University of California, Berkeley
Assistant Professor of Energy and Resources, 7/73-6/75.
Associate Professor of Energy and Resources, 7/75-6/78.
Professor of Energy and Resources, 7/78-6/96 (and Class of 1935
Professor of Energy, 8/92-6/96).
Management: Vice Chair of the Energy and Resources Group, 1983-
96, and Acting Chair, 1982-83 and Fall 1990. The Energy and
Resources Group was/is a campus-wide, interdisciplinary,
graduate-degree-granting program of teaching and research, with
46 full-time equivalent faculty, 50-100 affiliated faculty
(salaries paid by other campus units), 3-4 administrative
staff, and 50-60 graduate students, and a budget in the range
of $3-5 million per year.
Harvard University
Teresa and John Heinz Professor of Environmental Policy, John
F. Kennedy School of Government , and Professor of
Environmental Science and Public Policy, Department of Earth
and Planetary Science, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, 7/76-
present (half time 7/05-present).
Management: Director and Faculty Chair, Program on Science,
Technology, and Public Policy (STPP), Belfer Center for Science
and International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of
Government, 7/76-present. STPP comprises research efforts
engaging 4-6 faculty members and senior researchers, 3-6
administrative staff, and 10-20 research fellows and research
associates, with a budget of $3-5 million per year.
The Woods Hole Research Center
Management: President and Director of the Center, half--time 7/
05-present. The Center is an independent, nonprofit,
nonpartisan research and education organization focused on
interactions of the land, soil, vegetation, water, and climate
of the planet and the relation of these factors to human well-
being. The center employs 50 scientists, policy analysts, and
support staff and has a budget that has ranged in my tenure
from $5.5 million to $8.5 million per year.
The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
Management: Member of the Board of Directors, concurrently with
the above positions, 1991-2005. The Board oversees the
operation of a charitable foundation with assets in the range
of $4-5 billion and annual outlays in the range of $200-250
million. I chaired the Board committee overseeing the
Foundation's Program on Peace and International Cooperation
(circa $20 million per year) 1994-96, served on the Budget
Committee 2000-2005, and chaired the Institutional Policy
Committee 2002-2005.
9. Attach a copy of your resume. Up-to-date CV and separate
complete publications list are attached.
10. List any advisory, consultative, honorary, or other part-time
service or positions with Federal, State, or local governments, other
than those listed above, within the last 5 years.
I have been an informal advisor, in consequence of my roles in the
National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and
Arms Control, the National Commission on Energy Policy, the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Aspen Institute,
and in connection with government-agency grants to my research and
policy-analysis projects at Harvard and the Woods Hole Research Center
(for details of all of which see item 11, below), to the following:
U.S. Department of State.
U.S. Department of Defense.
U.S. Department of Energy.
National Nuclear Security Administration.
Central Intelligence Agency.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Senate Committee on Energy.
numerous individual Members of Congress.
11. List all positions held as an officer, director, trustee,
partner, proprietor, agent, representative, or consultant of any
corporation, company, firm, partnership, or other business, enterprise,
educational, or other institution within the last 5 years.
Harvard University (professors are considered ``officers''; see
entry under item 8, above).
John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation (trustee; see
entry under item 8, above).
Woods Hole Research Center (the position of President, which
I've held since June 2005--see entry under item 8, above--
entails membership on the Board of Trustees, of which I was
also a member in the period 19942004, serving as Vice Chair).
Tsinghua University (Beijing, China; Guest Professor, a non-
resident three-year appointment entailing 1-2 lectures per
year; began 5/08).
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
President-elect, 2/05-2/06.
President, 2/06-2/07.
Chair of the Board, 2/07-2/08.
Member of the Board, 2/05-2/08.
(A number of projects and offices of the AAAS provide
advice to Congress and Executive Branch agencies when
requested)
National Commission on Energy Policy
Co-Chair, 2002-present.
(The National Commission on Energy Policy is an
independent, foundation-funded, nonprofit, bipartisan
organization that develops consensus recommendations on
U.S. energy policy and provides them, along with
supporting analyses, to relevant committees of the U.S.
Congress, Executive Branch agencies, and the public.
The other two Co-Chairs, since the Commission's
inception, have been John Rowe, CEO of the Exelon
Corporation, and William Reilly, EPA Administrator
under President George H. W. Bush.)
United Nations Foundation
Consultant on climate-change and energy issues, 11/03-
5/07 (This work also entailed advising the Commission
on Sustainable Development of the United Nations, the
U.N. Secretary General, and the President of the
General Assembly).
National Academy of Sciences
Chair, Committee on International Security and Arms
Control, 19942004 (The chairmanship of this standing
committee is considered an ``officer'' position in the
NAS.)
MIT Press
Chair of the Editorial Advisory Board of the journal
Innovations: Technology, Governance, Globalization,
2004-present.
U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation
Member, Council of Advisors, 2001-present.
China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development
Member, Board of Councilors, 2002-present.
Princeton University Carbon Management Initiative
Member, Advisory Board, 2002-2007.
Climate Central
Member, Board of the Board, 2008-present (Climate
Central is a 501.3.c based in Princeton, NJ and led by
distinguished climate scientist Berrien Moore and
Weather Channel climatologist Heidi Cullen, focused on
developing objective and balanced content on climate
change for the electronic media).
Aspen Institute
Participant in a number of Aspen Institute
Congressional Seminars and Congressional Breakfasts.
In addition, I have served during the past 5 years as an informal
advisor, in connection with grants by the indicated entities to my
research and policy-analysis projects at Harvard and the Woods Hole
Research Center, to the following:
BP
Shell USA
Goldman Sachs Center for Environmental Markets
Doris Duke Charitable Foundation
The Winslow Foundation
The Heinz Family Philanthropies
The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
The David and Lucille Packard Foundation
The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Brothers Fund
The Energy Foundation
The Nuclear Threat Initiative
I have also served in the last 5 years as an occasional informal
advisor (unpaid and in the absence of grants to my projects) to the
following:
The Rockefeller Foundation
The Clinton Global Initiative
The Carnegie Corporation of New York
Google.org
The Open Society Institute
Sigma Xi, The Scientific Honorary Society
The Nand and Jeet Khemka Foundation
The World Economic Forum
12.Please list each membership you have had during the past 10
years or currently hold with any civic, social, charitable,
educational, political, professional, fraternal, benevolent or
religious organization, private club, or other membership organization.
Include dates of membership and any positions you have held with any
organization. Please note whether any such club or organization
restricts membership on the basis of sex, race, color, religion,
national origin, age, or handicap.
Besides entities listed above under items 8 and 11, none of which
restricts membership, I have been a member during the past 10 years of
the following other organizations (also all non-restrictive on the
indicated grounds):
National Academy of Sciences, 1991-present.
National Academy of Engineering, 2000-present.
American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1983-present.
Council on Foreign Relations, 1996-present.
California Academy of Sciences, 1985-present.
American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1971-
present (offices held listed under item 11).
The American Physical Society, 1970-present.
Sigma Xi, The Scientific Honorary Society, 1966-present.
The MIT Alumni Association, 1965-present.
The Stanford Alumni Association, 1970-present.
Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, 1973-present.
Chair of the U.S. Pugwash Committee, 1983-95.
Member of the International Pugwash Council, 1982-97.
Chair of the Executive Committee of the International Pugwash
Council, 1987-97.
Federation of American Scientists, 1974?-present.
Union of Concerned Scientists, 1980?-present.
Sierra Club, 1966?-present.
Environmental Defense Fund, 1980?-present.
Natural Resources Defense Council, 1980?-present.
Quissett Yacht Club, 2004-present.
13. Have you ever been a candidate for and/or held a public office
(elected, non-elected, or appointed)? If so, indicate whether any
campaign has any outstanding debt, the amount, and whether you are
personally liable for that debt.
No, nothing in this category.
14. Itemize all political contributions to any individual, campaign
organization, political party, political action committee, or similar
entity of $500 or more for the past 10 years. Also list all offices you
have held with, and services rendered to, a state or national political
party or election committee during the same period.
Our political contributions have been modest and we have not kept
good records of them. To the best of my recollection, those in the last
10 years have been as follows:
My wife and I made contributions totaling $2,000 to the
Presidential campaign of President-elect Barack Obama in 2008.
We contributed (I believe) $1,000 to the Presidential campaign
of Senator John Kerry in 2004.
We contributed (I believe) $1,000 to the Presidential campaign
of Vice President Gore in 2000.
We contributed (I believe) $500 to one or more of Senator John
Kerry's re-election campaigns.
We contributed (I believe) $500 to one or two of Congressman
Rush Holt's election campaigns.
I provided modest amounts of advice on climate-change and energy
issues to both the Clinton and Obama Presidential campaigns during the
primaries, and subsequently to the Obama campaign during the general
election. I was designated a surrogate for Senator Obama on energy and
climate-change issues during the general election but never performed
in this role.
I was a member of Scientists and Engineers for Kerry during the
2004 Presidential campaign and gave a number of speeches in this role
in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and New Mexico.
I was a member of Scientists and Engineers for Gore during the 2000
Presidential campaign and participated in some conference-call meetings
on strategy for mobilizing support for Vice President Gore in the
science and engineering communities.
I have held no other offices or rendered any other services for
state or national political parties or action committees in this
period.
15.List all scholarships, fellowships, honorary degrees, honorary
society memberships, military medals, and any other special recognition
for outstanding service or achievements.
In inverse chronological order:
John H. Chafee Memorial Lecture, National Council for Science
and the Environment, 2008.
Robert Fletcher Award of the Thayer School of Engineering,
Dartmouth College, 2007.
President, American Association for the Advancement of Science,
2006-07.
Jerome Wiesner Lecture, University of Michigan, 2002.
Honorary Sc.D., Clark University, 2002.
Joseph Rotblat Lecturer, Annual Student Pugwash Conference,
2002.
National Associate of the U.S. National Academies (award ``for
exceptional service''), 2001.
John Heinz Prize in Public Policy, 2001.
Member of the National Academy of Engineering (elected 2000).
Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, 2000.
Sidney Drell Lecturer, Stanford University, 2000.
Kaul Foundation Award for Excellence in Science and
Environmental Policy, 1999.
Fusion Leadership Award for 1998, Fusion Power Associates.
Honorary D.Eng., Colorado School of Mines, 1997.
Council on Foreign Relations (elected 1996).
Nobel Peace Prize acceptance lecture on behalf of the Pugwash
Conferences on Science & World Affairs, 1995.
Forum Award of the American Physical Society, 1995.
Volvo Environment Prize, 1993.
Member of the National Academy of Sciences (elected 1991).
Fellow of the American Physical Society (elected 1988).
Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science (elected 1987).
Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences (elected 1985).
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (elected
1983).
Kistiakowsky Visiting Scholar for the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences, 1983-84.
MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship, 1981-86.
Federation of American Scientists Public Service Award for
1979.
Gustaysen Memorial Lecturer, University of Chicago, 1978.
Honorary Sc.D., University of Puget Sound, 1975.
Distinguished Teaching Award of the University of California,
Berkeley, 1975.
NSF Predoctoral Fellowship, Stanford University, 1967-69.
NSF Graduate Fellowship, MIT, 1965-66.
Lockheed Undergraduate Scholarship, MIT, 1961-65.
16.Please list each book, article, column, or publication you have
authored, individually or with others. Also list any speeches that you
have given on topics relevant to the position for which you have been
nominated. Do not attach copies of these publications unless otherwise
instructed.
A complete publication list (395 items) is attached.*
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\*\ This information is retained in the Committee files.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
With respect to speeches, I have been giving 20 to 50 speeches per
year on topics of energy, environment, climate change, nuclear arms
control and nonproliferation, and science and technology policy since
the early 1970s. Reconstructing anything even close to a complete list
would not be possible. In place of that I am attaching (a) a list of
speeches given in the past few years and (b) two files of URLs where
PowerPoint, video, or audio from some of the recent speeches can be
accessed online.
17. Please identify each instance in which you have testified
orally or in writing before Congress in a governmental or non-
governmental capacity and specify the date and subject matter of each
testimony.
John P. Holdren, ``Observations on Technology Assessment'', in
Technology Assessment, Hearings before the Subcommittee on
Science, Research, and Development, House Committee on Science
and Astronautics, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1970, pp.
604-615.
John P. Holdren, ``Adequacy of lithium supplies as a fusion
energy source'', in Controlled Thermonuclear Research, Hearings
before the Subcommittee on Research, Development and Radiation
of the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, Part 2, 10-11 November
1971, pp. 656-662.
John P. Holdren, ``Research on Electric Energy--Who Should Do
It?'', Hearings on Amendment 364 to S. 1684, before the
Committee on Commerce, U.S. Senate, March 16, 1972, 8 pp.; and
Jerome Weingart and John P. Holdren, ``A Summary of the Case
for Federal Coordination of Research and Development on
Electricity'', Committee on Commerce, U.S. Senate, March 16,
1972, 8 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``Population and Environment--Are We In
Trouble'', Hearings of the Subcommittee on Population Growth,
House Republican Task Force on Population Growth & Ecology, Apr
26, 1972, 18 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``Observations on the Energy Dilemma'', in
Energy Research and Development, Hearings before the
Subcommittee on Science, Research and Development, House
Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. Government Printing
Office, 1972, pp. 516-517.
John P. Holdren, ``Some Observations on Raw Materials and
Limits to Growth'', Testimony before the Subcommittee on
Science and Technology, Committee on Commerce, U.S. Senate, at
Hearings in San Francisco, June 17, 1973, 8 pp. [Also presented
in revised form as testimony before the California Assembly
Committee on Energy and Diminishing Materials, Los Angeles,
December 18, 1974.]
John P. Holdren, ``Zero-Infinity Dilemmas in Nuclear Power'',
in Reactor Safety Study (Rasmussen Report), Oversight Hearing
before the Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment,
Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, U.S. House of
Representatives, Serial 94-61, Government Printing Office,
Washington, D.C., pp. 357-364. (Adapted from an invited lecture
at the 1976 Annual Meeting of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, Boston, 21 February 1976, 8 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``Energy Costs as Potential Limits to
Growth'', in Middle- and Long-Term Energy Policies and
Alternatives, Supplemental Hearing with Appendix, Subcommittee
on Energy and Power of the Committee on Interstate and Foreign
Commerce, U.S. House of Representatives, December 16, 1976,
Serial 94-157, Government Printing Office; Washington, D.C.,
pp. 203-214.)
John P. Holdren, ``Energy and Global Change'', Testimony before
the Committee on Science, Technology, and Space of the U.S.
House of Representatives, Washington, DC, 17 July 1991, 7 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``Some Observations on the Energy Future'',
Testimony before the Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on
Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives,
21 April 1994, 8 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``The Threat from Surplus Nuclear-Bomb
Materials'', Invited testimony before the Subcommittee on
Europe, Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and the Permanent
Subcommittee on Investigations, Senate Committee on
Governmental Affairs, U.S. Congress, 23 August 1995, 6 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``U.S. Vulnerability to Oil-Price Shocks and
Supply Constrictions . . . And How To Reduce It'', Invited
Testimony at Oversight Hearings before the Senate Committee on
Governmental Affairs on Recent Oil-Price Increases, 24 March
2000.
John P. Holdren, ``Improving U.S. Energy Security And Reducing
Greenhouse-gas Emissions: What Role For Nuclear Energy?'',
Invited Testimony for the Subcommittee on Energy and
Environment, Committee on Science, U.S. House of
Representatives, 25 July 2000.
John P. Holdren, ``Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy in
the U.S. Energy Future'', Invited Testimony before for the
Committee on Science U.S. House of Representatives on ``The
Nation's Energy Future: Role of Renewable Energy And Energy
Efficiency'', 28 February 2001.
John P. Holdren, ``Federal Energy R&D for the Challenges of the
21st Century: The 1997 PCAST Report and Its Relevance to S.
597'', Invited Testimony before the Committee on Energy and
Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, 18 July 2001.
John P. Holdren, ``Some Comments On S. 1008: Amendments To The
Energy Policy Act of 1992 to Develop the United States Climate
Change Response Strategy'', John P. Holdren, Statement for the
Record, Hearings before the Senate Committee on Governmental
Affairs, 18 July 2001:
John P. Holdren, ``Beyond the Moscow Treaty'', invited
testimony for the Committee on Foreign Relations, U.S. Senate,
12 September 2002, 12 pp.
John P. Holdren, ``Expanding Coal Use While Protecting the
Climate'', Statement for Panel I of the Clean Coal Conference,
Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, 10 March
2005.
18. Given the current mission, major programs, and major
operational objectives of the department/agency to which you have been
nominated, what in your background or employment experience do you
believe affirmatively qualifies you for appointment to the position for
which you have been nominated, and why do you wish to serve in that
position?
The Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in the Executive
Office of the President has the responsibility to provide independent
advice to the President and Vice President on the science and
technology (S&T) aspects of all of the policy issues with which they
are concerned, including national and homeland security, energy,
environment, health, transportation, information infrastructure,
agriculture, and the roles of science and technology in the economy, as
well as issues of the S&T workforce and S&T education and training.
OSTP also provides input, in coordination with the Office of Management
and Budget, on the S&T content of the President's annual budget request
to the Congress and carries out a variety of other functions relating
to the two-way communications about S&T matters between the Executive
Office of the President and the Congress; among the relevant Executive
Branch departments, agencies, and offices; and among S&T offices and
ministries around the world.
Assets I would bring to the role of OSTP Director in leading these
diverse and complex efforts include:
unusually broad interdisciplinary training and experience
across multiple scientific and engineering fields and
substantive focuses (aerospace engineering, space science,
plasma physics, nuclear weapons, energy technology, climate-
change science, technology assessment), plus extensive working
collaborations with biologists, economists, and political
scientists on the interactions of physical, biological, and
socioeconomic dimensions of national and global challenges;
substantial experience working in and with many of the
relevant sectors (universities, national laboratories,
corporations, foundations and other NGO's, state and national
government, and a wide variety of international S&T agencies
and organizations);
close interactions on S&T issues with Members of Congress on
both sides of the aisle (dating back to my first Congressional
testimony before the Honorable George Brown, long-time Chair of
the House Committee of Science, in 1970) and extending to work
with Senators Nunn, Lugar, and Domenici in the 1990s and 2000s
on nuclear threat reduction in Russia and with Senators
Domenici and Bingaman over the past few years on national
energy legislation;
extensive experience in advising Executive Branch
departments and agencies on S&T matters through, e.g., my
membership on and chairmanship of many National Academies
committees over the years (advising the State Department,
Defense Department, Energy Department, and National Nuclear
Security Administration, among others), my service on the first
Energy Research Advisory Board to the Secretary of Energy
(1978-1979) and on subsequent advisory committees to the DOE on
fusion energy through 1994;
my experience on President Clinton's Committee of Advisors
on Science and Technology, lodged administratively in OSTP,
from its inception in 1994 until the transition of 2001 (during
which time I led PCAST studies requested by the President on
protecting nuclear-weapon materials against terrorists and
proliferators, the U.S. fusion energy research program, U.S.
Federal energy R&D for the challenges of the 21st century, and
the Federal role in international cooperation on energy-
technology innovation, as well as serving as U.S. co-chair of a
bilateral U.S.-Russian commission on plutonium management
reporting to Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin);
my experience building bipartisan consensus on energy and
climate-change issues through my co-chairmanship of the
National Commission on Energy Policy; and
long and systematic study of the S&T advisory apparatus of
the Federal Government, beginning with participation in the
hearings and deliberations that led to establishment of the
Congressional Office of Technology Assessment in 1972 and
including teaching and research leadership on Federal science
and technology policy in my role as Director and Faculty Chair
of the program on Science, Technology, and Public Policy at
Harvard's Kennedy School of Government from 1996.
In the last connection, I want to add that I've had the great
privilege of being mentored by and/or working closely with five
previous Presidential science advisors--George Kistiakowsky
(Eisenhower), Jerome Wiesner (Kennedy, Johnson), Frank Press (Carter),
Jack Gibbons (Clinton I), and Neal Lane (Clinton II). I worked very
closely with both Dr. Gibbons and Dr. Lane, and with all of their OSTP
Associate Directors, during the two Clinton terms. And I am well
acquainted with the current OSTP Director, Honorable John H. Marburger,
having spent time with him discussing science and technology policy
issues before and during his term.
I want to serve in this position because I believe our country
faces both immense challenges and immense opportunities across a range
of important issues where the wise use of insights from science and
applications of technology are going to be crucial in determining the
outcomes, and because I believe the OSTP Director can potentially play
an important role in helping the administration and the Congress get
the outcomes we need.
19. What do you believe are your responsibilities, if confirmed, to
ensure that the department/agency has proper management and accounting
controls, and what experience do you have in managing a large
organization?
Proper management and accounting controls are essential in any
governmental organization, as well as in any corporation or nonprofit.
The fact that OSTP is a relatively small operation, with about 65 staff
and an annual budget of about $6 million, does not alter that reality
in any way. And, of course, the Director has the primary responsibility
for ensuring that proper management and accounting controls are in
place and for overseeing their implementation.
I currently manage an operation of similar size (50 staff, annual
budget of about $8.5 million) in my role as President and Director of
the Woods Hole Research Center (since June 2005 and member of the Board
since 1994). The Center's books are subject to the professional annual
audits required of any such organization, as well as to annual audits
by the Federal Government because of the grants and contracts we hold
from Federal agencies. Those audits have been spotless during my
tenure, as they were during the tenure of my predecessor. (I am only
the second Director the Center has had since its founding in 1985.)
I have also managed similar sized academic operations at both
Harvard and the University of California, Berkeley: As a Trustee of the
MacArthur Foundation for 14 years, long-time member of the Budget
Committee of that Board, and Chair of its Institutional Policy
Committee in 2002-5, I have had shared responsibility for overseeing
the finances and management of a much larger organization.
20.What do you believe to be the top three challenges facing the
department/agency, and why?
1. In a way, the biggest challenging facing OSTP is and always
has been how to meet its very diverse and substantial
responsibilities with the small staff and budget at its
disposal. This challenge translates into the need to recruit
extremely talented, organized, and dedicated staff members--
starting with the Associate Directors but extending right down
through the administrative staff--who will be both ingenious
and hard-working in order to get it all done.
2. Another (and related) top challenge is to develop the needed
working relationships--with the President and Vice President,
with the OMB and NSC and NEC, with the other S&T-rich Executive
Branch departments and agencies, and with the Congress--without
which there is no hope of OSTP doing the job that is needed
from it. Meeting this challenge is a matter of investing the
effort to create and nurture those relationships (an effort
that must start with but cannot be limited to the OSTP
Director), which means a lot of listening, not just talking.
3. The challenges of process that I mentioned first are large,
but not larger than the challenges of substance faced by OSTP
in formulating advice--augmenting that of the other relevant
departments, agencies and offices and recognizing the
prerogatives of the Congress--about S&T and the economy, S&T
and national and homeland security, S&T for national and global
public health, the role of S&T in addressing the energy/
climate-change/oil-dependence challenge, and more. Distilling
all this down to one challenge (as required by the question's
request for a total of only three) motivates me to put it as
follows. Our society's well-being rests equally on three
pillars: economic conditions and processes (jobs, income,
wealth, trade . . .), socio-political conditions and processes
(national and homeland security, personal safety, justice,
equity, access to and quality of health care and education . .
.), and environmental conditions and processes (clean air and
water, functioning nutrient cycles, a stable and favorable
climate . . .). All three pillars are essential, just as a
three-legged stool collapses if any single leg fails. The
challenge facing OSTP and all other organs of government that
deal with science and technology is to help figure out how
government, business, academia, and foundations and other NGO's
can more effectively collaborate in developing and applying
science and technology in ways that strengthen all three legs
simultaneously.
b. potential conflicts of interest
1. Describe all financial arrangements, deferred compensation
agreements, and other continuing dealings with business associates,
clients, or customers. Please include information related to retirement
accounts.
I receive a circa 50%-time salary from Harvard University in
connection with my professorship in the John F. Kennedy School of
government.
I receive a circa 50%-time salary from the Woods Hole Research
Center in connection with my position as President and Director there.
This balance shifts to approximately 70%-30% in favor of the Woods
Hole Research Center in the summer and semesters when I am carrying a
reduced teaching load.
I am vested in the retirement plans at both Harvard and the Woods
Hole Research Center. I am also vested in the retirement plan at the
University of California, Berkeley, where I was on the faculty from
1993 to 1996, and in the TIAA-CREF retirement program in connection
with earlier service at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory and the
California Institute of Technology.
I have no deferred compensation arrangements with any of the
institutions where I have been employed, and I have no other continuing
business or financial dealings of any kind.
2. Do you have any commitments or agreements, formal or informal,
to maintain employment, affiliation, or practice with any business,
association or other organization during your appointment? If so,
please explain.
If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, I will take a public-service leave
of absence from Harvard University, effective immediately upon
confirmation. There is no expectation on Harvard's part or mine that I
would be carrying on any activity or practice at or for Harvard during
the period of my service with the government.
If confirmed by the Senate, I will resign my position at the Woods
Hole Research Center, effective immediately upon confirmation. There is
no expectation on the Center's part or mine that I would carry on any
activity or practice at or for the Woods Hole Research after
confirmation to my government position.
I would also resign, effectively immediately upon confirmation,
from all boards and other advisory positions in which I currently
serve, and I would undertake no other commitments of this type during
the period of my service in government.
3. Indicate any investments, obligations, liabilities, or other
relationships which could involve potential conflicts of interest in
the position to which you have been nominated.
In connection with the nomination process, I have consulted with
the Office of Government Ethics and the Executive Office of the
President's designated agency ethics official to identify potential
conflicts of interest. Any potential conflicts of interest will be
resolved in accordance with the terms of an ethics agreement that I
have entered into with the EOP's designated agency ethics official.
4. Describe any business relationship, dealing, or financial
transaction which you have had during the last 10 years, whether for
yourself, on behalf of a client, or acting as an agent, that could in
any way constitute or result in a possible conflict of interest in the
position to which you have been nominated: None.
5. Describe any activity during the past 10 years in which you have
been engaged for the purpose of directly or indirectly influencing the
passage, defeat, or modification of any legislation or affecting the
administration and execution of law or public policy.
In 1999, in my capacity as a member of President Clinton's
Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology, I chaired a PCAST
study, at the President's request, of the Federal role in international
cooperation on energy-technology innovation. The President's intent was
for this study's arguments and recommendations to influence the
relevant portions of his FY2001 budget request to the Congress, and it
was also his stated hope that these arguments and recommendations would
influence the Congress to approve the relevant items in his request. At
his direction, following completion of the report, I met with relevant
agency heads and then with some of the Members of Congress most
concerned with these matters to explain the recommendations.
From 2000 to 2002, I served as the Chair of a National Academy of
Sciences Committee conducting a study originally requested from the
Academy by President Clinton on the topic of technical issues relating
to ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. This
followed the Senate's vote in 1999 not to consent to ratification of
the indicated treaty. The President's stated intent in requesting the
study, which was ultimately delivered to the Bush administration and to
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2002, was to assemble
authoritative information and analysis on the main technical issues
that had been advanced in the Senate debate as question marks about the
wisdom of ratifying the treaty. The intent was clearly to contribute to
the knowledge base for a yea or nay vote on ratification of the treaty
if and when it was re-submitted to the Senate.
From 1996 to the present I have been one of the principal
investigators of a project in the Belfer Center for Science and
International Affairs at the Kennedy School of Government called
``Managing the Atom'' and focusing, in part, on the adequacy of the
programs of the U.S. Government and other governments to keep nuclear
weapons and nuclearweapon-useable materials out of the hands of
terrorists and proliferant states. Reports over the years from this
project, which has been supported mainly by the Nuclear Threat
Initiative (Co-Chaired by Senator Sam Nunn and Ted Turner and led by
former Undersecretary of Energy Charles Curtis), have made
recommendations on opportunities, priorities, and budgets for the U.S.
government's efforts in this domain. These recommendations, some
authored and all approved by me, were intended to influence budget
requests and appropriations and were regularly briefed to relevant
Executive Branch officials and Members of Congress to try to achieve
this.
From 2002 to the present, I have served as one of three Co-Chairs
of the independent, foundation-funded, bipartisan National Commission
on Energy Policy, which consists of prominent experts on energy
technology, policy, and regulation from academia, business, labor, and
NGO's, as well as individuals with high-level state and Federal
Government experience in the energy domain, and which is devoted to
developing consensus recommendations on U.S. energy policy that might
command bipartisan support in the U.S. Congress. Our December 2004 and
April 2007 recommendations (all unanimous) have been briefed to
Executive Branch officials and relevant Members of Congress in the hope
of constructively influencing U.S. energy policy.
6. Explain how you will resolve any potential conflict of interest,
including any that may be disclosed by your responses to the above
items.
In connection with the nomination process, I have consulted with
the Office of Government Ethics and the Office of Science and
Technology Policy's designated agency ethics official to identify
potential conflicts of interest. Any potential conflicts of interest
will be resolved in accordance with the terms of an ethics agreement
that I have entered into with the Office of Science and Technology
Policy's designated agency ethics official.
c. legal matters
1. Have you ever been disciplined or cited for a breach of ethics
by, or been the subject of a complaint to any court, administrative
agency, professional association, disciplinary committee, or other
professional group? If so, please explain: No.
2. Have you ever been investigated, arrested, charged, or held by
any Federal, State, or other law enforcement authority of any Federal,
State, county, or municipal entity, other than for a minor traffic
offense? If so, please explain: No.
3. Have you or any business of which you are or were an officer
ever been involved as a party in an administrative agency proceeding or
civil litigation? If so, please explain: No.
4. Have you ever been convicted (including pleas of guilty or nolo
contendere) of any criminal violation other than a minor traffic
offense? If so, please explain: No.
5. Have you ever been accused, formally or informally, of sexual
harassment or discrimination on the basis of sex, race, religion, or
any other basis? If so, please explain: No.
6. Please advise the Committee of any additional information,
favorable or unfavorable, which you feel should be disclosed in
connection with your nomination: I believe that my answers to this
questionnaire have disclosed everything of relevance.
d. relationship with committee
1. Will you ensure that your department/agency complies with
deadlines for information set by Congressional committees? Yes.
2. Will you ensure that your department/agency does whatever it can
to protect Congressional witnesses and whistle blowers from reprisal
for their testimony and disclosures? Yes.
3. Will you cooperate in providing the Committee with requested
witnesses, including technical experts and career employees, with
firsthand knowledge of matters of interest to the Committee? Yes.
4. Are you willing to appear and testify before any duly
constituted committee of the Congress on such occasions as you may be
reasonably requested to do so? Yes.
______
resume of john p. holdren
Employment
Woods Hole Research Center
President and Director (6/05-)
Harvard University
John F. Kennedy School of Government:
Teresa and John Heinz Professor of Environmental Policy
and Director, Program in Science, Technology, and
Public Policy, Belfer Center for Science and
International Affairs (7/96-).
Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Department of Earth and Planetary
Sciences:
Professor of Environmental Science and Public Policy
(7/96-).
Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Environmental Science and Public
Policy Major:
Member of the Board of Tutors (9/96-9/07).
University of California, Berkeley
Professor of Energy and Resources Emeritus (7/96-).
Class of 1935 Professor of Energy (8/91-6/96).
Professor of Energy and Resources (7/78-6/96).
Chair of Graduate Advisors, Energy and Resources Group
(1988-96).
Vice Chair, Energy and Resources Group (1983-96, on
leave 1987-88).
Acting Chair, Energy and Resources Group (1982-83, Fall
1990).
Associate Professor of Energy and Resources (7/75-6/78).
Assistant Professor of Energy and Resources (7/73-6/75).
California Institute of Technology
Senior Research Fellow, Division of Humanities & Social
Sciences and Environmental Quality Laboratory (1/72-9/73).
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Physicist, Theory Group, Magnetic Fusion Energy Division (7/70-
6/73, on leave 1/72-6/73).
Stanford University
Research Assistant, Institute for Plasma Research (7/69-6/70).
Lockheed Missiles and Space Company, Sunnyvale, California
Consultant in Re-Entry Physics (9/66-6/67).
Associate Engineer, Senior, Re-Entry Aerodynamics (Summer
1966).
Associate Engineer, Performance Analysis (Summer 1965).
Recent Concurrent and Visiting Appointments
Tsinghua University: Guest Professor (3/08-).
Woods Hole Research Center: Woods Hole, Massachusetts: Visiting
Scholar (1/92-7/92, 5/93-5/94); Distinguished Visiting
Scientist (5/94-), Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees (5/94-).
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory: Faculty Consultant,
Magnetic Fusion Energy (subsequently Energy) Division (11/73-);
Visiting Physicist, Theory Group, Magnetic Fusion Energy
Division (Fall 1986); Faculty Consultant, Laser & Environmental
Directorate (7/94-).
Education
Ph.D. (6/70), Stanford University, Department of Aeronautics &
Astronautics and Institute for Plasma Research (Dissertation:
``Collisionless Stability of an Inhomogeneous, Confined, Planar
Plasma'').
S.M. (6/66), Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of
Aeronautics and Astronautics (Dissertation: ``Landau Damping of Plasma
Oscillations in a Uniform External Magnetic Field'').
S.B. (6/65), Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of
Aeronautics and Astronautics.
Publications
Co-authored books and book-length reports (inverse chronological order)
Confronting Climate Change: Avoiding the Unmanageable and
Managing the Unavoidable, Scientific Expert Group on Climate
Change & Sustainable Development (Coordinating Lead Authors R
Bierbaum, J Holdren, M MacCracken, R Moss, & P Raven), Report
to the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development, United
Nations Foundation and Sigma Xi, February 2007, 144 pp.
Monitoring Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear-Explosive Materials: An
Assessment of Methods and Capabilities, Committee on
International Security and Arms Control (John P. Holdren,
Committee Chair, William F. Burns, Study Co-Chair, Steven
Fetter, Study Co-Chair, Spurgeon M. Keeny, Study Editor-in-
Chief, and 12 others), National Academy of Sciences (National
Academy Press, Washington, DC), April 2005, 264 pp.
Ending the Energy Stalemate: A Bipartisan Strategy to Meet
America's Energy Challenges, National Commission on Energy
Policy (John P. Holdren, Co-Chair, William K. Reilly, Co-Chair,
John W. Rowe, Co-Chair, Philip R. Sharp, Congressional Chair,
Jason Grumet, Executive Director, and 12 others (NCEP,
Washington DC), December 2004, 128 pp.
Controlling Nuclear Warheads and Materials: A Report Card and
Action Plan, Matthew Bunn, Anthony Wier, and John P. Holdren,
Project on Managing the Atom, Belfer Center for Science and
International Affairs, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard
University, for the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI, Washington,
DC), March 2003, 231 pp.
Technical Issues Related to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty,
Committee on Technical Issues Related to Ratification of the
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (John P. Holdren, Chair, and 10
others), National Academy of Sciences (National Academy Press,
Washington, DC), June 2002, 84 pp.
Securing Nuclear Weapons and Materials: Seven Steps for
Immediate Action, Matthew Bunn, John P. Holdren, and Anthony
Wier, Project on Managing the Atom, Belfer Center for Science
and International Affairs, Kennedy School of Government,
Harvard University, and the Nuclear Threat Initiative, May
2002, 78 pp.
Interim Storage of Spent Nuclear Fuel, Matthew Bunn, John P.
Holdren, Allison Macfarlane, Susan E. Pickett, Atsuyuki Suzuki,
Tatsujiro Suzuki, and Jennifer Weeks, Harvard University
Project on Managing the Atom and University of Tokyo Project on
Sociotechnics of Nuclear Energy, June 2001, 124 pp.
Powerful Partnerships: The Federal Role in International
Cooperation on Energy Innovation, Panel on International
Cooperation in Energy Research, Development, Demonstration, and
Deployment (John P. Holdren, Chair, Samuel F. Baldwin, Study
Executive Director, and 13 others), President's Committee of
Advisors on Science and Technology (Executive Office of the
President of the United States, Washington, DC), 1999, circa
300 pp.
Federal Energy Research and Development for the Challenges of
the Twenty-First Century, Energy Research and Development Panel
(John P. Holdren, Chair, Samuel F. Baldwin, Study Executive
Director, and 20 others), President's Committee of Advisors on
Science and Technology (Executive Office of the President of
the United States, Washington, DC), 1997, circa 250 pp.
The Future of U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy, Committee on
International Security and Arms Control (John P. Holdren,
Chair, William F. Burns, Study Chair, Jo L. Husbands, Staff
Director, and 14 others), National Academy of Sciences
(National Academy Press, Washington, DC), 1997, 100 pp.
Reactor-Related Options for the Disposition of Excess Weapons
Plutonium, Panel on Reactor-Related Options (John P. Holdren,
Chair, Matthew Bunn, Study Executive Director, and 6 others),
Committee on International Security and Arms Control, National
Academy of Sciences (National Academy Press, Washington, DC),
1995, 418 pp.
Management and Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium,
Committee on International Security and Arms Control (John P.
Holdren, Chair, Wolfgang K.H. Panofsky, Study Chair, Matthew
Bunn, Study Executive Director, and 17 others), National
Academy of Sciences (National Academy Press, Washington, DC),
1994, 275 pp.
Report of the Senior Advisory Committee to the Department of
Energy on Environmental, Safety, and Economic Aspects of
Magnetic Fusion Energy, John P. Holdren, Chair, and 9 others,
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory UCRL-53766 (National
Technical Information Service, Springfield, VA), 1989, 345 pp.
Energy in Transition 1985-2010, Committee on Nuclear and
Alternative Energy Systems (Harvey Brooks and Edward Ginzton,
Co-Chairs, and 14 others), National Research Council (W.H.
Freeman, San Francisco), 1980, 677.pp.
Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment, Paul R.
Ehrlich, Anne H. Ehrlich, and John P. Holdren (W.H. Freeman,
San Francisco), 1977, 1051 pp.
Fusion and Fast Breeder Reactors, W. Haefele, J. Holdren, G.
Kessler, and G. Kulcinski, with contributions by A.
Belostotsky, R. Grigoriants, D. Kurbatov, G. Shatalov, M.
Styrikovich, and N. Vasiliev (International Institute for
Applied Systems Analysis, Vienna, 1977), 506 pp.
Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions, Paul R. Ehrlich, Anne H.
Ehrlich, and John P. Holdren (W.H. Freeman, San Francisco),
1973, 304 pp. German edition: Humanokologie (Springer Verlag,
Berlin/Heidelberg), 1975, 234 pp.
Energy: A Crisis in Power, John Holdren and Phil Herrera
[separately authored halves of the book] (Sierra Club Books, New
York), .1971, 252 pp. Japanese edition, Blue Backs, Tokyo, 1977.
Books co-edited
Conversion of Military R&D Judith Reppy, Vsevolod Avduyevsky,
John Holdren, and Joseph Rotblat, eds. (MacMillan) 1998, 296
pp; Building Global Security Through Cooperation, J. Rotblat
and J. P. Holdren, eds. (Springer-Verlag), 1990, 301 pp; The
Cassandra Conference: Resources and the Human Predicament, P.
R. Ehrlich and J. P. Holdren, eds. (Texas A&M University
Press), 1988, 330 pp; Strategic Defences and the Future of the
Arms Race, John P. Holdren and Joseph Rotblat, eds.
(MacMillan), 1987, 286 pp; Earth and the Human Future, Kirk R.
Smith, Fereidun Fesharaki, & John P. Holdren, eds. (Westview),
1986, 258 pp; Population: Perspective 1973, Harrison Brown,
John Holdren, Alan Sweezy, and Barbara West, eds. (Freeman-
Cooper), 1974, 284 pp; Man and the Ecosphere, Paul R. Ehrlich,
John P. Holdren, and Richard W. Holm, eds. (W.H. Freeman),
1971, 307 pp; Global Ecology, John P. Holdren & Paul R.
Ehrlich, eds. (Harcourt), 1971, 292 pp;
Other publications (full listing provided separately)
Some 350 other professional and popular publications on plasma
physics, energy technology and policy, population-resource-
environment interactions, global environmental change, and
international security and arms control, including 27 chapters
in books edited by others; 51 articles in refereed journals
(e.g., Science, Plasma Physics, Fusion Technology, Nuclear
Technology, Energy, Annual Review of Energy and the
Environment, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Environment, Energy
Policy); 50 research reports; 30 magazine articles (in, e.g.,
Saturday Review, Scientific American, Technology Review, Issues
in Science and Technology); and 23 pieces of Congressional
testimony.
Honors (inverse chronological order)
John H. Chafee Memorial Lecture, National Council for Science
and the Environment, 2008.
Robert Fletcher Award of the Thayer School of Engineering,
Dartmouth College, 2007.
President, American Association for the Advancement of Science,
2006-7.
Jerome Wiesner Lecture, University of Michigan, 2002.
Honorary Sc.D., Clark University, 2002.
Joseph Rotblat Lecturer, Annual Student Pugwash Conference,
2002.
National Associate of the U.S. National Academies (award ``for
exceptional service''), 2001.
John Heinz Prize in Public Policy, 2001.
Member of the National Academy of Engineering (elected 2000).
Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, 2000.
Sidney Drell Lecturer, Stanford University, 2000.
Kaul Foundation Award for Excellence in Science and
Environmental Policy, 1999.
Fusion Leadership Award for 1998, Fusion Power Associates,
Washington, D.C.
Honorary D.Eng., Colorado School of Mines, 1997.
Council on Foreign Relations (elected 1996).
Nobel Peace Prize acceptance lecture for the Pugwash
Conferences on Science & World Affairs, 1995.
Forum Award of the American Physical Society, 1995.
Volvo Environment Prize, 1993.
Member of the National Academy of Sciences (elected 1991).
Fellow of the American Physical Society (elected 1988).
Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science (elected 1987).
Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences (elected 1985).
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (elected
1983).
Kistiakowsky Visiting Scholar for the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences, 1983-84.
MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship, 1981-86.
Federation of American Scientists Public Service Award for
1979.
Gustavsen Memorial Lecturer, University of Chicago, 1978.
Honorary Sc.D., University of Puget Sound, 1975.
Distinguished Teaching Award of the University of California,
Berkeley, 1975.
Committees and Boards
UN Foundation/Sigma Xi Scientific Expert Group on Climate Change
and Sustainable Development (reporting to the U.N. Secretary-General
and Commission on Sustainable Development, Coordinating Lead Author,
2004-2007).
National Commission on Energy Policy (an independent, bi-partisan,
multi-sectoral group providing advice to the Congress and the
Administration, Co-Chair, 2002-).
President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology,
Executive Office of the President of the United States (1994-2001).
Chair, Panel on Nuclear Materials Protection, Control, and
Accounting, 1994-95.
Chair, Panel on Research on Magnetic Fusion Energy, 1995.
U.S. Chair, U.S.-Russian Scientific Commission on the
Disposition of Surplus Plutonium, 1996-98.
Chair, Panel on U.S. Federal Energy R&D for the Challenges of
the 21st Century, 1997.
Chair, Panel on International Cooperation in Energy Research,
Development, Demonstration, and Deployment, 1998-99).
National Academy of Sciences/National Academy of Engineering
Roundtable on Scientific Communication and National Security,
The National Academies (Member, 2003-2006).
Joint Working Group of the U.S. National Academies and the
Russian Academy of Sciences on U.S.-Russian Cooperation on
Nuclear Non-Proliferation (U.S. Chair, 2002-2005).
Committee on Technical Issues Related to Ratification of the
Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty (Chair, 2000-2002).
Committee on U.S.-India Cooperation on Energy (Chair 1999-
2004).
Committee on Balancing Scientific Openness and National
Security Controls at the National Weapons Laboratories (Member,
1998-1999).
Committee on U.S.-China Cooperation on Energy (Ex-Officio
Member, 1998-2000).
Advisory Board, ISSUES IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (1996-).
Committee on International Security and Arms Control (1992-;
Chair 1993-; Chair of the Panel on Reactor-Related Options for
Disposition of Weapon Plutonium, 1992-95; U.S. Co-Chair of the
Working Group of U.S.-China Cooperation on Energy and
Security,1995-97; Chair of the Panel to Review the Spent-Fuel
Standard for Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium, 1999-).
Panel on Human Impacts on Ecosystems (Chair), Board on Biology
and Commission on Behaviorial and Social Sciences and Education
(1991).
Committee on Nuclear & Alternative Energy Systems (1975-9).
Committee to Survey the Literature of Nuclear Risks (1975-9).
International Environmental Programs Committee (1970-5).
Panel on Environment & Growth, Committee on Research Applied to
National Needs (1973).
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Advisory Committee on International Science, 2004-6.
Board of Directors of the AAAS, 2005-8.
President-Elect of the AAAS, 2005-6.
President of the AAAS, 2006-7.
Chairman of the Board, 2007-8.
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Committee on International Security Studies (1982-99, Vice
Chair 1983-99).
U.S. Pugwash Committee (Chair 1983-91, Co-Chair 1992-95).
U.S. Department of Energy Committees
Fusion Energy Advisory Committee (1991-4).
U.S. National Review Committee for the International
Thermonuclear Engineering Reactor Conceptual Design Activity
(1991).
Senior Committee on Environmental, Safety, and Economic Aspects
of Magnetic Fusion Energy (Chair 1985-89).
Energy Research Advisory Board (1978-9).
Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs
Member of the International Council (1982-97).
Member of the Executive Committee of the Council (1982-97,
Chair 1987-97).
MacArthur Foundation
Member of the Board of Directors (1991-2005; Chair of the Board
Committee for the Program on Peace and International
Cooperation, 1994-96; Budget Committee, 2000-2005; Chair of the
Committee on Institutional Policy, 2002-2005).
Advisory Panel to the International Security Program (1984-8).
Federation of American Scientists (Council Member, 1974-78, 1979-
86; Treasurer, 1979-80; Vice Chairman, 1980-84; Chairman, 1984-86).
Editorial Boards
Innovations: Technology, Governance, Globalization (2005-),
Issues in Science and Technology (2000-), International Journal
of Global Energy Issues (1989-); Science and Global Security
(1987-); Environmental Conservation (1984-2000); Bulletin of
the Atomic Scientists (1984-86, Advisory Council 1979-81); Soft
Energy Notes (1979-82); Resources and Energy (1978-90); Annual
Review of Energy (1975-82).
Other
Executive Committee, Fusion Division, American Nuclear Society
(1987-1991); Advisory Council, Aldo Leopold Leadership Program
(1995-2001); Jury for the 2000 Blasker Energy Prize; U.S.-China
Advisory Council for Sustainable Development (2000-),
International Climate Change Task Force (2004-5), Board of
Directors, U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation
(2001-), Board of Councilors, Chiina-U.S. Center for
Sustainable Development (2002-), Board of Directors, Climate
Central (2008-).
Harvard Teaching (FAS = Faculty of Arts and Sciences, KSG = Kennedy
School of Government)
Junior Seminar in Environmental Science and Public Policy (FAS
1997, 99, 01, 03); Energy Systems (KSG 1996, 97, 98, 99, 00,
01, 03, 05, 06, 07, 08); Interdisciplinary Science and
Technology Assessments for Policy (KSG 1997, 98, 99, 00, 01,
02, 04, 05); Introduction to Environmental and Resource Science
for Policy (KSG 00, 01, 03, 04, 05, 06, 08); Introduction to
Science and Technology Policy (KSG 97, 01, 03, 04, 05, 06).
UC Berkeley Teaching
Energy and Society (1973-95); Critical Issues in Energy
Technology (1973-1978); Quantitative Aspects of Global
Environmental Problems (1973-2006); Professional Methods for
Interdisciplinary Careers (19802004); graduate seminars on
diverse topics (1976-2006).
Personal
Born 1 March 1944, Sewickley, Pennsylvania; married Cheryl Lea
Edgar (now Dr. Cheryl E. Holdren) February 1966; children John
Craig (b. 1966) and Jill Virginia (b. 1968); grandchildren
Alexis Ukiah Han Holdren (b. 1991), Laurel Makaira Holdren (b.
2000), Tor Ilan Holdren Hoick (b. 2001), Kalea Tazlena Hoick
Holdren (b. 2005), step-grandchild Maya Banks (b. 1992).
The Chairman. Thank you. We decided that we would actually
have both witnesses give testimony back to back, and then that
would encourage us to cross-question them and have all kinds of
fun.
To introduce Dr. Lubchenco is Senator Ron Wyden, who is
from the State of Oregon. So please proceed.
STATEMENT OF HON. RON WYDEN,
U.S. SENATOR FROM OREGON
Senator Wyden. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. As an
alum of this Committee, I know how much you value good science.
I have worked with many of you over the years in this very
committee room, spent a number of years I think on the perch
right next to Senator Nelson. So we appreciate the good work
that you all do to promote particularly sensible science and
scientific integrity.
And Dr. Jane Lubchenco's career has essentially been built
around those kinds of principles. She is a star on our faculty
at Oregon State University. But when you look at her
extraordinary track record, I think it is fair to say she is
the bionic woman of good science.
[Laughter.]
Senator Wyden. She has managed to do just about everything,
winning respect in every quarter.
For example, she has already served as scientific advisor
to two different administrations. She served President Clinton,
for example, for two terms on the National Science Board, and
she was part of the National Academy of Sciences in a climate
change report to President George Herbert Walker Bush. So I
think all of us who have toiled on this climate change issue
understand it is not exactly for the faint-hearted. You are
going to have to be bipartisan, and Dr. Lubchenco has already
shown with her previous service and the respect she won in two
different administrations that she is a very up to that.
At Oregon State, Dr. Lubchenco has had the opportunity to
confront many of the issues that NOAA is going to face on a
daily basis. She studied marine ecosystems around the globe.
She has worked to bring her conclusions home, again advising
policymakers of both political parties.
She was a recipient of the 2002 Heinz Award for the
environment. I note Senator Kerry's long history on these
issues. And here is what the Heinz Award said in recognizing
her. ``She has shown that while science should be excellent,
pure, and dispassionate, scientists should not sacrifice a
right and must not ignore the responsibility to communicate
their knowledge about how the earth is changing or to say what
they believe will be the likely consequences of different
policy options.''
So we have in Dr. Lubchenco somebody who has been driven by
the effort to dispassionately find the facts. Her scientific
contributions are recognized worldwide. She has been named one
of the most highly cited ecologists in the world, and as I
mentioned, for her great record, she has repeatedly been
recognized.
Let me close by saying, Mr. Chairman and colleagues, we so
value Dr. Lubchenco in Oregon. We would not give her up under
normal circumstances. She is such a valuable asset and has won
so much respect from scientists across the philosophical
spectrum and policymakers that we would not give her up unless
there were a chance to come to the aid of our country at a
critical time. Everyone in this room understands that if we are
going to make enduring changes in climate change, they are
going to have to be bipartisan. They are going to have to be
driven by good science and finding the facts. That is what Dr.
Lubchenco's career has been all about, and it is why I come
before you today to give her a recommendation this morning and
look forward to her serving in this critical position.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and colleagues.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Wyden, very much.
Dr. Lubchenco, I look forward to your testimony which is
just redolent with enthusiasm and promise.
STATEMENT OF DR. JANE LUBCHENCO, UNDERSECRETARY-
DESIGNATE OF COMMERCE FOR OCEANS AND ATMOSPHERE,
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
Dr. Lubchenco. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Hutchison,
distinguished members of the Committee. It is a deep honor for
me to be here today.
Senator Wyden, I greatly appreciate your very kind remarks,
and I value the time that you took to come here today. I know
it is a very, very busy day.
I am here with the love and support of a wonderful family,
and I wish to thank my 91-year-old mother, a pediatrician, my
late father, a surgeon and Army captain for enabling their six
daughters to pursue their dreams while instilling in each of us
a strong sense of values, family, love, and heritage. I am
grateful to my sisters too for teaching me the merits of
compromise and balance. I am very pleased that my husband Bruce
and my son Duncan are able to be here today, and I am grateful
to them for their continuing love and encouragement. And my
thanks to my wonderful staff and colleagues in Oregon and
around the country for their overwhelming support.
I first became enamored with the oceans during a college
class in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. To a Colorado native, life
in the sea seemed exotic and endlessly fascinating. Little did
I realize then that life in the oceans is also essential to
human well-being and prosperity along the coasts, as well as
inland.
I have been a professor of marine biology at Oregon State
University since 1977. I lead a large team of scientists
studying the marine ecosystems off the coasts of Washington,
Oregon, and California. We focus on understanding how the
ecosystem is changing and how society might recover and sustain
the jobs, recreational opportunities, healthy seafood, and wild
beauty that all depend upon healthy ocean ecosystems. I have
spent my entire career focused on connections, the connections
between land, sea, and air and the connections between people
and ecosystems.
I would bring to NOAA a firm belief that science should
inform, not dictate decisionmaking, a deep respect for multiple
points of view, a wealth of experience leading complex projects
and organizations. And I believe that these experiences have
prepared me well to serve the Nation by leading NOAA.
NOAA is, indeed, the crown jewel of the Commerce
Department. It is an indispensable partner with the private
sector in creating jobs along the coasts and inland. NOAA helps
protect lives and property in times of natural disaster. It is
a trusted steward of a bounty of marine and coastal resources,
and it is the premier Government agency for applied science.
Working with you and using the best available science as
our guide, here is what I think we could do. We can add
hundreds of millions of new dollars to the economy by bringing
back fisheries, both commercial and recreational. We can
improve fishing and farming, lower insurance rates, and make
air travel safer by improving weather forecasting. We can spur
the creation of new industries, for example, by improving
climate forecasting to enable better decisions about
infrastructure, public safety, and consumer needs. And we can
protect and recover the bays, beaches, rivers, and oceans that
amaze, inspire, and connect us all.
My vision for NOAA is strongly colored by the experiences I
had traveling around the country with the Pew Oceans Commission
doing public hearings in many coastal communities. The
consistent theme that we heard from CEOs to fishermen's wives,
from farmers to coastal residents was the same: an intimate
connection between people and oceans. 50 percent of Americans
live on the coast. Most of the rest love to visit clean beaches
and eat healthy seafood. Indeed, 60 percent of the country's
GDP comes from coastal communities.
Now our country must rise to a new challenge, dealing with
the impacts of a changing climate. I have heard firsthand from
business leaders and elected officials about the urgent need
for better information about likely local impacts of climate
change. From concern about droughts and sea level rise to
changes in the chemistry of the ocean, there is a real hunger
for more and better information.
If confirmed, I will work to create a National Climate
Service similar to the National Weather Service within NOAA.
NOAA is the best agency in the Government to synthesize the
scientific data on climate change and create products and
services that can be used by the public to guide important
decisions such as where to build a road or a wind turbine. This
idea has been studied by the agency, by the National Academy of
Sciences, and by this committee. It is an idea whose time has
come, and I would like to make it happen.
Being the Administrator of NOAA is a big job. Some of the
challenges I know well: ending overfishing, anticipating the
consequences of climate change, preparing for natural disasters
in a time when resources are tight, restoring ecosystems on
which we depend for food, water, livelihoods and other
challenges I am just learning. Getting the satellite program
back on track is chief among them.
If confirmed, I would work hard with Members of this
Committee and the Senate and the House in realizing the great
potential inherent in NOAA. Together, we can provide America
the best climate change science, restore her oceans' vitality,
and recharge our economy, putting us on a path to
sustainability.
Again, thank you very much for your courtesy, Mr. Chairman
and members of this committee. I look forward to your
questions.
[The prepared statement and biographical information of Dr.
Lubchenco follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Jane Lubchenco, Undersecretary-Designate of
Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, U.S. Department of Commerce
Mr. Chairman, Senator Hutchison, and distinguished members of the
Committee, I am honored to appear before you as President Obama's
nominee for Undersecretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and
Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. I
am grateful for the courtesy shown to me by the Members of this
Committee with whom I have visited over the past several weeks, and I
am eager to continue and deepen our dialogue.
I come before you today with the love and support of a wonderful
family. I wish to thank my 91-year old mother, a pediatrician, and my
late father, a surgeon and Army Captain, for encouraging and enabling
their six daughters to pursue their dreams while instilling in each of
us a deep sense of values, family, love and heritage. I thank my
sisters for teaching me the merits of compromise, humility and balance.
I'm pleased that my husband Bruce and son Duncan are able to be here
today and I'm grateful to them for their continuing encouragement and
love. And I wish to thank my staff and colleagues in Oregon and around
the country for all of their support.
I was fortunate to grow up in Colorado where I developed a deep
appreciation for the land--hunting and fishing with my father, hiking
and camping with family and friends. I also grew to understand the
pervasive importance of weather, especially from family stories about
the extended droughts in South Carolina in the late 20's that triggered
my paternal grandparents' move to Colorado.
I first became enamored with the oceans during a college class in
Woods Hole, Massachusetts. To a Colorado native, the life in the sea
seemed exotic and endlessly fascinating. Little did I realize then that
life in the oceans is also essential to human prosperity and well-
being--both along the coasts and inland. My exposure to the oceans was
love at first sight and my life's work was set in motion.
I am currently a professor of marine biology and zoology at Oregon
State University, where I have taught since 1977. I lead a large
interdisciplinary team of scientists studying the large marine
ecosystem off the coasts of Washington, Oregon and California. We focus
on understanding how the ecosystem is changing and how society might
recover and sustain the jobs, recreational opportunities, healthy
seafood and wild beauty that all depend upon healthy ocean ecosystems.
Indeed, I have spent my entire career focused on the connections
between the land, sea and air and between people and the land and
ocean.
Throughout my teaching, leadership of large organizations, and
participation in public service, I have emphasized the important role
of clear scientific input in decisionmaking. I have stressed my belief
that science should inform, not dictate, decision-making.
I have gained a wealth of experience in leading large, complex
projects and organizations and serving on Boards of Directors for major
foundations and organizations. These projects, organizations and boards
include the American Association for the Advance of Science, the
International Council for Science, the Partnership for
Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans, the National Science
Board, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Monterey Bay
Aquarium, the Environmental Defense Fund and Oregon Governor
Kulongoski's Advisory Group on Global Warming. I believe that these
experiences have prepared me well to serve the Nation by leading NOAA.
My students have always been an inspiration. Young minds are adept
at challenging one's thinking and introducing novel ideas. If I was
talking with them right now about NOAA, and why I'm so excited to have
the honor of being nominated to lead the agency, I'd say this.
NOAA is the crown jewel of the Commerce Department. It is an
indispensible partner with the private sector in creating jobs and
growth all along our coasts. It is also the trusted steward of a bounty
of marine resources that belong to all Americans. It helps to protect
lives and property in times of natural disaster. And it is the premier
government agency for applied science.
I tell my students that science is more than just fascinating
knowledge, it is also useful knowledge. I believe passionately that
science should inform our decisions. I can think of no better place to
use my knowledge and experience than at NOAA. Working with you, and
using the best available science as our guide, here is what I think we
can do.
We can add hundreds of millions of new dollars to the
economy by bringing back fisheries--both commercial and
recreational.
We can improve farming, lower insurance rates, and make air
travel safer by improving weather forecasting.
We can spur the creation of new industries. Improved climate
forecasting, for example, can serve as the backbone of new
enterprises helping businessmen and public servants alike make
better decisions about infrastructure, public safety, consumer
needs and product research and development.
We can protect and recover bays, beaches, rivers and oceans
that amaze, inspire and connect us all.
My love of oceans, scientific knowledge and ability to find common
ground among diverse perspectives led to my service on the Pew Oceans
Commission and the Joint Ocean Commission Initiative. I have spent a
good deal of time thinking about the future of NOAA and its work. My
vision for NOAA is strongly colored by the experience of traveling
around the country doing public hearings with the Commission. We
listened to people from all walks of life--on the coasts and in the
heartland. The consistent theme from CEOs to fishermen's wives, from
farmers to coastal residents was the same: There is an intimate
connection between Americans and our coasts and oceans. Fifty percent
of us live in coastal areas; most of the rest love to visit beaches and
eat seafood. Sixty percent of the country's GDP is generated in coastal
communities. NOAA and Congress have the job of protecting the oceans
and Great Lakes. But it is not just protecting nature for its own sake.
Jobs and a healthy environment go hand-in-hand--in the ocean as well as
on the land.
Now our country must rise to a new challenge--dealing with the
impacts of the changing climate. In my work on the Ocean Commissions, I
heard firsthand from businesses and state and local governments about
the need for better information and predictions about the impacts of
climate change in communities all across this country. From concern
about droughts and sea level rise to changes in the chemistry of the
ocean, there is a real hunger for more and better information. If
confirmed, I will work to create a National Climate Service, which
would be similar to the National Weather Service, within NOAA. NOAA is
the best agency in the government to synthesize the scientific data on
climate change and create products and services that can be used by the
public to guide important decisions such as where to build a road or
wind turbines. This idea has been studied by the agency, the National
Academy of Sciences, and by members of this Committee. It is an idea
whose time has come, and I would like to make it happen.
Being the Administrator of NOAA is a big job. Some of the
challenges I know well from my work: Ending overfishing; anticipating
the consequences of climate change; preparing for natural disasters in
a time when resources are tight; restoring ecosystems on which we
depend for food, water and livelihoods.
Other challenges I'm just learning. Getting the satellite program
back on track is chief among them. I look forward to working with you
to strengthen NOAA as a partner with business in creating economic
growth and as a trusted steward of America's oceans, Great Lakes and
coasts.
I have great admiration for the legions of dedicated scientists and
other talented professionals at NOAA. I know that this Committee and
the Congress has been very supportive of NOAA and its work. I relish
the opportunity to lead the team. I pledge to bring transparency,
fairness, integrity and accountability to the job, using a consultative
and collaborative approach. If confirmed, I will work hard with the
Members of this Committee, the Senate, and the House in realizing the
great potential inherent in NOAA. Together we can provide America the
best climate change science, restore her ocean's vitality and recharge
our economy, putting us on a path to sustainability.
Again, thank you very much for your courtesy, Mr. Chairman and
Members of this Committee.
______
a. biographical information
1. Name (Include any former names or nicknames used):
Jane Lubchenco.
Jane Ann Lubchenco.
Jane Lubchenco Menge.
2. Position to which nominated: Administrator, National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
3. Date of Nomination: January 20, 2009.
4. Address (List current place of residence and office addresses):
Residence: Information not released to the public.
Office: Department of Zoology, Oregon State University, 3029
Cordley Hall, Corvallis, OR 97331-2914.
5. Date and Place of Birth: December 4, 1947; Denver, Colorado.
6. Provide the name, position, and place of employment for your
spouse (if married) and the names and ages of your children (including
stepchildren and children by a previous marriage).
Bruce Menge (Husband), Wayne and Gladys Valley Professor of
Marine Biology, and Distinguished Professor of Zoology, Oregon
State University; Duncan Nicholas Lubchenco Menge (son) (27).
7. List all college and graduate degrees.. Provide year and school
attended.
B.A. 1969, Colorado College (Biology; Ford Foundation
Independent Study Program).
M.S. 1971, University of Washington (Zoology).
Ph.D. 1975, Harvard University (Ecology).
8. List all post-undergraduate employment, and highlight all
management-level jobs held and any non-managerial jobs that relate to
the position for which you are nominated.
All of my employment is related to the position for which I am
nominated.
Assistant Professor, Harvard University, 1975-77.
Assistant Professor 1977-1982, Associate Professor 1982-88,
Oregon State University (OSU).
Research Associate, Smithsonian Institution, 1978-1984.
Professor 1988-; Chair, Department of Zoology 1989-92;
Distinguished Professor 1993-, OSU.
Wayne and Gladys Valley Professor of Marine Biology 1995-
Present, OSU.
Visiting Professor: University of the West Indies, Kingston,
Jamaica, 1976; Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Panama,
1975-1984; Universidad Catolica, Santiago, Chile, 1986;
Institute of Oceanography, Academica Sinica, Qingdao, P.R.
China, 1987; University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New
Zealand, 1994-95, 1999-2000, 2002-2003.
National Science Board, member 1996-2000, 2000-2006, twice
nominated by President William Jefferson Clinton and twice
confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
9. Attach a copy of your resume.*
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10. List any advisory, consultative, honorary, or other part-time
service or positions with Federal, State, or local governments, other
than those listed above, within the last 5 years.
White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, National
Science and Technology Council's National Forum on Environment
and Natural Resources R&D, Chair, Biodiversity and Ecosystem
Dynamics Group, 1994.
Corvallis City Council, Advisory Commission on Open Space,
1995-98.
National Marine Fisheries Service, Ecosystem Principles
Advisory Panel, 1997-2000.
President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology
(PCAST), Committee on Biodiversity and Ecosystems, 1997-1998.
Oregon State of the Environment Report, Science Panel, 1998-
1999.
Governor of Oregon's Global Warming Advisory Group, Co-Chair,
2003-2005.
Joint Oceans Commission Initiative, Member, 2004 to Present.
National Science Foundation, Search Committee for Assistant
Director for Geosciences, Chair, 2007.
11. List all positions held as an officer, director, trustee,
partner, proprietor, agent, representative, or consultant of any
corporation, company, firm, partnership, or other business, enterprise,
educational, or other institution within the last 5 years.
Monterey Bay Aquarium, Trustee, 1995-2007, Program Committee,
1995-2007.
Environmental Defense Fund, Trustee, 1995-2009, Science
Advisory Committee, 1995-present; Co-Chair of Oceans Committee,
1997-present; Vice-Chair, 2005-present.
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Beijer Institute for
Ecological Economics Director, 1999-2004.
SeaWeb, 2000-2007, Director.
David and Lucile Packard Foundation Trustee, 2001-2004, Trustee
Emerita 2004-present.
International Council for Science, 1999-2002, President-Elect;
2002-2005, President; 2005-2007, Past President.
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Trustee 2007-present.
Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History,
Director, 2007-present.
Aldo Leopold Leadership Program. Founder and Chair 1993-2002;
Co-Chair 2003-2006; Senior Advisor and Chair of Board of
Advisors, 2006-present.
Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans
(PISCO). Co-Founder and Lead Principal Investigator of 13 Co-
PIs. (1999-present).
Science of Marine Reserves Project of PISCO, Team Leader, 2007-
present.
Communication Partnership for Science and the Sea (COMPASS),
Co-Founding Principal and Chair (1999-2007).
International Consortium for Research in Upwelling Marine
Biogeographic Areas (ICORUMBA), 1 of 8 PIs, 1992-2007.
Climate Central, Co-Founder, Vice Chair and Secretary, 2008.
Aspen Dialogue and Commission on Arctic Climate Change,
Commissioner, 2008-2010.
12. Please list each membership you have had during the past 10
years or currently hold with any civic, social, charitable,
educational, political, professional, fraternal, benevolent or
religious organization, private club, or other membership organization.
Include dates of membership and any positions you have held with any
organization. Please note whether any such club or organization
restricts membership on the basis of sex, race, color, religion,
national origin, age, or handicap.
National Academies/National Research Council Appointments
NAS, delegate to Class Membership Committee, 1997, 1998; NRC,
Ecosystem Panel, 1997-1999; NAS, Robertson Memorial Lecture,
Selection Committee, 1998; NAS Committee on Class and Section
Structure, 1999-2001; Sub-Committee, Earth, Environment,
Agriculture and Resources, 1999-2001; NAS Development
Committee, 1999-2002; NAS, Member of Council, 1999-2002; NAS
Council Committee on Scientific Programs, 1999-2002; NAS
Council Committee on Budget and Internal Affairs, 1999-2002;
First Chair of newly created Section of Environmental Sciences
and Ecology of NAS, Section 63, 2000-2001; NAS Executive
Committee, 2001, 2002; NAS Committee on Sustainability Science,
2002-2003; NRC Committee on International Capacity Building for
the Protection and Sustainable Use of Oceans and Coasts, 2006-
2007; NAE Blue Ribbon Task Force on Grand Challenges for
Engineering, 2006-2007; Section 63 delegate to Council
Membership Committee, 2007-2008; NRC Ocean Studies Board Review
Team member, 2007-2008; NRC Committee on Ecological Impacts of
Climate Change, 2008; NRC Panel on Advancing the Science of
Climate Change of the Committee on America's Climate Choices,
2008-2010.
National Science Board Appointments
Member 1996-2006: The NSB provides advice to the President,
Congress and the Nation about science and technology and is the
Board of Directors of the National Science Foundation.
Committee on Education and Human Resources, 1996-1997;
Committee on Programs and Plans, 1997-2006; Task Force on the
Environment, Chair, 1998-2000; International Task Force, 2000-
2002, 2005-2006; Task Force on Science and Engineering
Infrastructure, 2001-2003; Committee on Strategy and Budget,
2001-2006; Nominating Committee, 2002; Subcommittee on Polar
Issues, 2002-2006; Nominating Committee, 2006.
Other Advisory Boards and Panels
United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Scientific and
Technical Advisory Panel (STAP), Roster of Experts, 1993-2000;
Pew Fellows Program in Conservation and the Environment,
Advisory Committee, 1995-98; Corvallis City Council, Advisory
Commission on Open Space, 1995-98; Living On Earth, P135 radio
show, Scientific Advisory Board, 1997-2000; National Marine
Fisheries Service, Ecosystem Principles Advisory Panel, 1997-
2000; President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology
(PCAST), Committee on Biodiversity and Ecosystems, 1997-1998;
Sea Studios Foundation, The Shape of Life production, Advisory
Board, 1997-2001; Oregon State of the Environment Report,
Science Panel, 1998-1999; Consultative Group on Biological
Diversity, Advisor's Forum, 1998; Pacific Ocean Conservation
Network, Scientific Advisory Committee, 1997-98; AAAS,
Millennium Symposium, AAAS and the American Bar Association,
1998-2000; Science and Technology News Network, Advisory Board,
1998-present; National Geographic Society's Sustainable Seas
Expeditions, Technical Advisory Committee, 1998-2001; World
Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland, 1998-2001, 2004-5; Earth
Day 2000 National Council, 1999-2000; Ecotrust Council, 1999-
present; Forum on Religion and Ecology, Advisory Board, 1999-
present; International Biodiversity Observation Year, Advisor),
Board, 2000-2002. Center for Informal Learning and Schools,
collaboration among the Exploratorium, University of California
Santa Cruz and Kings College London. 2001-2005; Sea Studios
Foundation, Strange Days on Planet Earth production, Advisory
Board, 2001-2006; Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Advisory
Committee 2002; Vulcan (Paul Allen's Organization), Advisor,
2000-2002; University of Washington, Friday Harbor
Laboratories, Ten Year Review Committee, 2002; University of
Washington, Department of Biology, Board of Visitors, 20022005;
University of Washington, Friday Harbor Laboratories
Centennial. Symposium Committee (Chair), 2003-2004; Millennium
Ecosystem Assessment (MA), Convening Lead Author, (Synthesis
Chapter for Business and Industry) and Lead Author (Millennium
Development Goals chapter), 2002-2005; Governor of Oregon's
Global Warming Advisory Group, Co-Chair, 2003-2005; The Ocean
Foundation, Board of Advisors, 2006-present; Duke University
Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Board of
Advisors, 2006-present; Stanford University Woods Institute for
the Environment, Board of Advisors, 2006-present; World
Commission on Protected Areas, Marine, Senior Advisory Panel,
2006-present; Google Ocean Council of Advisors, 2007-present;
Sailors for the Sea, Science Advisory Committee, 2008-present;
Environmental Law Institute 40th Anniversary Committee, 2008-
2009; Aldo Leopold Foundation, Advisory Council, 2008-present;
The Natural History Network, Advisory Council, 2008-present.
Selection Committees
Pew Fellows in Marine Conservation 1995-98; Aldo Leopold
Leadership Program 1998-2008; David and Lucile Packard
Foundation, Interdisciplinary Science Program, 1998-2001; James
S. McDonnell Centennial Fellowships, Selection Committee for
Global and Complex Systems Fellows, 1997-99; American
Association for the Advancement of Science, Science Editor-in-
Chief, 1999-2000; Ecological Society of America, Nominating
Committee, 2001-2002; John B. Oakes Award for Distinguished
Environmental Journalism, 1999-2004; Smithsonian Institution
Natural History Museum Sant Chair in Marine Science, 2005-2006;
AAAS Committee on Nominations, 2007, 2008; Chair of Nominating
Committee for National Science Foundation's Head of GEO
Directorate, 2007.
International Council for Science (ICSU):
U.S. Delegate to First World Conference on Science, Budapest,
June-July 1999; U.S. National Academy of Sciences Delegate to
International Council for Science, XXVI General Assembly,
Cairo, 1999; President Elect 1999-2002; ICSU Committee on
Scientific Programs and Review, 2000-2002; ICSU Executive Board
2002-2007; ICSU XXVII General Assembly, as President-Elect and
Chair of Forum on Sustainability Science, Rio de Janeiro, 2002;
President 2002-2005; Third World Academy of Sciences 20th
Anniversary, delivered Opening Remarks, Beijing PRC; Inter-
Academy Panel meeting, Mexico City, 2003; U.N. World Summit on
the Information Society, address to plenary session, Geneva,
Switzerland, 2003; United Nations, Commission on Sustainable
Development, testimony to Ministers, New York, 2004; European
Science Foundation, plenary address, Strasbourg, France, 2004;
Third World Academy of Sciences 15th General Meeting, Trieste,
Italy 2004; Keynote Address for Inauguration Ceremony for
ICSU's Regional Office for Africa--the first of four Regional
Offices in development worldwide, Pretoria, S.A. 2005; Chair of
Nominating Committee, 2005; Chair of Executive Board and
Strategic Plan for ICSU 2006-2012; Chair of XXVIII General
Assembly of ICSU, Shanghai and Suzhou, China, Oct 2005; Past
President, 2005-2007; Keynote Speaker for 75th Anniversary
Celebration, Paris, 2006; Chair, Press Conference for Global
Launch of ICSU's and World Monitoring Organization's
International Polar Year, March 2007.
International Committees (separate from ICSU):
Religion, Science and the Environment I: 95-1995: The Meaning
of the Apocalypse in Today's World, member of Steering
Committee 1994-1995; Religion, Science and the Environment H:
The Black Sea as a Paradigm. Executive Chair of Scientific and
Religious Steering Committee, 1996-1998; Religion, Science and
the Environment III: The Danube, Scientific and Religious
Steering Committee, 1998-2000; UNESCO (United Nations
Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization), Scientific
Advisory Board, 1996-1999; OECD Megascience Forum, Biodiversity
Working Group, 1998; Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Beijer
Institute, Asko meetings, Valuing Ecosystem Services, 1998;
Evolution and Culture 1999; Inclusive Wealth, 2001; Uncertainty
in Science 2002; Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Project,
Steering Committee, 1998-2000; U.S. delegate to First World
Conference on Science, Budapest, June-July 1999; Global
Environmental Change/Open Science Conference, Amsterdam, 2001;
Religion, Science and the Environment IV: The Adriatic,
Honorary Committee, 2001-2003; NSB Review Team, Antarctic
Research Program, 2000; Environmental Defense Marine Protected
Area visiting committee, Cuba, 2002; Science in Kruger National
Park, Synthesis Team, South Africa, 2002; Religion, Science and
the Environment V: The Baltic, Honorary Committee 2002-2003;
Inter-Academy Panel, ex officio member, 2002-2005; Millennium
Ecosystem Assessment, Convening Lead Author: Private Sector
Synthesis Report; Lead Author: Millennium Development Goals
Chapter; Religion, Science and the Environment VI: The Caspian
Sea, Honorary Committee, 2004-2005; Religion, Science and the
Environment VII: The Amazon Basin, Honorary Committee, 2005-
2006; Steering Committee for International Union of Biological
Sciences (IUBS)'s 29th Conference and General Assembly, 2007,
Washington, D.C.; World Life Sciences Forum BioVision, Science
Chair for Environment for March 2007 Forum, 2006-2007; Third
World Academy of Sciences Membership Advisory Committee in
Systems Biology, 2007-2009; Religion, Science and the
Environment VIII: The Arctic, Honorary Committee, 2007;
International Marine Conservation Congress 2009, Steering
Committee, 2007-2009; European Project on Ocean Acidification,
Reference User Group Member, 2008; Arctic TRANSFORM:
Transatlantic Policy Options for Supporting Adaptations in the
Marine Arctic, expert working group member, European
Commission-funded, EU-US transatlantic dialogue, 2008-9.
Professional Memberships: (all memberships for at least the last 10
years: all current unless otherwise indicated)
American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Ecological Society of America.
American Institute of Biological Sciences.
Phycological Society of America (terminated in 2007).
British Ecological Society (honorary member for life).
Western Society of Naturalists.
Association for Women in Science.
Memberships during some of the last 10 years, but not presently:
American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (terminated in
2007).
American Society of Naturalists (terminated in 2007).
To my knowledge these clubs or organizations do not restrict
membership on the basis of sex, race, color, religion, national origin,
age, or handicap.
13. Have you ever been a candidate for and/or held a public office
(elected, non-elected, or appointed)? If so, indicate whether any
campaign has any outstanding debt, the amount, and whether you are
personally liable for that debt: No.
14. Itemize all political contributions to any individual, campaign
organization, political party, political action committee, or similar
entity of $500 or more for the past 10 years. Also list all offices you
have held with, and services rendered to, a state or national political
party or election committee during the same period.
Ocean Champions--$500 (2008); $2,000 (2007); $2000 (2005);
$1,000 (2004).
Steve Novick, Democratic primary race for Senate, Oregon--$500
(2007);
$500 (2008).
Oregon League of Conservation Voters--$500 (2005).
Democratic National Committee--$500 (2004).
I have not held any offices in a political party.
15. List all scholarships, fellowships, honorary degrees, honorary
society memberships, military medals, and any other special recognition
for outstanding service or achievements.
Honorary Societies (year elected, leadership responsibilities):
American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1993; National Academy
of Sciences, 1996; elected to Council 1999-2002; Executive
Committee 2001-2002; American Philosophical Society, member
1998; European Academy of Sciences, member, 2002; The Royal
Society, Foreign Member, 2004; Academy of Sciences for the
Developing World (TWAS), Associate Member, 2004; Academia
Chilena de Ciencias (Chilean Academy of Sciences),
Corresponding Member, 2007.
Honorary Doctoral Degrees:
Drexel University, 1992; Colorado College, 1993; Bates College,
1997; Unity College, 1998; Southampton College, Long Island
University, 1999; Princeton University, 2001; Plymouth State
College, 2002; Michigan State University, 2003; Georgetown
University, May 2008.
Other Honors and Awards:
8 Science Citation Classics or Top 0.25 percent Papers, ISI
(Institute for Scientific Information) Current Contents; George
Mercer Award, Ecological Society of America, 1979 (co-recipient
Bruce A. Menge); Outstanding Teacher Award, OSU Alpha Lambda
Delta (freshman honor society), 1986; National Lecturer,
Phycological Society of America, 1987-89; American Association
for the Advancement of Science Fellow, 1990; Pew Scholar in
Conservation and the Environment, Pew Charitable Trusts, 1992-
1995; Distinguished Professor, Oregon State University, 1993;
MacArthur Fellow, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur
Foundation, 1993-1998; Oregon Scientist of the Year, Oregon
Academy of Science, 1994; Golden Eagle Award, Council for
International Nontheatrical Events (CINE), Washington, D.C.
(for National Geographic film Diversity of Life), 1994, co-
recipients James and Elaine Larison; AWIS Fellow, Association
for Women in Science, 1997; Distinguished Service Award,
Ecological Society of America, 1997; Honorary Member, Golden
Key National Honor Society, 1998; National Conservation Award,
Daughters of the American Revolution, 1998; Founder's Education
Award, Daughters of the American Revolution, 1998; Sustained
Achievement Award, Renewable Natural Resources Foundation,
1998; David B. Stone Award, New England Aquarium, 1999; Howard
Vollum Award, Reed College, 1999; Honorary Member, British
Ecological Society, 2001; Golden Plate Award, The American
Academy of Achievement, 2001; Ed Ricketts Memorial Award,
Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, 2002; CSSP Leadership
Citation, Council for Scientific Society Presidents, 2002; The
Heinz Award for the Environment, Heinz Family Foundation, 2002;
Outstanding Woman Scientist, 1 of 50 named by Discover
Magazine, November, 2002; ISI Highly Cited Researcher in
Ecology/Environment, 2002; Distinguished Service Award, Society
for Conservation Biology, 2003; Distinguished Alumna Award,
College of Arts and Sciences, University of Washington, 2003;
Nierenberg Prize for Science in the Public Interest, Scripps
Institution of Oceanography, 2003; Distinguished Scientist
Award, American Institute of Biological Sciences, 2004;
Environmental Law Institute Award, 2004 (the first scientist to
receive this honor); Public Understanding of Science and
Technology Award, American Association for the Advancement of
Science, 2005 (the first woman to receive this award); OSU
College of Science Gilfillan Award, 2006; Beijer Fellow, Royal
Swedish Academy of Sciences' Beijer Institute of Ecological
Economics, 2007-present; The Zayed International Prize for the
Environment, for Scientific and Technological Achievements,
Dubai, United Arab Emirates, 2008; Edward O. Wilson
Biodiversity Technology Pioneer Award, 2009, American Computer
Museum.
16. Please list each book, article, column, or publication you have
authored, individually or with others. Also list any speeches that you
have given on topics relevant to the position for which you have been
nominated. Do not attach copies of these publications unless otherwise
instructed.
Please see the attached list of all publications.**
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The fallowing is a list of all invited presentations for the last 3
years. Earlier years are not listed due to the volume of information,
but are available should that he deemed useful.
Invited Presentations (2006-2008)
2008:
Arizona State University, School of Life Sciences Seminar and
Wrigley Lectures Series, Invited Speaker, ``The Slippery Slope
to Slime or A Mutiny for the Bounty? Scientific Knowledge
Informing Today's Choices and Tomorrow's Ocean''; Tempe, AZ;
California Current Ecosystem-Based Management meeting, Invited
Speaker, ``Embracing a New Era''. Santa Cruz. CA; Harvard
University, Biodiversity, Ecology and Global Change Seminar
Series, Invited Speaker, ``Seas the Day: Science Informing
Today's Choices and Tomorrow's Ocean'', Boston, MA; American
Association for the Advancement of Science Annual Meeting,
Speaker in three symposia ``Finding Sustainability without
stability: New Goals for a World in Flux'', ``Local and Global
Returns on Marine Reserves: Are the Investments Paying Off?'',
and ``Strange Days on Planet Ocean: New Insights on the Effects
of Climate Change'', Boston, MA; San Diego Natural History
Museum, Invited Speaker, ``Climate Change and the World's
Oceans'', San Diego, CA; OSU Society of Women Engineers,
Keynote speaker ``Grand Challenges for Engineers'', Corvallis,
OR; Port Orford Ocean Resource Team Water Festival 2008,
Keynote Speaker, Port Orford, OR; University of British
Columbia Fisheries Seminar Series, Invited Speaker, Vancouver,
BC, Canada; Aspen Institute, Aspen Environmental Forum, invited
speaker, Aspen, Colorado; University of Washington School of
Aquatic & Fishery Science Lecture Series, Invited Speaker,
``Oceans, Climate Change and the Pacific Northwest'', Seattle,
WA; University of Washington, School of Aquatic and Fishery
Science inaugural graduate student-invited speaker, ``Oceans,
Climate Change and the Pacific Northwest'' and Forum on
Science, Ethics and Policy, Invited Speaker, ``Scientists' New
Social Contract with Society: Communicating Climate Science and
more'', Seattle, WA; American Museum of Natural History Spring
Environmental Lecture and Luncheon, Panelist on climate change
and oceans, New York, NY; NOAA-USDA National Stakeholder
Meeting on Alternative Feeds for Aquaculture, Keynote Speaker,
Silver Spring, MD; Georgetown University, Graduate School
Commencement Speaker, Washington, D.C.; Intergovernmental
Oceanographic Commission (IOC)/ICES/PICES, Effects of Climate
Change on the World's Oceans International Symposium, Plenary
Speaker, Gijon, Spain; UNESCO/GLOBEC, Eastern Boundary
Upwelling Ecosystem Symposium, Workshop Leader, Canary Islands,
Spain; National Geographic, Aspen Institute, and Linblad
Expeditions Arctic Expedition for Climate Action, speaker and
Commissioner, Svalbard, Norway; Google Science Foo Camp,
Invited Participant, Mt. View, CA; Oregon Public Broadcasting
(OPB) Salon, Guest Speaker, Newport, OR; Hatfield Marine
Science Center Marine Science Media Fellowship Program; World
Conservation Congress, 2 Plenary Talks (on the `Value of Marine
Reserves', and on the new `Marine Protected Area layer of
Google Earth') and 1 concurrent session (on Lessons for the
Arctic from Oceans around the world). Barcelona, Spain.
2007:
University of California, Santa Cruz Fred Keeley Lecture in
Environmental, Keynote Speaker, Santa Cruz, CA; University of
California, Santa Cruz Panel on Women in the Environmental
Sciences, Panelist, Santa Cruz, CA; American Association for
the Advancement of Science Annual Meeting, Speaker in four
symposia on ``Human Psychology and the Science of Climate
Change'' ``West Coast Oceanic Anomalies'', ``Advocacy in
Science and Journalism'' and ``Science and Ethics of
Sustainability'', San Francisco, CA; Straub Environmental
Lecture, Invited Speaker, ``Environmental Changes and Human
Well-Being: Information and Hope'', Salem, OR; BioVision 2007,
Speaker and Chair ``Conference on Environment'' and Summarizer
for Closing Plenary, Lyon, France,; Joint Ocean Commission
Initiative Conference on Regional Ocean Governance, Opening and
Closing Remarks, Monterey CA,; IUCN Marine Summit, Invited
Speaker, ``Fisheries, MPAs and human well-being'', Washington,
D.C.; Cornell University Iscol Lecture, ``Seas the Day:
Recovering the Diminishing Bounty of Oceans'', Ithaca, NY;
Crafoord Prize Jubilee Celebration, Royal Swedish Academy of
Sciences, Invited Speaker, ``Seas the Day: The Slippery Slope
to Slime or a Mutiny for the Bounty?'', Lund, Sweden,; Joint
meeting of the American Philosophical Society, the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Academy of
Sciences, Panel on Energy Choices, ``Energy Choices, Climate
Change and Oceans'', Washington, D.C.; International Union of
Biological Sciences General Assembly, ``Natural Security:
Ecosystems and Human Well-Being'', Washington, D.C.; Gilfillan
Lecture, OSU College of Science, Keynote Speaker, ``Recovering
the Bounty of the Oceans: Science and Society''; Ecological
Society of America symposium ``Ecology: the Integrative
Science'', San Jose, CA; Kristine Bonnevie Lecture, Keynote
Speaker, ``The Quickening Pace of Environmental Changes in
Oceans: Evolutionary, Ecological and Social Implications'',
University of Oslo, Norway; Religion, Science and The
Environment Symposium VII: The Arctic Ocean, ``Global Changes
for Life in Oceans''; Greenland; Fundacion COPEC Meeting
``Global Changes in Ocean Ecosystems and their Implications for
Science & Management'', Invited Speaker and panelist, Santiago,
Chile; Pontificia Universidad Catolica Seminar, Invited
Speaker, Santiago, Chile; Commission Permanente del Pacifico
Sur, Course on Management of Marine Protected Areas, Invited
Speaker, Valparaiso, Chile; Heceta Head Coastal Conference
``Oregon's Ocean: Resources and Opportunities'', Master of
Ceremony, Florence, OR; Linus Pauling and his Era: The
Scientist as Public Citizen, Invited Speaker, ``A Scientist's
Conscience'', Corvallis OR.
2006:
American Association for the Advancement of Science Annual
Meeting, Symposium Speaker, ``Scientists, the Public and
Policy-Makers in Dialogue: Principles and Applications'';
``Matching Scales: Human-Ecological Interface in the Marine
Ecosystem'', St. Louis, MO; Oregon Zoo Wildlife Conservation
Lecture Series, Invited Speaker, Portland, OR; American
Fisheries Society, Oregon Chapter Annual Meeting, Plenary
Speaker, Sun River, OR; Douglas County Global Warming Coalition
``The Latest Science on Global Warming'' Public Lecture,
Keynote speaker, Roseburg, OR; City Club of Portland, Invited
Speaker, ``Climate Change and its Implications for Oregon'';
Portland, OR: American Society of Limnology and Oceanography,
keynote address: `Prospects for our Oceans; Sustainability of
the Seas', Victoria, BC; The Seminar Group's Global Warming in
the Pacific Northwest Conference, Keynote Speaker, `The Science
of Global Warming: What's Likely? What's Possible?' Seattle,
WA; Italian Ecological Society National Meeting, Plenary
Speaker, ``Prospects for the Oceans: Sustainability of the
Seas'', Civitavecchia, Italy; Italian Ecological Society
National Meeting, Invited Speaker, ``PISCO: Harnessing
Interdisciplinary Science to Understand a Large Marine
Ecosystem'', Viterbo, Italy; Portland State University,
Environmental Sciences and Resources Group, Annual Keynote
Speaker, ``The Environment and Human Wellbeing'', Portland, OR;
Colorado College, Religion and Public Life Issues in Science
Symposium, Invited Speaker, ``Science, Religion, and the
Environment'', Colorado Springs, CO; Committee on Data for
Science and Technology (CODATA) of the International Council
for Science, 40th Anniversary Keynote Speaker, ``Science's Sine
Qua Non: Making Scientific Knowledge Understandable, Relevant
and Useful'', Beijing, China.
Service on Editorial Boards:
American Naturalist, 1978-81; Oecologia, 1985-88; Journal of
Phycology, 1987-90; Ecological Applications, 1989-93; The
Northwest Environmental Journal, 1991-93; Trends in Ecology &
Evolution, 1991-2006; Conservation Ecology, 1995-2001; Issues
in Ecology, 1995-2002, 2003-2007; Ecosystems, 1997-99;
Environmental Conservation, 1998-99: Advisory Editor,
Ecological Studies, Springer-Verlag, 1993-2000; Associate
Editor, Encyclopedia of Biodiversity, Academic Press, 1997-
2000; International Advisory Board, Encyclopedic: of Global
Environmental Change, Wiley, 1998-2001; Editor for Special
Issue on Marine Reserves, Ecological Applications, 1999-2002;
Ad-hoc editor, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
1998-present; Frontiers in Ecology, Advisory Board, 2001-2004;
Human-Environment Interactions (U. Michigan book series), 2003-
present; Faculty of 1000, 1 of 3 Heads of Faculty for Ecology
and Evolution, 2003-present; Marine Ecosystems and Management,
2007-present.
Other Appearances Below is a selection of briefings, videos, films,
televised or nationally published interviews and articles, not
including local and regional media interviews or profiles or public
lectures (see next section):
1995--Briefing: Newt Gingrich, Speaker, U.S. House of
Representatives, on biodiversity, for 2 hours, in Atlanta, 27
January.
1996--Film: Keeping the Earth (produced for the Union of
Concerned Scientists by New Wrinkle, Inc., in cooperation with
the National Religious Partnership for the Environment);
interview of J. Lubchenco in film.
1996--Exhibits and videos: at Hatfield Marine Science Center,
Newport, OR, by New England Technology Group; on rocky
intertidal research findings, including biodiversity and
coastal communities; J. Lubchenco as scientific advisor and
interviewee.
1997-98--Film: ``The Shape of Life'', 6 hour-long PBS series on
the relationship between shape and function in living
organisms; Scientific Advisory Committee, Sea Studios
Foundation.
1997--Video: of briefing for President William Jefferson
Clinton and Vice President Al Gore on climate change, East
Room, White House.
1997--28 Radio and television interviews: public and
commercial; local, national and international stations; taped,
filmed, and call-in, live; 5 minutes to 1 hour; on climate
change and state of the world.
1997--Profile: Christian Science Monitor's Outstanding
Americans, 15 August.
1997--Briefings: His All Holiness Bartholomew I, Ecumenical
Patriarch of the (Christian) Orthodox Church; status of the
world's oceans, climate change and biodiversity; 10 days,
September.
1998--Briefing: Newt Gingrich, Speaker of U.S. House of
Representatives, on climate change, 2\1/2\ hours, Atlanta, GA,
20 April.
1998--Briefing: President William Jefferson Clinton, First Lady
Hillary Rodham Clinton and Vice President Al Gore, on ocean
issues, 1 hour, Monterey, CA, 12 June.
1998--Video: Interviewed (as Chair of Scientific and Religious
Steering Committee) in Black Sea-Voyage of Healing, produced by
Harvey McKinnon and Peter Davis, Villon Films, Vancouver, BC,
55 min. 1999.
1999--Book Profile: The Door in the Dream: Conversations with
Eminent Women in Science, Elga Wasserman, Joseph Henry Press,
300 p. (published interview).
1999--Video: Featured in Generation to Generation: The Story of
Climate Change and Oregon, produced by Odyssey Productions for
the Oregon Office of Energy, 8 min.
1999--Popular Article: interview of Lubchenco: by Tont, Sargun
A. in GEZI National Geographic Traveler (Turkish), March 2(18):
20-24.
2000--Briefing: Marine Protected Area and Marine Reserves along
the West Coast; 2 days, for Academic scientists, government
agency and nongovernmental organization staff, Monterey, CA.
2001--Public Community Forum: ``Marine Biodiversity in Oregon''
for Biodiversity Roundtable, Corvallis, OR; speaker.
2001--Briefing: ``The Scientific Consensus on Marine Reserves''
to the Oregon Policy Advisory Council, Corvallis, OR; speaker.
2001--Film: IMAX film Lost Worlds on Biodiversity; advisory
committee.
2001--Film: Empty Oceans, Empty Nets. PBS/Habitat Media, Steve
Cowan and Barry Schienberg, producers, televised presentation
about ocean fisheries, interviewee.
2002--Oral Presentation: ``Environment and Human Health'' to
the Consultative Group on Biological Diversity, Washington,
D.C.
2002--Briefing: ``The Science or Marine Protected Areas and
Marine Reserves'', 2 days, Monterey, CA, for high-level
decisionmakers in state and Federal Government agencies,
organized by COMPASS.
2002--Roundtable: between NAS Scientists, and White House and
Federal Agency Staff on Sustainability Science.
2002--Profile: Jane Lubchenco named ``1 of 50 Most Important
Women in Science'': Discover Magazine, November, Vol, 23, No.
11: 52-57.
2002--Profile: Interview with Jane Lubchenco. ``Ocean
Advocate'' by Monica Michael Willis, Country Living Magazine:
July, Vol. 25, No. 7:30.
2002--Popular Article: Interview with Jane Lubchenco. ``State
of the Planet: A Global Report Card'' by Mike Klesius, in
National Geographic Magazine: September, pp: 104-115.
2002--Briefing: ``The Science of Marine Reserves'' for Oregon
media. Corvallis, OR.
2002--Inaugural Guest Lecture: to News Staff, Oregonian
Newspaper, Portland, OR.
2002--Profile: Career World Magazine for students 7-12. 31(3).
2002--Press Conference: As new President of ICSU, results of
scientific input into and follow-up actions to World Summit on
Sustainability Development.
2002--Oral Presentation: ``The Science of Marine Reserves'' to
Board of Directors of Conservation International, Seattle, WA.
2003--Radio Interview: ``Voice of America'' on PISCO new
research, 30 minutes.
2003--Press Briefing: To 30 national and international
reporters at the annual AAAS meeting, on new discoveries about
coastal oceans.
2003--Seminar: Norm Thompson Outfitters, on climate change and
sustainability.
2003--Seminar: Nike, Inc., on climate change.
2003--TV, Radio and Print Interviews: >30 on Pew Oceans
Commission report.
2004--National Press Conference, Pew Oceans Commission Report
to the Nation, National Press Club, Washington, D.C., televised
nationally.
2003--National Press Conference, U.S. Capitol, Members of
Congress commenting on the Pew Oceans Commission report.
2003--TV Special: Oregon Field Guide, Oregon Public
Broadcasting, features natural history of Oregon's rocky
shores.
2003--Oral Presentation: Capitol Hill Oceans Week, Washington,
D.C., for panel on Marine Protected Areas and Marine Reserves.
2003--Profile: Portland Oregonian, Sunday paper, pages 1, 8,
and 9.
2003--Opening Remarks: Third World Academy of Sciences 20th
Anniversary Celebration, Beijing, with the President of the
People's Republic of China, Hu Jintao.
2003--Interview--NPR Radio: The Steve Scher Show, 1 hour, call-
in; Seattle; with William Ruckelshaus on the Pew Oceans
Commission and the U.S. National Oceans Commission reports.
2003--Interview: KING TV: Seattle, WA, on Puget Sound as a
microcosm of global ocean challenges.
2004--Address to U.N. World Summit on the Information Society:
plenary session, Geneva, on the role of science in the
information society.
2004--TV Film: National Geographic's Strange Days on Planet
Earth, a 4-part PBS, NGS special feature; partnership between
Sea Studios, PBS/National Geographic Society and Vulcan;
scientific advisory board; aired on PBS in 2005.
2004--TV Film: Farming the Seas, PBS/Habitat Media Documentary
Film, Steve Cowan producer; interviewee.
2004--Oral Presentation: Rotary Club of Corvallis, April;
sustainability.
2004--Address to the United Nations Commission on Sustainable
Development-12, High Level Ministerial Segment, on the role of
science in enhancing sustainable development with particular
attention to freshwater, sanitation and human settlements; New
York, April.
2005--Written Evaluation of U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy
draft report prepared for the Governor of Oregon, from the
Marine Scientific Advisory Panel.
2004--Environmental Grant-Makers Association, keynote speaker,
Kaua'i, Hawai'i.
2005--Interview: Common Ground: Oregon's Ocean, 30 min film
produced by Green Fire Productions on the state of the ocean
ecosystem off Oregon and the merits of establishing a network
of marine reserves to protect them.
2005--Interview: National Academies InterViews Project.
Distinguished scientists talk about their research, why they
became scientists and other aspects of their careers.
http://www.nationalacademies.org/interviews/people/
lubchenco.html.
2005--Testimony: Oregon State Senate Land Use and Environment
Committee concerning recommendations from the OR Governor's
Advisory Group on Global Warming. March 25.
2005--Press Briefing: Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, launch
of the MA for North American audiences. Washington, D.C.
2005--Testimony: Portland City Council, on climate change,
invited, June 8.
2005--Interviews: Los Angeles Times, New York Times, National
Public Radio, etc. on aquaculture, May and June.
2005--Interviews on oceans and climate change: Print: GeoTimes;
LA Times; New York Times; National Geographic; Broadcast: KPSA,
San Francisco; Premier Radio.
2005--Interview: National Geographic Magazine. Field interviews
and photo shoot for June 2006 article on state of the oceans,
July 20-23.
2005--Interviews on science and society: national and
international press at the International Council for Science's
General Assembly, extensive coverage in China, Asia and
international press.
2005--Radio Broadcast: Eugene City Club talk `The Environment
and Human Well-Being', broadcast on Oregon Public Broadcasting
Radio.
2005--Forum on Climate Change: organized for community leaders
of mid-Willamette Valley by PISCO and COMPASS.
2006--Interviews on global warming: Print media: The Astorian,
Oregonian; broadcast: KPOJ Radio, KPNW Radio.
2006--Interviews on aquaculture: Print media: Delicious Living
Magazine.
2006--Interviews on ecosystem services and the Millennium
Ecosystem Assessment.
2006--Interviews on state of the oceans, marine reserves, ocean
policy or Oregon's ocean, print: The New Scientist; OSU's Terra
magazine; broadcast: OPB's Oregon Territory.
2006--Booklet: PISCO's Coastal Connections, Volume 5,
highlighting new scientific findings from the PISCO team.
2006--Radio Broadcast: Oregon Public Broadcasting of Portland
City Club talk ``Climate Change and its implications for
Oregonians.''
2006--Training: Trained 18 new Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellows
to be effective communicators of their scientific information
(1 of 2 weeks).
2006--Interview on Maintaining the Integrity of Science: Print
media: The Scientist, October.
2006--Interviews on the low-oxygen zone off the west coast
(Print: New York Times, Oregonian, AP, and others; TV: ABC
network news; NBC Portland news; Eugene KVAL news.
2006--Radio Interview on Oregon Territory, Oregon Public
Broadcasting, on Oregon's intertidal zone, climate change, and
more. The reporter and producer, Christy George received a 2007
Gracie Award from the American Women in Radio and Television
for the 20 minute show.
2007--Testimony to Joint Committee on Emergency Preparedness
and Ocean Policy, Oregon Legislature on ``The Science of Marine
Reserves'' 6 March.
2007--Interview by Claudia Dreifus for OnEarth Magazine on
climate and oceans.
2007--Interview for Pink Magazine on changes in oceans.
2007--Interviews on climate change and oceans for New
Scientist.
2007--TV Interview: OPB TV for 1-hour special show on climate
change in Oregon; aired 25 October; rebroadcast 30 October.
2007--TV and press interviews (El Mercurio, La Tercera) on
climate change and Nobel Peace Prize, Santiago Chile.
2008--Testimony to Oregon Senate Environment Committee,
invited, on marine reserves, 16 January.
2008--Interview: Common Ground 2: Oregon's Ocean Legacy, film
produced by Green Fire Productions on the sustainable use of
Oregon's ocean.
2008--Testimony to U.S. House of Representatives--Select
Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, invited,
``Climate and Oceans; Impacts and Implications''.
2008--Training: Trained 19 new Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellows
to be effective communicators of their scientific information
(1 of 2 weeks).
2008--Interviewed and Quoted in Parade Magazine on ocean
health. Chen, Daryl. 2008. ``Can Our Oceans Survive?'' July 27,
page 6.
2008--Interviewed and Quoted in article for Society of Women
Engineers Magazine on NAE Grand Challenges Project. Thomas,
Charlotte, ``Engineering's Grand Challenges--What's Your
Pick?'' SWE Magazine 54(5): 36-44.
2008--Interviewed and quoted in Scientific American Magazine on
Hypoxia research.
2008--Content provided for new layer of Google Earth on Marine
Protected Areas (MPA) and for new MPA portal
ProtectPlanetOcean.org; based on PISCO's Science of Marine
Reserves booklets.
2008--Profiled by Associated Press (AP) in their ``Newsmakers''
series.
17. Please identify each instance in which you have testified
orally or in writing before Congress in a governmental or non-
governmental capacity and specify the date and subject matter of each
testimony.
1995--Invited testimony to the U.S. Senate Environment and
Public Works Committee, on reauthorization of the Endangered
Species Act. U.S. Congressional Record. 13 July.
1997--Invited testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives
Subcommittee on Fisheries Conservation, Wildlife and Oceans, on
upcoming International Year of the Ocean. U.S. Congressional
Record. 30 October.
1997--Invited Briefing to President William Jefferson Clinton
and Vice-President Al Gore on climate change, East Room, White
House.
1998--Invited Briefing to Newt Gingrich, Speaker of U.S. House
of Representatives, at his request, on climate change, 2\1/2\
hours, in his Atlanta, GA office, 20 April.
1998--Invited Briefing to President William Jefferson Clinton,
First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and Vice President Al Gore,
on ocean issues, 1 hour, Monterey, CA, to summarize
deliberations of the National Oceans Conference, 12 June.
1999--Invited Testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives
Subcommittee on Fisheries Conservation, Wildlife and Oceans, on
the National Marine Sanctuaries Enhancement Act. U.S.
Congressional Record.
2008--Invited Testimony to U.S. House of Representatives--
Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming,
``Climate and Oceans; Impacts and Implications''. U.S.
Congressional Record.
18. Given the current mission, major programs, and major
operational objectives of the department/agency to which you have been
nominated, what in your background or employment experience do you
believe affirmatively qualifies you for appointment to the position for
which you have been nominated, and why do you wish to serve in that
position?
NOAA is the Nation's premier science agency focusing on exploring,
understanding, explaining and managing our oceans and atmosphere. My
scientific career has been spent at exactly this nexus. My research has
focused on the oceans and on the connections between the land, sea and
air. Through my teaching and participation in public service, I have
emphasized the role of clear and current scientific input in decision-
making. I have also always stressed my belief that science should
inform decision-making. It should not dictate decisions. I have led
large, complex projects and organizations and served on Boards of
Directors for major foundations and non-governmental organizations.
These projects, organizations and boards include the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, the International Council
for Science, the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal
Oceans, the National Science Board, the David and Lucile Packard
Foundation, the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and the Environmental Defense
Fund. I believe that I can utilize my knowledge, skills and experience
to serve the Nation by leading NOAA.
19. What do you believe are your responsibilities, if confirmed, to
ensure that the department/agency has proper management and accounting
controls, and what experience do you have in managing a large
organization?
As the top executive in NOAA, it will be my responsibility, if
confirmed, to make sure that the agency has proper management systems
and accounting controls in place and working, and I take that
responsibility very seriously. I will personally devote time, resources
and attention to making sure that the proper internal controls are in
place and that there is oversight of the ``business'' of NOAA. In my
more than thirty-year career as a scientist, simultaneously managing
multiple ongoing research projects, and other scientific, academic, and
policy endeavors, I have gained a wealth of experience in running an
enterprise. I understand firsthand how to manage budgets, build a
management team, maximize human resources, and solve problems to
deliver tangible results.
20. What do you believe to be the top three challenges facing the
department/agency, and why?
I believe the top three challenges facing NOAA are the satellite
program, fisheries management, and ensuring that the Nation is prepared
to deal with the impacts of climate change, including changes in
weather patterns and disasters. Fixing the satellite program is key to
NOAA's ability to forecast accurately extreme weather events. The
current problems must be solved. The cost overruns are a serious drain
on the NOAA and Federal budgets and they reflect poorly on the agency.
Ending overfishing by 2011 is required by the newly amended Magnuson-
Stevens Act, and will require making difficult choices involving
fishing jobs and fishing communities. It will require time, attention
and an ability to balance competing interests. Climate change is one of
the greatest challenges facing our nation; NOAA can play a key role in
helping us to forecast likely changes and adapt to the inevitable
impacts of climate change that we will face in the years ahead. I look
forward to working with the Committee on all of these challenges, if I
am confirmed.
b. potential conflicts of interest
1. Describe all financial arrangements, deferred compensation
agreements, and other continuing dealings with business associates,
clients, or customers. Please include information related to retirement
accounts.
Oregon Public Employees Retirement System. As an Oregon State
University (OSU) employee, I have been a participant in the state of
Oregon's employee pension plan. I will work with OSU, the State of
Oregon Public Employees Retirement System and the Office of Government
Ethics to identify the proper steps to recuse myself from any related
matter, if necessary, for the duration of my government service.
Variable Annuity Life Insurance Company. I have also been a
participant in an IRA through this company. Twill work with the Office
of Government Ethics to identify the proper steps to recuse myself from
any related matter, if necessary, for the duration of my government
service.
SEP IRA. I participate in a SEP IRA. I will work with the Office of
Government Ethics to identify the proper steps to recuse myself from
any related matter, if necessary, for the duration of my government
service.
Northwestern Mutual Fund Life Insurance. I have universal life
insurance through this company. I will work with the Office of
Government Ethics to identify, the proper steps to recuse myself from
any related matter, if necessary, for the duration of my government
service.
2. Do you have any commitments or agreements, formal or informal,
to maintain employment, affiliation, or practice with any business,
association or other organization during your appointment? If so,
please explain.
Oregon State University (OSU). If confirmed, I will go on leave of
absence without pay from my faculty position at Oregon State
University.
I will continue to participate in the State of Oregon Employees
Retirement System. No further contributions will be made by Oregon
State University during my leave of absence.
3. Indicate any investments, obligations, liabilities, or other
relationships which could involve potential conflicts of interest in
the position to which you have been nominated.
I have worked with the Office of Government Ethics to develop an
agreement on avoiding potential and actual conflicts of interest.
4. Describe any business relationship, dealing, or financial
transaction which you have had during the last 10 years, whether for
yourself, on behalf of a client, or acting as an agent, that could in
any way constitute or result in a possible conflict of interest in the
position to which you have been nominated.
I have worked with the Office of Government Ethics to develop an
agreement on avoiding potential and actual conflicts of interest.
5. Describe any activity during the past 10 years in which you have
been engaged for the purpose of directly or indirectly influencing the
passage, defeat, or modification of any legislation or affecting the
administration and execution of law or public policy.
I have never been a registered lobbyist. I believe that it is
important to provide scientific information to policymakers in order to
help inform their decisions. For example, I have testified before
Congress on numerous occasions, briefed the President and Vice
President, served on The National Science Board and Committees of the
National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering,
and participated in nongovernmental activities providing input to
governmental bodies or individuals, such as the Aspen Institute
Congressional Program. These activities have all been listed in answers
to earlier questions.
6. Explain how you will resolve any potential conflict of interest,
including any that may be disclosed by your responses to the above
items.
I have worked with the Office of Government Ethics to develop an
agreement on avoiding potential and actual conflicts of interest.
Should other issues arise, I will seek the counsel of the Office of
Government Ethics and where appropriate, would recuse myself from a
decision or take any other steps necessary to in order to avoid an
actual or appearance of a conflict of interest.
c. legal matters
1. Have you ever been disciplined or cited for a breach of ethics
by, or been the subject of a complaint to any court, administrative
agency, professional association, disciplinary committee, or other
professional group? If so, please explain.
Our neighborhood association was involved in a water dispute in
which a subset of households filed suit against the rest of the group.
My husband and I were named in the group that was sued. It was resolved
out of court.
2. Have you ever been investigated, arrested, charged, or held by
any Federal, State, or other law enforcement authority of any Federal,
State, county, or municipal entity, other than for a minor traffic
offense? If so, please explain: No.
3. Have you or any business of which you are or were an officer
ever been involved as a party in an administrative agency proceeding or
civil litigation? If so, please explain: Please see C.1 above.
4. Have you ever been convicted (including pleas of guilty or nolo
contendere) of any criminal violation other than a minor traffic
offense? If so, please explain: No.
5. Have you ever been accused, formally or informally, of sexual
harassment or discrimination on the basis of sex, race, religion, or
any other basis? If so, please explain: No.
6. Please advise the Committee of any additional information,
favorable or unfavorable, which you feel should be disclosed in
connection with your nomination: I do not know of any.
d. relationship with committee
1. Will you ensure that your department/agency complies with
deadlines for information set by Congressional committees? Yes.
2. Will you ensure that your department/agency does whatever it can
to protect Congressional witnesses and whistle blowers from reprisal
for their testimony and disclosures? Yes.
3. Will you cooperate in providing the Committee with requested
witnesses, including technical experts and career employees, with
firsthand knowledge of matters of interest to the Committee? Yes.
4. Are you willing to appear and testify before any duly
constituted committee of the Congress on such occasions as you may be
reasonably requested to do so? Yes.
The Chairman. Thank you very much. Thank you for your
statement.
You have talked about the importance of the integrity of
science, and I mentioned the Johns Hopkins/Isaac Newton
approach. You follow the truth wherever it is. I am not a
scientist. If I were trained as a scientist, I think I would
rigidly and forever believe what you both said.
It gets difficult in government because there are a lot of
other points of view. Take climate change. I support that.
There are a lot of people who produce coal in my State who are
maybe less enthusiastic about it, but so be it.
How do you protect the integrity--this is for each of you--
of science? Because science is something which, through your
work, has led you to a conclusion--perhaps two, but at least,
let us say, a conclusion: this is a better way to go than this
way. How do you protect that when you are being buffeted by a
variety of other interests within government?
Dr. Lubchenco. Mr. Chairman, if I might begin and I will
let my colleague continue. I believe very firmly that the role
of science is to inform our understanding and inform our
decisions. The science does not tell us what to do. It helps us
understand what is happening, how things are changing, and what
the likely consequences of different policy choices might be.
It is one of a number of factors that I believe should be taken
into account in making political decisions. Those decisions
will also include values, economics, politics, and other kinds
of information. My hope is that the scientific information
would be available in relevant and understandable ways to help
inform those decisions but not necessarily to dictate any
particular outcome. The choices that you make are often social
decisions that should rely on the science.
Dr. Holdren. Let me just add to what my colleague has said,
with which I fully agree. I often say to my students in the
first lecture in a course I have taught for many years about
environmental and resource science for policy that the
scientific facts are never everything in decision-making and
policymaking, but they are usually something. They are relevant
in various ways to the policy decisions that are being made.
And I think it is always important, therefore, to distinguish
between the best assessment scientists can offer of our current
understanding of situations that bear on policy versus, on the
other hand, the range of policy preferences which will
ultimately enter the debate based on the diverse kinds of
factors that Dr. Lubchenco has mentioned.
The America COMPETES Act, signed into law in August 2007,
actually requires the Director of the Office of Science and
Technology Policy to develop and issue an overarching set of
principles to ensure the open communication of data and results
from Federal scientists and to prevent the intentional or
unintentional suppression or distortion of such research
findings. That is actually a big challenge in thinking about
scientific integrity in the Federal Government. I think getting
it done is going to require clarifying policies for
disseminating research results, developing processes for
appealing those dissemination decisions, and providing training
to inform, reinforce and update managers, researchers, and the
public information staffs on those policies. It is a big
challenge, but we are going to get it right.
The Chairman. Dr. Holdren, there are many scientists out
there. Just take climate change. I mean, there are some
scientists--I mean, there are some sort of bogus papers put out
and conclusions reached, but there are many scientists who have
very, very different views about what the irreversible date
might be, for example, on climate change; or how serious is
climate change; or what do we have to do to measure its
seriousness. And there are remarkable differences from
scientists on that subject. Yet they are all scientists. How do
you resolve that?
Dr. Holdren. Well, let me say, first of all, that there has
always been, always will be diversity of opinion among
scientists about any complicated issue. Scientists are as
diverse a group as any other you will find, and people come to
different conclusions about how to interpret the same data.
This is routine.
My position would be that in matters of public policy,
policymakers should bet with the odds. You look at the range of
scientific opinion. You look at the center of gravity of that
scientific opinion. You look at what the bodies that have
accumulated the most expert knowledge and brought it to bear on
the question have to say. You can never conclude that any
particular interpretation in science is final. All science is
contingent; it could change with new information, new data, new
observations, new analysis. But if you are making policy, it is
wise in my judgment to go with the opinion of the bulk of the
part of the scientific community that has studied that
particular question.
In the case of climate change, immense effort has been
devoted to determining what that center of gravity of
scientific opinion is. It is available to us in the reports of
the National Academy of Sciences, in the reports of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in the reports of
distinguished bodies all around the world who have focused the
relevant expertise available to them on this question. And the
basic conclusions of all of those groups are the same. Climate
change is real. It is accelerating. It is caused, in
substantial part, by human activity. It is dangerous and it is
getting more so.
There are lots of details on which you can find lots of
difference of opinion, but the mainstream view is the one I
have just stated. And if I were a policymaker betting the
public's welfare on an interpretation of science, I would go
with the mainstream.
The Chairman. All right. My time is up. Senator Hutchison,
the Ranking Member.
STATEMENT OF HON. KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON,
U.S. SENATOR FROM TEXAS
Senator Hutchison. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
My first question is administrative basically, but I think
it was said by Senator Wyden--and I think all of us who have
served on this committee agree that we have been bipartisan and
we have been very strong for science and technology and
research. My question to both of you is, will our Committee,
every member of our Committee, minority as well as majority, be
able to call your offices for help within your agencies with
data that we might need? In other words, will you answer
questions and give the same type of help to every member of our
Committee?
Dr. Lubchenco. Absolutely, Senator.
Dr. Holdren. The same. I have always worked with members on
both sides of the aisle in both the House and the Senate. I do
not even ask my potential employees what their political
affiliation is. I look forward to working with all of you.
Senator Hutchison. Thank you very much.
Let me just say a couple of things that are very important
to me in the experience that I have had on this committee.
Number one is the great need that was shown in the report,
``Rising Above the Gathering Storm,'' for more research into
the basic sciences to stay on top of the fields of the hard
sciences and, second, the encouragement of teaching and
recruiting young people to be interested in taking the courses
in middle and high school so that they will take the courses in
college, which I think you addressed somewhat.
But in the National Science Foundation, for instance, the
social sciences have become I think a fairly large part,
sometimes taking away from the hard sciences. And I hope that
we can know where our needs are and our priorities right now,
and that is to stay on top of the innovation and technological
advances that have kept our economy strong through the years.
So that is one area that I would like to discuss.
Second, my colleague, Senator Nelson, and I have been very
interested in NASA and space, and the fact that we are going to
have a gap of 5 or 6 years when Americans will not be able to
fly into space is not acceptable to us. And I would like to ask
Dr. Holdren if you are committed in your position in the White
House to perhaps having the National Space Council revived
where there is a policy focus on the concerns that we have
about our space flight gap, as well as the ability to use the
Space Station for basic research, which was a function of
Senator Nelson's and my authorization of NASA that we did
designate a part of the Space Station as a national laboratory
so that there could be more research influx from outside
agencies, which has begun to occur. But if we cannot get there,
it is going to be hard to fulfill those missions.
Dr. Holdren, will you make NASA and science in space a
priority, and do you have any thoughts about the National Space
Council being a part of the White House to look at the overall
focus of NASA?
Dr. Holdren. Thank you very much. The short answer to the
second question is yes. It is a priority, and we have been
looking at what the best way to resurrect the National Space
Council in the White House would be. I think that is going to
happen.
And there is no question that the gap in our capacity to
put people in space is a matter of great concern with the
Shuttle program coming to an end and its successor program not
yet ready. We are looking at that very carefully, and I would
look forward to working with you and Senator Nelson and the
other members of this committee on how we can shrink that gap.
It is going to be a great challenge, of course, particularly in
these difficult budget times, but we are committed to figuring
that problem out because it is very important.
On your first question about fundamental research, again I
completely agree that we need to pay very careful attention to
the adequacy of our support for fundamental research in this
country. That fundamental research is primarily the
responsibility of Government simply because when you are
talking about high-risk, high-pay-off, long-term kinds of
investigations where the immediate benefits are not so obvious,
nobody but the Government is going to invest the sums of money
needed to get that done. And at the same time, it is relatively
cheap compared to many other things that we do.
The America COMPETES Act, which really emerged in part from
the report you mentioned, ``Rising Above the Gathering Storm,''
embodied the recommendation of that report that research at the
NSF, at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and
in the DOE Office of Science should be ramped up at a rate that
would double it in 7 years. And that was authorized in the
America COMPETES Act. I think it is a good idea. I think we
will pursue very vigorously every way at our disposal to try to
see that that happens, although again it will be a huge
challenge in the current budget environment.
Senator Hutchison. Let me just say--and I do have a
question for Dr. Lubchenco--that I would add NASA in there as
well for the capabilities to use the Space Station and other
areas of basic scientific research that can be done best in
space, as you are prioritizing.
The other issue that I have--for the past two Congresses, I
have introduced legislation to increase weather modification
and mitigation research. My original bill was to put it in NOAA
because I thought that would be the better place for it. I did
not get anywhere, and it was suggested that perhaps we should
put it in the White House to be in the science office, the
OSTP. And it died there as well.
My question to you is--I really think it should be in NOAA
with support from OSTP, but here is my question. You talk about
climate change research. There are today 14 agencies of the
Federal Government overlooking, overseeing, and promoting
research into climate change, which clearly means there is no
focus and no strategy that has really brought us into what I
think is a cohesive policy.
But mitigation and modification has really not come to the
forefront, and with the violence in weather that we see, which
has certainly hit my State, has hit Senator Martinez and
Senator Nelson's State very hard--we just saw it in Oklahoma
last week--I believe it is time for us to step back and say is
there something that we are doing that is making a difference
in this violence of weather or is there something we could do
that would affect it, either pro or con.
For instance, is there something that could be done to
lessen the impact of a hurricane when it is still out in the
far miles of the ocean away from land, or is there something
that could be done in tornadoes, or is there something that is
happening when we actually do weather modification in cloud
seeding in one area that makes an avalanche occur in another
area?
I do not know the answers, and I do not know if it is
positive or negative. But it seems to me that if we are going
to look at climate change, weather mitigation and/or
modification should also be something that we try to do
research on to determine if there is something that can be done
or if something is done in one place, would it affect another
place.
And I would ask both of you to address if you think this is
worthy, where you think it would most likely reside, and would
either of you be willing to help work on something that would
move this priority up in the climate change arena as well.
Dr. Holdren. Let me take a first crack at that, and then I
will turn it over to my colleague.
People have for years been studying the possibilities for
weather modification, not just rain enhancement, but trying to
ameliorate the power of the most powerful storms. It is an
immense challenge because the power of nature manifested in
these ways is enormous and it is difficult to influence or
steer it. But I believe that such work needs to continue. It
would need to continue even if we did not have reason to be
concerned about human influences on large and powerful storms
because even before human influences, we all know those storms
can do tremendous damage.
So I think it is a worthy area of further research. I think
it should be expanded, along with many other things that need
to be expanded in our study of weather and climate.
You mentioned 14 agencies. We have in the Global Change
Research Program, authorized in the Global Change Research Act
of 1990, a framework for integrating the efforts in those 14
agencies and to making sure that important issues do not fall
between the chairs and that, at the same time, unnecessary
duplication is eliminated. I think that Act is in need of
updating and expansion by the Congress, and there have been
bills in both the Senate and the House that contain a lot of
the needed ingredients, and I would very much want to work with
this committee and others to make sure that that gets done.
I think that the weather modification issue that you are
interested in would be something that could well be pursued in
NOAA. There may be other agencies that are interested in it.
From OSTP's standpoint, I would certainly want to be involved
in the coordination that makes sure that the important research
that needs to be done gets done in the place best suited to do
it.
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, part of your question alluded to
the importance of weather forecasting, and I would note that
fully a third of the U.S. GDP is dependent on accurate weather
forecasting and that our ability to do that is, in fact, the
product of lots of research in the past and ongoing research to
make it even better and better.
I agree with you completely that it is appropriate to go
beyond simple forecasting and to do the fundamental research
that is appropriate to help us understand if it is possible
and, if so, how to modify the impact of some of these weather-
related disasters but also to guide our understanding of
mitigation and adaptation efforts. I am a strong believer in
the importance of fundamental research to help do the kinds of
things that are needed by society.
As to where it best fits, I cannot give you that answer
now, but I would be willing to work with you, if I am
confirmed, and with my colleague, Dr. Holdren, and try to
figure this out.
Senator Hutchison. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you very much to the Ranking Member.
Senator Isakson will be followed by Senator Nelson, Senator
Martinez, and Senator Begich. Senator Isakson?
STATEMENT OF HON. JOHNNY ISAKSON,
U.S. SENATOR FROM GEORGIA
Senator Isakson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I have to say of all the nominees by the President for his
Cabinet or for White House appointments that I have
interviewed, Dr. Lubchenco is the most engaging and qualified.
And I had a delightful meeting with her, and I have absolutely
no questions of her because with all the ones I asked her
yesterday she was spot-on.
But Dr. Holdren, who I am sorry I did not get the chance to
meet with, in your opening statement made a statement that hits
at the heart of the discussion we had yesterday, Dr. Lubchenco.
In fact, Dr. Lubchenco and I are going to do a scuba diving
trip in the spring. We both share that affinity, among other
things.
Dr. Holdren, when you were talking about the two strands
that dictate policy and science and technology, you said the
following: ``meaning the use of insights from science and
engineering in the formation of those parts of economic,
defense, space, health, environmental policy, agricultural
policy, and so on, where such insights are needed to help shape
sensible policies.''
My question yesterday of Dr. Lubchenco was: in the Savannah
River basin between Georgia and South Carolina, we are in a
category 4 drought, as are we in the ACT and the ACF. In the
ACT and the ACF, there is litigation that is dictating water
flows, but in the Savannah River basin, it is being done by the
Corps of Engineers outside of litigation.
Recently the cfs flow was increased by 500 cfs out of Lakes
Hardwell and Thurmond into the Savannah River in order to raise
the level so as to protect a sturgeon. And this is not an
endangered species suit. NOAA was asked to opine as to what the
release should be and they did, and in reading it, it appeared
to fit more of an insight than evidence.
So my question to you is this. Given that water is so
essential to the life of human beings and so essential to our
well-being and given that there are many policies
agriculturally, environmentally, and otherwise, where NOAA or
scientists are asked to opine to determine what those releases
are, should that not be best based on scientific evidence
rather than insight?
Dr. Holdren. I guess that is a question to me or to both of
us?
Senator Isakson. It is kind of a speech. I am sorry about
that. But it is really important because we are so concerned
that opinions overtake facts, and the next thing you know you
are making decisions based on an insight but not really sound
scientific evidence.
Dr. Holdren. Well, again I would say the short answer is
yes. We, of course, would want to base policies where science
is germane on the best scientific understanding that can be
brought to bear, and in circumstances where that does not
happen because of lack of coordination among different
agencies, because perhaps one has gotten advice from a place
that did not have the best current understanding, we need to
work on fixing that. But there is no question, I think, that
everybody who pays attention to the intersection of science and
public policy wants that communication between science and
policy to be communicating the best understandings that we
have.
Senator Isakson. Well, I appreciate that answer, which is
very much similar to the answer that Dr. Lubchenco gave me
yesterday. And I look forward to working with you and with NOAA
when we deal with these issues that affect my State or really
our region, because most all these are interstate issues not
intrastate issues, to make sure we are always getting the best
scientific evidence we can to dictate the right policy that
affects the people we represent.
But I wish you the best and I look forward to our scuba
diving trip, Dr. Lubchenco.
Dr. Lubchenco. Thank you, Senator.
Senator Isakson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Isakson.
Senator Nelson?
STATEMENT OF HON. BILL NELSON,
U.S. SENATOR FROM FLORIDA
Senator Nelson. Picking up on the Ranking Member's
questions--and by the way, Mr. Chairman, I am really excited to
be the chairman of the Science and Space Subcommittee. I am
going to try to do you a good job.
I am really very excited about the quality of nominees that
we have in front of us, and I am very heartened by their
answers.
Now, just following up on Senator Hutchison's comments
about changing weather, we might not be able to change weather,
but we can sure try to track weather and more accurately
measure it.
Dr. Lubchenco, you and I have talked about the need for
enhanced cooperation between NASA and NOAA, the earth-observing
satellites, NPOES and GOES-R. And that is a big order because
those two agencies have not necessarily cooperated in the past.
Do you want to comment for the record on that?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I believe that both NOAA and NASA
intend to have the best possible relationships. I think we can
always improve on relationships. As you are aware, there is a
third entity involved in these satellites, and that is the
Department of Defense. It is my opinion that some of the
difficulties that we have gotten into, in terms of the two
satellite programs you mentioned, are partly a reflection of
the tripartite arrangement among those three agencies that has
not worked to the extent that it needs to. I think that is an
embarrassment. I think it needs to be fixed, and one of my
highest priorities is to work with my colleagues, if I am
confirmed, in those agencies, and with the Office of Science
and Technology Policy, and with you to fix this problem and put
it behind us.
Senator Nelson. I have the privilege of chairing that
Subcommittee in the Armed Services Committee as well, and I
want to work with you on that to see if we can smooth this out.
Now, Dr. Holdren, I was really very heartened to hear your
response to Senator Hutchison about the National Space Council.
Just for the record, I want it established that then-candidate
Obama clearly came out and stated that he wanted to reactivate
the National Space Council within the White House. Do you want
to say any more for the record here about that in addition to
what you have said to Senator Hutchison?
Dr. Holdren. Well, I am certainly happy to reiterate that
the President remains committed to that pledge. And as I
mentioned before, we are in discussion about the best way to do
it, but I have no doubt that it is going to happen.
Senator Nelson. Well, that is great because one of the
failings in the past--and not just with this immediate past
Administration, but previous ones--is that NASA becomes the
handmaiden of the Office of Management and Budget. And that is
not the way to set policy by having some green eyeshade person
over there determining what the policy is, whether we are
talking about NASA or NOAA or whatever it is. But that is the
way it has been in the past and, therefore, another reason at
the high councils of high Government policymaking to have such
a council right within the White House.
You are going to have four associate directors. Do you want
to tell us quickly what those are going to be?
Dr. Holdren. Certainly, Senator. The four will be the same
four Senate-confirmed associate director positions that existed
in the Clinton administration. There will be an associate
director for science, an associate director for technology, an
associate director for environment, and an associate director
for national security and international affairs.
Senator Nelson. And how are you going to coordinate with
others that get into energy and climate change policies, such
as Carol Browner, Dr. Chu, Nancy Sutley, as well as the NOAA
Administrator?
Dr. Holdren. The first thing I would say about that is that
the job of OSTP has always been about coordination. All of
these issues are issues that get pursued in multiple agencies
inside and outside the White House and are dealt with by
multiple Congressional committees. So I regard one of the
primary challenges and one of the primary functions of OSTP to
be building the relationships that enable those interactions to
work in a collaborative and efficient way. I think the people
who have been named to the other positions you have mentioned
in the energy domain are people of very high caliber. They are
also people that I happen to have known and worked with for a
long time. I have known and worked with Dr. Lubchenco for a
long time. And I think as a result, in part, of the long-
standing collegial relationships which we have in this set of
people, we are actually going to be able to work this very
well.
Senator Nelson. By the way, Dr. Lubchenco, also in
accurately measuring the weather: that also directly affects
NOAA in having the assets that it needs in space to measure the
weather and preventing a potential problem of the increased
accuracy. This is a problem that we now have on the paths of
hurricanes on that single-point failure: if the G-4 airplane is
down for maintenance or because of an accident, there is an
issue of having some backup there.
I want to ask you. You said at the end of your statement,
Dr. Lubchenco, that you want to create a National Climate
Service within NOAA. How is that organization going to interact
and affect NASA's earth science programs?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, the vision for the National Climate
Service would be a collaboration across a number of relevant
agencies. NOAA currently has a wealth of climate data. It has
deep experience in assembling those data and putting them into
models that help us understand how the climate system works.
And we are at a point now where we are able to do short-term
forecasting of climate-related events like El Ninos, for
example, that have huge consequences for weather patterns
around the world. The concept is to build on the very
successful model of the National Weather Service and to do the
same for climate services, but it clearly is an operation that
would interact, in a very collaborative, collegial fashion,
with a number of other agencies that have information or need
of those kinds of data.
Senator Nelson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Nelson.
Senator Martinez?
STATEMENT OF HON. MEL MARTINEZ,
U.S. SENATOR FROM FLORIDA
Senator Martinez. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much, and
let me tell you it is a real pleasure to join the Committee and
I look forward to working with you and the other members of the
Committee on issues that are vitally important to our Nation
and the world.
The Chairman. We are glad you are here.
Senator Martinez. Thank you.
I wanted to offer to Dr. Lubchenco and Senator Isakson the
opportunity to do their scuba diving trip in the Florida Keys
where I think you will find an incredible natural resource in
our marine sanctuary, as well as at the Dry Tortugas where the
NOAA people do a fantastic job of keeping an eye on that
valuable resource as well. So anyway, come down to Florida. I
will be glad to host you. I am sure Senator Nelson would join
me in that.
For the last two Congresses, I have been working with
others in trying to advance legislation that would promote a
national hurricane research initiative to improve the
understanding of hurricanes, as well as the forecasting and
preparedness. This came from a recommendation, a report by the
National Science Board, which I would commend to your reading.
It would marshal the resources of various Government agencies
and research universities and private sector partners to
improve knowledge of hurricane intensity, storm surges, and
observation.
The whole concept is that if we know better not only that
it is coming next Tuesday but how strong it is going to be or
what the surge with it is going to be, because oftentimes we
find that much of the damage, as we know in my colleague,
Senator Vitter's State in New Orleans, is the sea surge that
sometimes does the greater damage, not the wind damage.
Would you commit to improving, Dr. Lubchenco, our ability
to do the research and perhaps to encourage this type of
legislation that would give you the ability to do better
forecasting on hurricanes?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, first of all, thank you for
mentioning the wonderful work that NOAA scientists and
employees have been doing in the Florida Keys National Marine
Sanctuary, and the Dry Tortugas, in particular. It is a
remarkable accomplishment. And a real credit to everyone who
has been involved. So thank you for recognizing their hard work
and their wonderful accomplishments.
I think that we have seen the benefits of research into
hurricane forecasting, and I note the remarkable improvements
that have been accomplished over the last couple of decades in
terms of our ability to predict hurricanes and thereby save
many thousands of lives, as well as avoided evacuations. We
have seen the power of investment in fundamental research that
has brought about those increases. I believe there is more
benefit to come from that, and I would agree with you
wholeheartedly that additional research into improved
forecasting, not just for the path of hurricanes, but for storm
surge and the other consequences that can be very damaging
would be a smart investment.
Senator Martinez. We need to work on mitigation efforts as
it relates to hurricanes because I think the damage could be
greatly reduced if we do the right preparation.
And while passing accolades, I think the National Hurricane
Center in Miami, by the way--those folks do a tremendous job.
They are very dedicated people. There are certain times of the
year when those of us who live in vulnerable areas like Florida
stay pretty much glued to what they have to say. So it is very,
very important work as well.
We have had some issues in Florida relating to fishing
quotas, and it is an area where sometimes a lot of controversy
arises because sometimes the research does not match up with
what the experience seems to be on the field, if you will. It
is an area where I hope perhaps you will attempt to put some
common sense into the science to ensure that we are doing what
is really best.
We want to protect our fisheries. We want to protect the
resources. We want to protect the different species, but at the
same time, a lot of people depend on fishing for a livelihood
whether it is related to commercial fishing or simply tourism
and enjoyment. And we have run into some conflict there over
the recent days, and I wanted to highlight that to you and
commend it for some analysis and study on your part.
I do not know that I want to take sides on that because I
am not a scientist, and I know I want the resources there for
my grandchildren, but I also want to make sure that when I hear
complaints that sometimes seem to be based on common sense that
we are not putting the practical aspects of this ahead of what
might be on a scientific notional basis wrong. So I am not so
sure that is a question, more of a comment.
With respect to the National Climate Service, having been
in the Executive Branch, there is a certain reality, and I do
not know how one frees themselves from the clutches of OMB. If
you can pull it off in this Administration, you have my
congratulations. I never could manage that at HUD during the
time that I was there, but I wish you well in that to both of
you.
But the reality is that when you look at initiating
something like a national climate service, what is going to
suffer or what is going to be--in other words, how do we make
that work? I can understand that, but I do not want it to be at
the expense of the other work that is so very important that we
are doing with weather today. So can you maybe comment on that
and how you intend to approach it?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I have not yet had an opportunity
to dig deeply into all of the thinking that has been done about
the National Climate Service. I think that it is a very
compelling concept. The information that I have seen is, I
think, suggestive that there is real opportunity here. What the
trade-offs would be and exactly how it would organized is yet
to be defined. I would look forward to working with the other
relevant agencies and with this committee in helping to outline
what that looks like.
Senator Martinez. And Dr. Holdren, in the moment I have
remaining, I just wanted to tell you that I worked with a
number of other colleagues here on the America COMPETES Act,
and I think it is a terribly important initiative. I hope that
you will give it the necessary passion and interest. I believe
that our competitiveness vis-a-vis the world is one of our real
upcoming challenges which goes beyond climate and other issues,
but it really has to do with human capital.
I have been involved also on the issues relating to
immigration, and I think as we look forward to some sort of
sensible immigration policy for the future of this country,
that we also should look to human capital and how we can
utilize the immigration laws--sensible immigration reform that
our country so desperately needs--to ensure that we are not
just utilizing it as a means of promoting family reunification,
but we also view it as a way of improving our competitiveness
in the world and as a natural resource in terms of human
capital.
Dr. Holdren. Well, I agree with all of that, Senator, and I
would certainly, if confirmed by the Senate, be giving a lot of
attention to making sure that the America COMPETES Act is
appropriately pursued across the many agencies that it affects.
Senator Martinez. Thank you very much, both of you, and
thank you for serving and thank you to your families.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Martinez.
Senator Begich?
STATEMENT OF HON. MARK BEGICH,
U.S. SENATOR FROM ALASKA
Senator Begich. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for
allowing me to shift up here. I appreciate it. I do not know
if, because I had no microphones there, there was a purpose.
[Laughter.]
Senator Begich. After 8 weeks, they have figured it out
that they do not want me to say too much. But no, Mr. Chairman,
thank you. It is great to be on this committee.
And we have two very good nominees here, based on the
information I have read. I have some very parochial questions.
Of course, from Alaska, we would. And then I have some general
questions based on your testimony, which I want to follow up.
Dr. Lubchenco, we had a great conversation. I think it was
yesterday. I have lost track of time here. No day is the same
anymore here. But I want to get specific on a couple things,
and a couple of the issues are, again, very parochial.
But in regards to fish farming, Alaska has banned fish
farming. We now produce--about 62 percent of the landed seafood
stock in this country comes from Alaska. And I think we have
probably the best managed fisheries in this country just by the
way we do it and it is solely--or I should say, probably 95
percent based on science. Sometimes other issues get connected
to it, and I think that is what has made us successful in how
we have managed the efforts of Alaska's seafood that feeds this
world in a lot of ways.
Can you give me your thoughts and opinions in regards to
support or, I would hope the next statement would be the more
logical one, no support of aquaculture in Federal waters?
Farming.
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I understand that there are very
real and legitimate questions that have been raised about
offshore aquaculture. It is my view that aquaculture, wherever
it is practiced, is a very key element of our food production
systems and that certain types of aquaculture are much more
benign in terms of their potential impact on the environment. I
believe that there needs to be scientifically grounded
information about how to achieve aquaculture that is
sustainable, in other words, without adversely impacting the
local or regional environment and without having negative
consequences on wild-caught fisheries.
I do not believe that we have identified the right
conditions under which aquaculture is sustainable. I would make
that a priority if I were confirmed. Those statements pertain
to aquaculture in general, and as you are well aware, there are
more than 220 species that are farmed by aquaculture and each
one has different issues and where it happens is critically
important.
So I am not prepared to put offshore aquaculture off the
table at this point. I do believe that we should not move ahead
in doing that at scale until we are convinced that, in fact, it
can be done in a way that is not damaging.
Senator Begich. Let me do additional follow up to that with
respect to specifically Alaska, where the Alaska community has
made a position to ban it. With waters off the shores of
Alaska, with respect and understanding to where Alaska is and
the communities--and there is no question in my mind we have
the most sustainable fisheries in this country. So how would
you look at Alaska and their aspects of what they have done in
making that determination or that decision?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I have great respect for the
positions that Alaska has taken on this issue, and I believe
that this is actually an opportunity to have a productive
Federal-State dialogue about practices in either State waters
that affect Federal waters or Federal waters that affect State
waters and to come to an agreement about what actually is going
to work for all of the species that, in fact, go back and forth
across State and Federal waters. We need to think about this
more holistically and this is a prime opportunity to do that.
Senator Begich. Excellent.
One other question. I think in the past you have been on
record at least with previous administrations utilizing the
Antiquities Act to close large areas in the Pacific area. And
it is not required that there be a NEPA or that even
stakeholders are part of the process.
How do you see your role here now? Because when you are on
this side of the equation, it is a little different. And how do
you see ensuring that there is a process clearly with
stakeholders and a NEPA-like or a NEPA process to ensure that
there is a good scientific evidence that is on the table?
Dr. Lubchenco. Thank you for that question, Senator. I have
seen firsthand scientific information that suggests that marine
protected areas and no-take marine reserves can, in fact, bring
huge benefit both in terms of protecting natural resources and
in some cases in helping to restore depleted fisheries.
More to the point, though, is the process by which
decisions are made to utilize this particular tool. It is my
belief that the best processes and ones for which decisions
will be respected and endure are processes that involve strong
stakeholder input, public participation, and open and
transparent decisionmaking, much as what is embodied in the
National Marine Sanctuaries Act. So my commitment, should I be
confirmed as Administrator of NOAA, would be to ensure that we
do have an adequate public process that is open and
transparent.
Senator Begich. Thank you very much, Doctor.
I have just a couple seconds. Dr. Holdren, I did not want
to feel like you were left out. So I am going to give you some
questions in writing. I do not know if there will be a second
round or not, but I will do that.
The Chairman. There will be a second round.
Senator Begich. Then I will hold my question for you. Thank
you.
The Chairman. I should announce, incidentally, before I
call on Senator Snowe, that both Senator Hutchison and I read
the FBI checks on these two distinguished folks, and it is some
of the easiest reading I have ever been through.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Senator Snowe?
STATEMENT OF HON. OLYMPIA J. SNOWE,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MAINE
Senator Snowe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I want to
welcome our two distinguished witnesses, both of whom are
steeped in peer-based, sound science which we certainly welcome
because so much of the credible science is going to dictate
some crucial policies in your respective fields and jointly
when it comes to climate change. So the expertise and
experience and background and qualifications that you both
bring to that endeavor is certainly going to be helpful to
those of us as policymakers and especially in some very
contentious debates.
Dr. Holdren, I have worked with you on the International
Panel on Climate Change, which I co-chaired with the Honorable
Stephen Byers, a member of Parliament in the United Kingdom,
and you contributed so much and worked so hard on the 10
recommendations that were provided back in 2005 that actually
are more relevant than ever at a time when we are trying to
establish, I think, some advisory guidelines for the developed
and the developing countries, especially those countries like
the United States and China and India outside the Kyoto
Protocol.
Obviously, in considering the debate on climate change and
determining what is going to be our policy, what is going to
dictate the level of emissions reductions in climate change
legislation that will be debated before the Congress obviously
is to avert the tipping point of raising the earth's
temperature. And we are about what? 350 parts per million at
this point. What are you going to be advising the President in
this regard? Because, obviously, it can make a difference by
2050 whether we are reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 50
percent, 65 percent, 70 or 80 percent.
Dr. Holdren. Well, thank you, Senator. We are at about 385
parts per million of carbon dioxide today in the atmosphere.
There is, as you know, a complicated relationship between what
the emissions are and what the concentrations ultimately
become.
The President has taken the position--took the position
very strongly in the campaign--that the United States should be
aiming to reduce its emissions by something like 80 percent by
2050. That would be compatible with a global strategy that
would have a reasonable chance of confining the global average
surface temperature increase to about 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6
degrees Fahrenheit. And that, in turn, I think would give us a
reasonable chance of avoiding some of the worst possible
outcomes from climate change. I believe the President remains
committed to that goal.
Obviously, it will be a great challenge to get there, but I
will point out that there will also be tremendous opportunities
associated with getting there in terms of the kinds of
innovation in clean energy and increased energy efficiency that
will create jobs and enable this country to maintain and
improve its competitive position.
The issue, of course, as you have mentioned, does involve
other countries as well. It is not possible for the United
States to address this question by itself. We will need to
bring China and India and the other major developing countries,
as well as the other industrialized countries, along in this
process of reducing emissions. I am actually quite optimistic
about that, and I know the President is, in part because the
major developing country emitters like China and India have
recognized that climate change is already harming them and it
cannot be fixed without them. So I think we are going to see a
process of engagement with those big emitters in the developing
world, as well as with our industrial country partners.
Senator Snowe. So you do not see any need at this point to
make any adjustments on that recommendation.
Dr. Holdren. The whole question of exactly how to construct
our intersecting energy and climate policies going forward is,
obviously, going to be a question intensely discussed and
interacted about between the Administration and the Congress.
You know, I think at this point the President has laid out his
general aims, and he will be interested in pursuing those.
But there is no question that this is a complicated domain
in which there is going to be a lot of discussion. A lot of
different provisions, a lot of different approaches will be
discussed. The Congress is clearly going to have a tremendous
role to play in this, and of course, we are looking forward to
your leadership, among others, because you have been a leader
in this domain in the Senate and in the world.
But it is going be a long slog. I do not want to kid
anybody. This is going to be tough to fashion the policies that
will get us and the rest of the world to where we should want
to be in order to minimize the risks of climate change of a
magnitude that we would have difficulty dealing with.
Senator Snowe. I appreciate that.
Dr. Lubchenco, we talked in our office the other day on a
number of issues and most notably as well on the fisheries. And
I expressed to you at the time my deep concern about the
tremendous divide and polarization that exists between our
fishing communities and the men and women in the fishing
industry in New England and certainly in the State of Maine and
the administrators and regulators. I have never seen it more
polarized in my 13 years that I have served in a leadership
capacity on the Subcommittee on Oceans and Fisheries, both as
Chair and as Ranking Member.
And most recently with the groundfish industry and the
interim rule that was just recently announced that essentially
reduces the days at sea by 60 percent to 20 days, that is about
3 weeks to make a living in the groundfishing industry. It is
devastating, obviously, as I have indicated to you,
particularly because the New England Fisheries Council in a 15
to 1 decision favored an alternative, and it totally dismissed
the decisions made by all 15, and the 1 was, of course, the
Regional Administrator who dismissed the recommendation. So
here we are with 20 days at sea.
What bold steps will you take to repair this relationship?
Because it clearly needs to be repaired. There is a lack of
trust, rightfully so, given the arbitrariness of the regulatory
process and regulators that have totally ignored and dismissed
and overridden the concerns of the fishing community. They are
going to be devastated. We need to preserve the fish and the
fishing stock and we also need to preserve the communities.
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I believe it is time to create a
new climate of trust--to have trust in the data, to have trust
in the process, and to have trust in the diverse points of
view. I agree with you completely that the polarization has
really permeated and poisoned all of the discussions. It
appears to be a seriously dysfunctional relationship.
I would pledge to make every attempt to try to begin to
rebuild the trust. I have seen a number of programs where
scientists and fishermen together are taking the data that they
can both believe in and both rely upon to serve as a basis for
having a reasonable discussion about making what are inevitably
some very tough choices. There are not easy choices here. And
it is often a choice between today and tomorrow.
We have seen the strong benefit of rebuilding stocks. The
12 stocks that have been rebuilt since 2001 now bring in over
$2 billion into our economy. Yet jobs today are critically
important, even more so than they might have been even just a
few years ago.
So there are, indeed, difficult decisions and difficult
choices. Those choices will be no less difficult but more
acceptable if there is a better climate of trust, and I would
pledge to work with you to try to begin to build that and
change the tenor of the discussion and the responses to the
decisions.
Senator Snowe. I very much appreciate that, and I thank you
both. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Snowe.
Senator Klobuchar?
STATEMENT OF HON. AMY KLOBUCHAR,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MINNESOTA
Senator Klobuchar. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I
look forward to working hard on the issues before this
committee facing this Congress. I want to thank you for your
leadership. I know there is a lot to do from the
reauthorization of the FAA to the digital TV transition, to
helping our captive shippers, something that I know you care a
lot about. And I am very much looking forward to it.
I want to thank you also for the Subcommittee Chairmanship.
I look forward to chairing the Subcommittee on Competitiveness,
Innovation, and Export Promotion. We are going to have a busy
agenda.
And I also welcome our two nominees here. I note, Dr.
Lubchenco, that everyone keeps inviting you to go scuba diving
off the coast of Florida and other places. I could only invite
you to go scuba diving in Lake Superior, which would be
slightly chilly.
In fact, you may have heard I, for 2 years, served on the
Oceans Subcommittee being the only non-ocean Senator on there,
but Lake Superior is very important, and the Great Lakes, to
that Subcommittee as well. And the economic and environmental
challenges to our Great Lakes continue to mount on a daily
basis, from the depletion of commercial fishing, something
Senator Snowe mentioned off the coast of Maine, to health
concerns posed by contaminated seafood, to the local effects of
global climate change.
We have issues with Lake Superior. We have had some
decreasing water levels that many believe may be due to climate
change. They got up slightly last year, but overall they have
been at an all-time low and it is believed that is because the
ice has melted more quickly. So the water levels have gone down
and our barges are having trouble getting in and it is less
economical for commerce.
Up in Duluth, we have had many invasive species that are
decimating the lake's ecosystems and damaging with both
commercial and recreational activities. And the harbor and open
water infrastructure that used to manage these problems
continues to deteriorate with age, something I am sure you will
hear about as well from Congressman Oberstar over on the House
side.
I believe the work of NOAA's Great Lakes Environmental
Research Laboratory is essential to properly sustain the Great
Lakes' ecosystems. And I wondered your views about addressing
the ongoing environmental initiatives being handled by the
Great Lakes laboratory.
Dr. Lubchenco. Thank you, Senator. I embrace the challenge
of coming up to speed on many of the issues in the Great Lakes
because, of course, I am less familiar with those. Because I
have not been at NOAA, I have not had an opportunity to be
briefed on all of the work of that laboratory. I am aware of a
number of colleagues who work in that laboratory and have great
respect for the work that they do, but I do not pretend to know
it in any great depth. I would, if confirmed, look forward to
learning a lot more about it and working closely with you to
make it be the best it can be.
Senator Klobuchar. Well, thank you.
And you also indicated your support for the creation of a
National Climate Service within NOAA. And I also hope that you
will consider the Great Lakes as part of that as well.
Dr. Lubchenco. Absolutely, Senator.
Senator Klobuchar. OK, very good. As I noted, we really
have seen a lot of changes because of the climate change issue,
and they are very different than the sea levels rising. We have
seen the waters going down.
The invasive species issue is something this Committee has
grappled with, and we would really like to do more on that. And
many of these species enter our waters through the ballast
water discharged by ocean-faring vessels as they enter U.S.
ports. Could you talk about that issue and if you have
considered that? We have had some disputes about getting this
done, and I really believe we need to be pragmatic and get
something done on the ballast water issue.
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, we have seen huge increases in the
number of invasive species around the United States and,
indeed, globally. As you are well aware, there is strong
evidence that many of those species are introduced through
ballast water being transported from one country to another or
one part of a country to another part.
This is an area where I believe there are opportunities for
research to help understand how to better treat ballast water.
There are existing techniques that involve exchange of ballast
water mid-ocean, so if a vessel is coming from, let us say,
Europe over to the Great Lakes, to discharge its ballast in the
middle of the Atlantic and take in oceanic water that is less
likely to have invasive species for coastal areas, Great Lakes
areas. Those techniques incur some cost and under bad weather
conditions can, in fact, be a risk in terms of safety. So they
are not perfect.
I believe that there is ample opportunity to do a better
job of recognizing the destabilizing impact of these invasive
species and the economic consequences of them much more broadly
than is currently appreciated and make better progress in
figuring out how to prevent them from becoming established to
begin with. This is partly an area of research and partly an
area where it is a matter of policy--just deciding how
important it is to actually have the kinds of regulations that
would make a difference in this area.
Senator Klobuchar. Very good. Thank you. And I know with
Senator Cantwell's leadership with the work that she has done
with oceans, and the Chairman's leadership here, I am hopeful
we will be able to get something done. As you know, there has
been some pending legislation about ballast waters that has
been sitting around for a while. I have only been here 2 years,
but it seems like 2 years too long. So we hope to get something
done.
Dr. Lubchenco. Thank you.
Senator Klobuchar. Thank you to both of you.
Congratulations, Dr. Holdren. I hope with our Subcommittee on
Innovation and Competitiveness, we will be able to work with
you in the future as well. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Klobuchar.
Senator Vitter?
STATEMENT OF HON. DAVID VITTER,
U.S. SENATOR FROM LOUISIANA
Senator Vitter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to both of
you for being here.
Dr. Holdren, one of the lines from the President's
inaugural address, which I most appreciated, was his comment
about science and honoring that and not having it overtaken by
ideology. My concern is that as one of his top science
advisors, many statements you have made in the past do not meet
that test, and so I wanted to explore that.
One is from a 1971 article with Paul Ehrlich titled
``Global Ecology'' in which you predicted that ``some form of
eco-catastrophe, if not thermonuclear war, seems almost certain
to overtake us before the end of the century.'' Do you think
that was a responsible prediction?
Dr. Holdren. Well, thank you, Senator, for that question.
First of all, I guess I would say that one of the things I
have learned in the intervening nearly 4 decades is that
predictions about the future are difficult. That was a
statement which at least at the age of 26 I had the good sense
to hedge by saying ``almost certain.''
The trends at the time were not positive either with
respect to the dangers of thermonuclear war or with respect to
ecological dangers of a wide variety of sorts. A lot of things
were getting worse.
I would argue that the motivation for looking at the
downside possibilities, the possibilities that can go wrong if
things continue in a bad direction, is to motivate people to
change direction. That was my intention at the time. In many
respects, there were changes in direction which reduced both
the probability of nuclear war, in part through arms control
agreements, and there were changes in direction in national and
international policy with respect to environmental problems,
including a good many laws passed by this Congress.
Senator Vitter. Given all of that context, do you think
that was a responsible prediction at the time?
Dr. Holdren. Senator, with respect, I would want to
distinguish between predictions and description of
possibilities which we would like to avert, and I think it is
responsible to call attention to the dangers that society faces
so we will make the investments and make the changes needed to
reduce those dangers.
Senator Vitter. Well, I would call ``seems almost certain''
a prediction, but that is just a difference of opinion.
Specifically, what science was that prediction based on?
Dr. Holdren. Well, it was based in the ecological domain on
a lot of science, on the evidence of the accumulation of
persistent toxic substances in the body fat of organisms all
around the planet, on the rise of the atmospheric
concentrations of carbon dioxide, of sulfur oxides, of
particulate matter, on trace metals accumulating in various
parts of the environment in large quantities, the destruction
of tropical forests at a great rate----
Senator Vitter. Has all of that dramatically reversed so
that this almost certainty has, obviously, been averted?
Dr. Holdren. Some of it has reversed, and I am grateful for
that. Again, I think it has been reversed in part because of
sensible laws passed by the U.S. Congress signed by various
Presidents.
Some of it has not reversed. We continue to be on a
perilous path with respect to climate change, and I think we
need to do more work to get that one reversed as well.
Senator Vitter. OK.
Another statement. In 1986, you predicted that global
warming could cause the deaths of 1 billion people by 2020.
Would you stick to that statement today?
Dr. Holdren. Well, again, I would not have called it a
prediction then and I would not call it a prediction now. I
think it is unlikely to happen, but it is----
Senator Vitter. Do you think it could happen?
Dr. Holdren. I think it could happen, and the way it could
happen is climate crosses a tipping point in which a
catastrophic degree of climate change has severe impacts on
global agriculture. A lot of people depend on that.
Senator Vitter. So you would stick to that statement?
Dr. Holdren. I do not think it is likely. I think we should
invest effort, considerable effort, to reduce the likelihood
further.
Senator Vitter. But you would stick to the statement that
it could happen----
Dr. Holdren. It could happen.
Senator Vitter. One billion by 2020. OK.
Dr. Holdren. It could.
Senator Vitter. In 1973, you encouraged a ``decline in
fertility to well below replacement'' in the United States
because ``280 million in 2040 is likely to be too many.'' What
would your number for the right population in the U.S. be
today?
Dr. Holdren. I no longer think it is productive, Senator,
to focus on the optimum population for the United States. I do
not think any of us know what the right answer is. When I wrote
those lines in 1973, I was preoccupied with the fact that many
problems the United States faced appeared to be being made more
difficult by the rate of population growth that then prevailed.
I think everyone who studies these matters understands that
population growth brings some benefits and some liabilities. It
is a tough question to determine which will prevail in a given
time period.
But I think the key thing today is that we need to work to
improve the conditions that all of our citizens face
economically, environmentally, and in other respects, and we
need to aim for something that I have for years been calling
sustainable prosperity.
Senator Vitter. Well, since we are at 304 million, I am
certainly heartened that you are not sticking to the 280
million figure.
But much more recently, namely a couple weeks ago in
response to my written questions, you did say on this matter
``balancing costs and benefits of population growth is a
complex business, of course, and reasonable people can disagree
about where it comes out.'' I will be quite honest with you. I
am not concerned about where you or I might come out. I am
scared to death that you think this is a proper function of
Government, which is what that sentence clearly implies. Do you
think determining optimal population is a proper role of
Government?
Dr. Holdren. No, Senator, I do not and I certainly did not
intend that to be the implication of that sentence. The
sentence means only what it says, which is that people who have
thought about these matters come out in different places.
I think the proper role of Government is to develop and
deploy the policies with respect to economy, environment, and
security that will ensure the well-being of the citizens we
have. I also believe that many of those policies will have the
effect and have had the effect in the past of lowering birth
rates, because when you provide health care for women,
opportunities for women, and education, people tend to have
smaller families on average. And it ends up being easier to
solve some of our other problems when that occurs.
Senator Vitter. Final question. In 2006, obviously pretty
recently, in an article, The War on Hot Air, you suggested that
global sea levels could rise by 13 feet by the end of this
century. Now, in contrast to that, the IPCC's 2007 report put
their estimate at between 7 and 25 inches. So their top line
was 25 inches, about 2 feet. What explains the disparity? Why
is the IPCC 600 percent off in their top level assessment?
Dr. Holdren. The disparity, Senator, is that the IPCC chose
not to include in that numerical estimate the mechanisms by
which the great ice sheets on Antarctica and Greenland could
disintegrate very rapidly in a warming world. What they
considered is the effect of----
Senator Vitter. Do you think it was a mistake?
Dr. Holdren. No, I do not say it was a mistake. In the
IPCC's report, it says we are not going to include those rapid
mechanisms because our models are not yet good enough to
represent them quantitatively in terms of how much they could
do by a particular year.
My statement was based on articles in the journals of
Science and Nature--peer-reviewed publications by some of the
world's leading specialists in studying ice, who had concluded
that twice in the last 19,000 years in natural warming periods
of similar pace to the warming period that we are experiencing
now in large part because of human activities, sea level went
up by as much as 2 to 5 meters per century.
The 2006 quote was not from an article I wrote. It was from
an interview in which I was quoted, where I had mentioned that
research which had indicated that those high rates were
possible. And the IPCC did not refute that. It simply said our
models cannot represent the phenomena that produce these high
rates in the past, so we have produced an estimate that only
includes some of the----
Senator Vitter. So bottom line, do you think the better
worst case estimate is 25 inches or 13 feet?
Dr. Holdren. The newer analyses that have been done since
the IPCC report came out indicate that the upper limit for the
year 2100 is probably between 1 and 2 meters, and those are the
numbers that I now quote because they are the latest science.
Senator Vitter. So you would no longer quote 13 feet.
Dr. Holdren. I would no longer quote 13 feet because newer
science indicates that the upper limit is only about 6.5 feet.
Senator Vitter. But going back to my first question.
The Chairman. The Senator is almost at 10 minutes.
Senator Vitter. Just a final followup. You would still
say--I think you did--that 1 billion people lost by 2020 is
still a possibility?
Dr. Holdren. It is a possibility and one we should work
energetically to avoid.
Senator Vitter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Cantwell, followed by Senator Warner.
STATEMENT OF HON. MARIA CANTWELL,
U.S. SENATOR FROM WASHINGTON
Senator Cantwell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I too look
forward to working with you in your capacity as Chairman of
this Committee and working with you on the Oceans, Atmosphere,
and Coast Guard Committee.
And thank you to both of the nominees before us today. We
appreciate your willingness to serve.
I am sure my questions may be seen as a little more
specific to the Pacific Northwest region, but I hope you will
indulge me because I have many. And I will start with you, Dr.
Lubchenco.
Obviously, the Columbia River salmon biological opinion has
come a long way, but not without a lot of court intervention.
So I guess I would like to start with: do you think that poor
management within the Government led to those court
interventions and decisions? And what would you do to avoid
that same--what would you change under NOAA to make sure that
we do not end up in the courts again?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I think this has been one of the
most challenging issues for the Pacific Northwest. I think the
situation that we are in now is a result of a long history of
finger-pointing at other drivers of change, both on the land
side and the ocean side, and that there was a significant
amount of time lost to denial of a problem and trying to blame
it on someone else instead of moving on with achieving
solutions.
I have not had the benefit of briefings from NOAA's staff
about the current state of play and would pledge to you to come
up to speed on that, if I am confirmed, as soon as possible and
to work with you to try to identify the ways that we can
resolve these issues. I simply do not have enough information.
Senator Cantwell. How confident are you, though, that you
can keep us out of the courts by having a strong management
response, as opposed to punting and then having the courts
decide?
Dr. Lubchenco. Obviously, it would be much better not to
have to have it go to the courts, and I would make every effort
to do that. I do not have enough information right now to know
how possible that is.
Senator Cantwell. I think what we will do is follow up with
some specific questions on that then. So maybe it will give you
a chance to become a little more familiar with it.
A second issue which you and I have had a chance to talk
about in my office is obviously the impact of hurricane-force
winds off the coast of Washington, and we have had quite a bit
of damage from this in the last couple of seasons. Obviously,
we have a huge Doppler radar gap there. Do you agree that we
need to solve this problem?
Dr. Lubchenco. Absolutely, Senator, and it seems like it is
one that is solvable.
Senator Cantwell. So would you say that this would be
solved under your tenure time?
Dr. Lubchenco. I would anticipate working with you to solve
that.
Senator Cantwell. Do you think we can solve it within the
next few years?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, you are probably a better judge of
that than I am, but I would----
Senator Cantwell. I would hope your tenure time would be
more than a few years.
Dr. Lubchenco. I would like to solve this, and I would work
with you to try to do that. I do not know how long it is going
to take.
Senator Cantwell. The Puget Sound Partnership is an
innovative collaborative effort in the Northwest I think you
are familiar with. It is an eco-based management approach to
our fisheries and ecosystem and ocean governance. If confirmed,
would you put resources toward this kind of effort in helping
Puget Sound on its recovery plans?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I agree with you completely that
this is a model partnership in part because it acknowledges the
deep interactions between a variety of different sectors on the
land side and how those activities affect the health and well-
being of Puget Sound and, therefore, the people in the Puget
Sound area. I think it is a model that is eminently worthy of
supporting and of emulating. I think it is a really nice
partnership.
The extent to which I would have resources available to
contribute significantly I cannot judge at this time. Part of
my challenge is that because I have only been a nominee, I have
not been able to be at NOAA. I have not had briefings on issues
in depth, including the budget. So I need to come up to speed
on that before giving you a more definitive answer on that. But
I do believe the partnership is extremely important and I would
hope there would be opportunity to support it financially as
well as verbally.
Senator Cantwell. Let us try the southern resident orca
population. Obviously, NOAA has already--basically it said that
it believes that it can take this from an endangered species to
a delisting of the species back to levels, they think, from
maybe 28 years ago. So if confirmed, under your leadership,
what kind of resources do you see dedicated to delisting that
population?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I cannot answer the resources
question. I can tell you that I think that this is something
that is extremely important and I would make it a priority.
Senator Cantwell. Do you think 28 years is a reasonable
recovery time?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I assume that those numbers are
partly a function of analyses based on the growth rates of the
populations and the extent to which they are currently under
stress. I have not looked at those analyses in depth but I
would anticipate doing so and would be eager to do so.
Senator Cantwell. I do not want to ignore Dr. Holdren.
Maybe we can get him in on this question.
Last year the Coast Guard Commandant testified before our
Subcommittee that as far as resources, he thought that we had
inadequate resources to respond to oil spills in the Arctic.
And I want to know if either of you believe that our Government
has the capability to effectively respond in the Arctic Ocean
and what the Administration can promise us that we will be
doing to better protect that area.
Dr. Holdren. Well, Senator, I do think that we have been
devoting inadequate resources to our ability to operate in the
Arctic. I think we are down to two heavy icebreakers in the
Coast Guard, both near the end of their operational life. That
is a particularly serious problem for our capacity to operate
in the Arctic in an era when other countries are expanding
their activities there. The capacity to respond to oil spills
is, in my judgment, also not adequate, and I think we are going
to have to take a careful look at how to increase the resources
available to the Coast Guard and the other relevant agencies so
that we can do a better job in that important region. That is,
again, something else that, if confirmed, I would certainly
expect to be working with members of this Committee about.
Senator Cantwell. Thank you very much. I see my time has
expired, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Cantwell.
Senator Warner?
STATEMENT OF HON. MARK WARNER,
U.S. SENATOR FROM VIRGINIA
Senator Warner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the
opportunity to be here and welcome the nominees.
One of the things I am still mastering--Dr. Holdren, maybe
you can help me on a technology piece here--is as a freshman
Senator how you appear at three different hearings that are
scheduled simultaneously. I have not mastered that yet. So my
apologies about missing the front part of the hearing.
I do want to start with you, Dr. Holdren, though. One of
the areas that I am very interested in that the President has
proposed is the creation of a chief technology officer that I
believe will be reporting to you. This is something we have
done in the Commonwealth of Virginia. We elevated technology to
a cabinet level position. We created a CIO. I think it was one
of the things that led us to being named the best-managed State
in the country.
As you look at the CTO position, do you see it more as an
internal function working with the CIO at OMB to bring about
greater technology and efficiency inside the Federal
Government, or do you see this as another kind of outreach
officer to spur innovation across the broader technology
community?
Dr. Holdren. Well, thank you for that question. Because no
CTO has been announced yet and certainly is not on board yet,
it is a little difficult to talk in detail about the division
of responsibilities. But I think the concept has been that the
CIO in the Office of Management and Budget is basically a
position focused on the use of information technology within
the Government to improve the operations of the Government, to
improve transparency, openness, efficiency, and so on, and the
CTO position has been seen primarily as an outward-reaching
position whose primary responsibilities are to see that we do a
better job of exploiting not only information technology but
opportunities in other domains of technology to feed into the
economic recovery that we so badly need and to address the
other major challenges that the country faces. I think the
reason the President committed so early to creating a new CTO
position, which the Government has never had, was to be able to
better bring technology to bear on these big challenges for the
whole society.
Senator Warner. So you would envision this individual's
scope being broader than IT and outward-looking.
Dr. Holdren. Yes, absolutely.
Senator Warner. How about, though, the role--I understand
the CIO role, the CIO role mostly focusing on the IT space, but
as you think beyond IT, how you bring technology functionality
to internal workings of Government, would that be CTO or CIO?
Dr. Holdren. Again, it is a little difficult to speculate
in great detail because some of what these positions will be
will depend on the characteristics of the people who occupy
them, and that is, obviously, not yet settled. But I think
across the domain of technology--information technology,
communications technology, biotechnology, nanotechnology--
obviously there are opportunities both inside and outside the
Government. There are opportunities to bring additional
insights about technology to bear on questions of national
security, for example, inside the Government.
But again, I believe that the President's primary intention
and primary aim with the CTO position, which has been on his
policy agenda since early in the campaign, is to address more
effectively the opportunities for advanced technology to be
brought to bear in society as a whole, not just in the
Government. That does not exclude doing so in the Government.
Senator Warner. I would hope as this role is fleshed out--
and recognizing it is a new position and it could have quite a
large brief--I would hope that you would look at those States
who have maybe gone before. And we have made mistakes. I think
actually Senator Cantwell's State, Washington State, has been
active in this area, but there may be lessons learned.
Dr. Holdren. We will certainly be doing that.
Senator Warner. Dr. Lubchenco, let me welcome you as well.
I may be somewhat following Senator Cantwell on a more region-
specific item and recognize that you may not be fully briefed
up on this. But what is critically important to Virginia and
the surrounding States is the health of the Chesapeake Bay, and
NOAA has played an important role in that. It seems like over
the last 25 years, we have been partners with NOAA and we
oftentimes have not even met the thresholds that we would have
hoped to have met. I would argue that at least in recent years,
the District, Virginia, Maryland, and States in the bay
watershed have actually stepped up with financial resources in
fairly substantial amounts.
I guess what I would ask is, recognizing you are not even
confirmed yet, but do you have a sense of what additional
authorities beyond just funding that NOAA might need to be a
better partner with the States on restoration of the Chesapeake
Bay? For example, I know there is a bay monitoring program
involving a series of buoys out throughout the bay that seems a
little undermanned at this point. But if you could just speak
to that specifically, if you have any knowledge, and then
generally about the bay.
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, I do not know the answer to your
question about relevant authority, and I would pledge to find
out about that at the earliest possible moment.
What I do think the Chesapeake Bay situation brings to the
fore, though, are the challenges inherent in managing
activities that cross not only the land and in this case the
estuary, the bay, but also that cross multiple jurisdictions,
local, State, multiple States, as well as different State and
Federal agencies. And that has been a challenge. I think the
model of working across those and setting up a multistate
process is a good model. I think we have seen that some parts
of that worked better than others, and having adequate funding
was certainly one of the challenges.
But Chesapeake Bay really is a microcosm of a lot of the
larger ocean issues, coastal issues in particular, where there
are activities on land that impact the quality, the health of
the ecosystems and therefore the resources and the jobs that
are available, and figuring out the right mechanisms to do that
integration is a huge challenge.
One of my goals at NOAA is to bring a more holistic
understanding of these interactions across different sectors
and to think about marine spatial planning in a comprehensive
sense with all appropriate parties and to do a better job of
resolving issues before they get to be so incredibly
challenging that it is very, very difficult to do something
about them.
Senator Warner. Well, thank you. I would simply add that as
the Nation's largest estuary and one that still remains in
great jeopardy, I do believe the States in the state compact
have stepped up their game over the last 4 or 5 years, both in
terms of water standards, in terms of runoff, in terms of
funding. But we have not had a collaborative partner at the
Federal level, and we look forward to having that kind of
collaboration going forward. So thank you.
Dr. Lubchenco. Great. I look forward to that, Senator.
Senator Warner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Warner.
I will just conclude my part. Senator Begich then has a
follow-up question, and then I will have a statement to make
before we conclude.
This is not part of your responsibility, Dr. Holdren, but I
judge you to be of such a high caliber that I know that you
will accept this responsibility.
I think one of the greatest embarrassments in the United
States of America is the fact that we have an air traffic
control system which is analog. We are the only country in the
western world. In fact, Mongolia is ahead of us. They are
building a digital GPS air traffic control system. The
consequences of this are overwhelming because if it were to be
solved, it might clear up delays by 30 percent or more.
What I am saying to you is that we have a President now who
seems to be enormously interested in technology and efficiency
and doing things in the right way. You will have the
opportunity, because of your position, of being face to face
with him. We have tried in our committee to do this, and we can
never get the money because of various reasons. I do not know
if the President is aware of this or not because I have not
talked with him about it, but I just hope very much that you
will. I think it is a supremely important national requirement.
It does fit into science and technology. The science and the
technology are all solved and they are available. It is the
fact that we will not put them to work. And I hope that you
will agree to do that.
Dr. Holdren. Well, Senator, you were generous saying it is
not my responsibility because, in fact, it is my responsibility
anyplace that science and technology are not being put to the
appropriate and needed uses across all the domains of the
Federal agencies. I am supposed to look for the gaps and help
see that the holes are filled. And this is a gap. It is an
important one. The President actually has recognized it. It is
certainly, if you will forgive this particular metaphor, on the
radar screen of the administration, and I am determined to fix
it and I know the President is determined to fix it.
The Chairman. My day is brighter.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Thank you, sir.
Dr. Lubchenco, I would like you to do something for me,
when confirmed. The National Weather Service provides the
Federal Aviation Administration with weather forecasting
services, and there is this rather large controversy that is
going on right now because the suggestion is because--as you
know, if you take off from Dulles, you get passed on from what
they call TRACON to TRACON. And there are now 21 of them across
the country, and there is a suggestion that it be reduced to
two. That would be highly efficient. That is met with some
resistance, obviously, from some of the employees. And then
there are some who say that it could involve safety issues.
But I think it is one of those things that--because it does
involve weather, the National Weather Service, I think it is
something that you could help in trying to resolve. It is not
so much a study or a commission I am looking for. It is a
bringing together of the parties so that we can quickly proceed
one way or another.
Would you put your attention to that?
Dr. Lubchenco. I certainly would, Mr. Chairman. I do not
know the details of this issue. I appreciate that it is an
important one, and I would look into it.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Begich?
Senator Begich. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Holdren, I am going to kind of read the question here.
I have a question then, for both of you I just have a request.
First off, I appreciate both of you talking about the
Arctic policy and how important that is, and I think that is a
huge, evolving issue that the administration and the Congress
will continue to deal with.
The Arctic Research and Policy Act of 1984 created the U.S.
Arctic Research Commission as an independent agency that
provides goals for Arctic research, and created the interagency
Arctic Research and Policy Committee which implements these
goals. The Commission, the Committee, your office, and the
Office of Management and Budget have specific responsibilities
outlined in the act. Yet, to be very frank with you, these
entities have never really worked together, never presented a
combined budget for this effort.
Will you use your office to lead this effort, once and for
all, to get a combined effort from a budgetary standpoint and
from reaching the policy goals?
Dr. Holdren. Yes, Senator. That is an easy one. The OMB and
the OSTP are supposed to work together on discharging those
kinds of responsibilities, making sure that interdisciplinary
cross-agency efforts and new initiatives of this sort are
included in the science and technology funding priorities going
forward. I am not familiar with all the details of this case
and how it has been handled in the past, but I can certainly
promise you----
Senator Begich. We will provide you with some material.
Dr. Holdren. And I can certainly promise you that, if
confirmed, I will take that up with the OMB Director as part of
our mandate to get these science and technology priorities
right in the budget going forward.
Senator Begich. Excellent.
And just one request for both of you, not for today. But as
I sat here listening to all the questions, most of them
relevant to your positions and the issues of what you are
talking about, Arctic policy is going to be huge. And I would
just be interested from your perspective--I am a very visual
person, and I am afraid to ask this question because I am
afraid of what the outcome will look like. But how you see and
whom you see will be involved in the decisions of Arctic policy
into the future by agency, so a very visual chart for me would
be very helpful. I am afraid to ask for this because I am
afraid that every Department division of the Federal Government
now believes they have a role in it, which is great, except it
will be probably the most disorganized effort. So I would be
curious at some point if you could provide to me, whichever one
of you that would be the most appropriate, a chart of how you
see and what agencies you see--because I know there are
jurisdiction issues. I know in Congress there are jurisdiction
issues. But if we do not figure that out, we are never going to
get to a comprehensive policy. So I will just leave that
request with you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Cantwell?
Senator Cantwell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
This for Dr. Holdren or Dr. Lubchenco. How do you intend to
make sure that agencies like NOAA have adequate say in our
Government's policy choices, especially as it relates to
offshore drilling? And the reason I bring this up--and I know
my colleague from Alaska might be leaving. Maybe he will stay.
Yes, have a seat.
[Laughter.]
Senator Cantwell. In a letter commenting on the EIS for the
Chukchi Sea oil and gas drilling plan, the National Marine
Fisheries Service wrote the Minerals Management Service
analysis did not present a strong enough case to NMFS that the
marine resources would be adequately protected. Yet, this
advice, along with similar advice from EPA and Fish and
Wildlife Service, was ignored by the Minerals Management
Service. So what do you intend to do to make sure that these
agencies who are in charge of protecting these resources are
heard on these important issues as it relates to offshore
drilling?
Dr. Lubchenco. Senator, you have highlighted what I believe
is one of the real challenges of different agencies, different
jurisdictions having different kinds of responsibilities, all
of which overlap in the same place. I believe that the sectoral
management of different activities in oceans does not serve us
well and needs to be converted into a more thoughtful mechanism
for doing more holistic planning of which activities' and which
sectors' uses are compatible with one another in a particular
place. And this inevitably, as you have highlighted, entails
interagency not only coordination and cooperation, but a
mechanism for----
Senator Cantwell. Well, I mean, to be blunt, it sounds like
the Minerals Management agency blew off NMFS. So what are you
going to do to make sure that that does not happen again?
Dr. Lubchenco. I anticipate working directly through the
Secretary of Commerce and with the other relevant Secretaries,
for example, the Secretary of the Interior, but also utilizing
the Council on Environmental Quality and the Office of Science
and Technology Policy to help establish from the outset a
mechanism for not letting that happen.
Senator Cantwell. Dr. Holdren?
Dr. Holdren. If I can add one thing to that. There is an
entity called the National Science and Technology Council which
has existed in the White House, organized by the Office of
Science and Technology Policy, but bringing together all of the
Executive Branch agencies typically at the deputy level that
have roles in science and technology. And this is a place where
in the past one has been able to address crosscutting and
overlapping jurisdiction issues effectively. In the last 8
years, it has languished. It was not really fully utilized in
the last administration, but our intention--certainly my
intention, if confirmed, would be to revive it and utilize it
fully to try to reduce the sorts of problems that you point to
here.
The other thing I would mention again is I think we have in
prospect a set of people across the relevant agencies who are
uncommonly experienced at communicating with each other, and
beyond the structural approaches to this through the NSTC, for
example, I think we are going to have some success in avoiding
these problems that come from crosscutting issues and
overlapping jurisdictions just because we are going to talk to
each other more.
Senator Cantwell. Well, one area in which I think we need
to better understand the response is on the Office of Response
and Restoration for oil spills, and we certainly have not
funded that program at the level of the President's request.
What do you think the impact of that is on cutting back on our
Nation's oil spill response capabilities?
Dr. Lubchenco. I think it puts us at risk that is not
really acceptable, Senator.
Senator Cantwell. Dr. Holdren?
Dr. Holdren. I agree. We need to fix it.
Senator Cantwell. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Cantwell.
Dr. Holdren. Mr. Chairman, I realize I am in danger of
failing to introduce my family and friends who have accompanied
me here and have supported me in this hearing. I do want to
mention that my wife of 43 years, Dr. Cheryl Holdren, is right
behind me, and that some of our dearest friends from Woods
Hole, Bill and Pi Smith, have come to lend their moral support
as well. So I wanted to thank them for that before we go any
further.
The Chairman. Yes. I think thanking your wife for being
here is probably pretty important.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. I would like to conclude this with the
following comments.
Number one, this is what you hope for in Government. Dr.
Holdren, you are happily ensconced exactly where you are. I can
even give you your address. But it is a very good life that you
are leading. The same with you, Dr. Lubchenco. And yet you are
giving that up for the purpose of coming to serve your
Government. And I think you do that, one, because you suspect
that this is an administration which really cares about what
you do. It is going to respond to what you do.
But more importantly, I think that you are both very
worried about the future of the planet and the oceans and the
earth and the people thereon and the wildlife thereon and the
fish life therein. So it is a noble service that you do, and I
do not think it should be left unthanked, even before you are
confirmed, for your willingness to do this. They talk about a
new generation of concern about Americans, but mostly at that
level they are talking about the younger people who came up
through various campaigns, et cetera. And you are both very
young, and I understand that. It is a magnificent service that
you do our country and we are very, very lucky that you are
doing it.
With that in mind, before Senator Hutchison left, we agreed
that we would try to move your nominations by unanimous consent
on the floor of the Senate. Now, that means that we do not do
it within the Committee. But speed is very important here, for
you to get on the job as quickly as possible. So we are going
to try and do that, and I want you to know that.
This hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:25 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
Prepared Statement of Hon. John F. Kerry,
U.S. Senator from Massachusetts
I am pleased to welcome Jane Lubchenco and my good friend John
Holdren, two of the most powerful voices in the scientific community on
the issue of global climate change. The only downside that I can think
of with respect to John's nomination is that I won't get to visit him
in Falmouth anymore. John has been an incredible resource to the Woods
Hole Institute and to the Kennedy School at Harvard University. More
importantly, he has been a tremendous voice on the critical challenge
of global climate change, and we are very fortunate that he will bring
that voice to this Administration.
We are facing a true crisis, and we need leaders who understand the
scope and urgency of the problem and are committed to taking action to
both reduce our domestic greenhouse gas emissions and actively reengage
with the international process. The reality is that today, the most
critical trends and facts all point in the wrong direction.
CO2 emissions grew four times faster during the last 8 years
than they did in the 1990s. Two years ago the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change issued a series of projections for global emissions,
based on likely energy and land use patterns. Well, today emissions
have actually moved beyond the worst case scenarios predicted by all of
the IPCC's models! Our oceans and forests are losing their natural
ability soak up and store greenhouse gases. This is a stronger climate
forcing signal than expected, arriving sooner than expected.
NOAA has a particularly important role in designing our Nation's
climate change research, assessment and response program, which frankly
has been shamefully neglected over the past 8 years. Dr. Lubchenco, I
am encouraged by the work that has already been done to design a
National Climate Service, a concept that Senator Snowe and I first
advanced last year in the Global Change Research Improvement Act. I
look forward to working together to ensure that the National Climate
Service serves an important function in providing key climate
information to mayors, Governors, natural resource managers, and other
experts working on the ground to respond to the ongoing impacts of
global climate change.
Dr. Holdren, as Director of the Office of Science and Technology
Policy, you will serve as a trusted voice at the center of the
President's approach to climate policy. I look forward to working with
you to guide an agenda that focuses on clean energy and climate
technology. As the President continues to build his budget request, I
also trust that you will serve as a forceful voice within the
Administration for full funding of the America COMPETES Act. In 2004,
China graduated six-hundred thousand engineers. The United States
graduated just seventy-thousand. We cannot continue to ignore the fact
that our fiercest competitors on the global stage are out performing us
in the classroom and in the laboratory.
Finally, yesterday the House of Representatives passed H.R. 554,
the National Nanotechnology Initiative Amendments Act of 2009. In the
coming weeks, I'll be reintroducing companion legislation in the
Senate, and I look forward to working with you to ensure that the U.S.
is in position to drive innovation in the field of Nanotechnology while
also taking the necessary steps to ensure that nanotechnology is safe
for consumers, for workers, and for the environment.
______
Prepared Statement of Hon. Barbara Boxer, U.S. Senator from California
Mr. Chairman: I am pleased today to express my support for the
confirmation of Dr. John Holdren as the Director of the Office of
Science and Technology Policy and Dr. Jane Lubchenco as the
Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Both of these individuals are renowned scientists with a deep
understanding of the environmental challenges we currently face--
particularly with respect to climate change. These nominations reflect
the Obama Administration's strong commitment to restoring the
prominence of science to our Nation and truly represent the change we
have all been anticipating.
I am confident that Dr. Holdren's experience both as a scientist as
well as a longtime advisor on science and technology policy will
provide a strong foundation for his work leading and coordinating our
Nation's many research and development priorities.
Dr. Holdren's work on the causes and consequences of global
environmental change and analysis of energy technologies and policies
is well known. As Chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee,
developing a comprehensive policy to mitigate and respond to climate
change is one of my greatest priorities. As Congress moves forward with
a climate change bill this year, I look forward to working with Dr.
Holdren to address the many environmental problems that our
communities, our Nation and our planet are facing.
I am also pleased that Dr. Holdren is committed to help
coordinating a comprehensive Federal effort to bolster America's
competitiveness in science and technology, and meeting the goals set in
the America COMPETES Act passed in 2007.
Dr. Lubchenco's broad expertise as a marine scientist and
experience formulating recommendations on ocean policymake her
exceptionally well qualified to lead the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, the agency responsible for coordinating our
Nation's ocean research and policy programs.
Dr. Lubchenco is a well-known research scientist whose expertise
bridges a wide range of issues under NOAA's jurisdiction, including the
impacts of climate change on ocean ecosystems.
Dr. Lubchenco's work to promote the communication of science to
policymakers makes her a particularly ideal choice for this position.
As Founder of the Aldo Leopold Leadership Program and a Founding
Principal of the Communication Partnership for Science and the Sea, she
has shown a strong commitment to improving the integration of science
and policy.
I am confident that Dr. Lubchenco has a deep understanding of the
myriad threats facing our oceans and effective strategies for
addressing them. As a Commissioner for the Pew Oceans Commission and
Joint Oceans Commission Initiative, Dr. Lubchenco worked to identify
priorities for improving management of our oceans. My National Oceans
Protection Act, which I introduced in the 109th and 110th Congresses
and plan to reintroduce again soon, would implement the recommendations
of these Commissions as well as the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy. I
look forward to working with Dr. Lubchenco to advance these priorities
in this Congress.
I am truly inspired by the nomination of these two distinguished
individuals and look forward to working with them to promote the
scientific innovation that will foster our economy and provide us with
the tools necessary to protect our communities from environmental
degradation.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. John D. Rockefeller IV
to Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. As Administrator, your Federal fishery management
responsibility will be substantial. Our fisheries are not only in need
of strong conservation management, but also are a central component to
our economy. How do you intend to make our fisheries sustainable and
profitable, while meeting the requirements of the recently reauthorized
Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act?
Answer. I support the goal of ending overfishing but also recognize
this will be a difficult task, one that will require the cooperation
and commitment of the fishing industry to rebuild these resources. The
Act is clear that annual catch limits must be in place by 2010 that
prevent overfishing. I understand that the regional fishery management
councils are working hard with NOAA to meet this goal. The health of
our marine fish stocks is directly linked to the health of many coastal
communities. I will work with the councils and all stakeholders to
ensure that overfishing is ended by the statutory deadline of 2010,
based on the best science available, while carefully considering the
economic consequences of our actions.
Question 1a. Are there any new approaches you intend to consider
for improving the performance of fishery management, particularly
regarding strengthening our Nation's regulatory enforcement
capabilities?
Answer. Providing the funding needed to fully implement the
Magnuson-Stevens Act is not only critical to an industry that
contributes over $30 billion to the U.S. Gross National Product, but
also to ensuring recreational fishing opportunities and a nutritious
source of food for Americans. I understand NOAA has carefully reviewed
the requirements associated with the new Magnuson-Stevens Act, and has
requested some significant increases to meet the statutory requirements
in the last 2 years. I believe it is time to fully fund implementation
of the Magnuson Act and to provide sufficient funding for enforcement.
I also believe we need to look at what has worked in some fisheries,
such as a system of catch-shares as opposed to stringent ``command and
control'' type regulation, and see if we have sufficient data to make
that system work in other fisheries.
I also understand that NOAA just provided Congress a list of the
worst offending countries with respect to IUU fishing--and that it
included such countries as China and Italy. It is not fair to our
fishermen to hold them to a higher standard than we are willing to
require of the rest of world's fish products that are sold in the
United States. It is imperative that we work internationally to end the
overfishing crisis and soon. If confirmed, I will take hard look at the
problem of how to stop illegal fish from coming into the U.S.
Question 2. Dr. Lubchenco, many of the issues within the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are new to me and I am looking
forward to learning more about ocean and coastal management. Two topics
that you have written extensively about are ecosystem-based management
and marine protected areas. Could you tell me a bit more about your
philosophy on using these two approaches as management tools for our
oceans?
As Administrator, what steps would you take to move toward a more
ecosystem view of ocean conservation and management, including
improving resilience of coastal communities and marine ecosystems and
resources given the expected impacts of global warming and ocean
acidification?
Answer. Ecosystem-based management is far superior to managing
ocean resources on a sector-by-sector basis and I would like to see
states and local governments working toward using this approach. NOAA
should lead by example--NOAA should look at its own management
decisions on a more ecosystem basis rather than by sector or statute. I
hope to implement greater regional governance within NOAA across its
programs. My predecessor, Admiral Lautenbacher, began the difficult
process of breaking down the ``silos'' within NOAA. If confirmed, I
would like to continue and increase those efforts.
Marine protected areas are one tool that can be used to rebuild
fisheries, safeguard ocean resources before they become depleted, and
help ensure healthy oceans. Marine Protected Areas can be used in
combination with other tools. However, each area in the ocean is
unique, and regulatory options should be evaluated on a case-by-case
basis to determine which combination of tools is most appropriate to
meet the stated goals and objectives of the region. When declaring
sanctuaries or marine protected areas, I believe we must ensure an open
and inclusive process that provides all stakeholders an opportunity to
participate as described in both the National Marine Sanctuaries Act
and the Magnuson-Stevens Act.
Question 3. Given that piecemeal efforts to advance offshore
aquaculture are occurring, what is your position on the need for or
your support of creating a national framework for aquaculture in the
United States? What environmental controls are needed to support the
industry without impacting wild fish stocks and their ecosystems? What
do you see as the largest barriers to a healthy U.S. aquaculture
industry?
Answer. Offshore aquaculture may be an important part of our future
food supply. We need to put our best scientists to work to figure out
if it is possible to raise fish in the open ocean in a manner that
produces safe seafood and does not cause lasting harm to the marine
environment. We are not there yet. Moreover, there are no permits yet
available for open ocean aquaculture in Federal waters. NOAA does not
have a fully implemented national aquaculture program, or even
authority to issue these permits--it is still in the research and
development phase. I will take a hard look at what is being considered
in the Gulf of Mexico to determine if it is within the Department's
authority to allow aquaculture there. Regardless, we must begin to
develop the technology and the permitting process to be prepared. I
will work with Congress to do just that.
Question 4. Dr. Lubchenco, in December of last year, the Government
Accountability Office released a report on the National Marine
Fisheries Service and marine mammal protection. The report concluded
that the National Marine Fisheries Service relies on incomplete,
outdated, or imprecise information about human-caused mortality for
many marine mammals stocks. Are you aware of this issue within the
National Marine Fisheries Service?
Answer. I was not aware of this issue. Thank you for bringing it to
my attention.
Question 4a. What steps do you plan on taking to address this
issue?
Answer. I will re-double the agency's effort to conserve marine
mammals in the face of increasing threats from humans, including
requesting additional funding if it is needed to meet the agency's
statutory obligations under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and
Endangered Species Act.
Question 4b. I know there are a multitude of issues that need your
immediate attention once you are confirmed as the next Administrator of
NOAA, will marine mammals be one of the issues on your radar screen?
Answer. Absolutely, yes.
Question 5. Dr. Lubchenco, I am concerned with the status of the
International Whaling Commission. If confirmed for Administrator of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration what steps do you plan
to take to try and strengthen the International Whaling Commission and
reduce the number of whales that are still killed each year?
Answer. Unfortunately, despite the International Whaling Commission
(IWC) moratorium on commercial whaling, there are thousands of whales
killed each year and their meat ends up being sold in markets in Japan,
Iceland and Norway. I will work to see that the scientific whaling
loophole, and others like it that allow commercial whaling to continue,
are closed.
Question 5a. Do you believe an essential role for the United States
is to ensure whale conservation becomes and remains the IWC's focus?
Answer. Yes. I believe that the IWC must re-focus itself on
conservation and dealing with the many threats to whales that exist
today--including climate change, marine pollution, and ocean noise.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Mark Begich to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. Some 62 percent of the Nation's seafood is landed in
Alaska, none of its fish stocks are considered overfished and wide
areas of ocean have been proactively closed to fishing to protect
subsea habitat. As managed by the North Pacific Fishery Management
Council, Alaska is generally considered to have one of the best managed
fisheries in the world yet some have proposed changes in the regional
fishery management council structure to address overfishing and other
issues apparent elsewhere in the Nation. What changes do you propose in
the regional council process and how might that affect the regulatory
process in Alaska?
Answer. I wish to commend the North Pacific Fishery Management
Council for its recent decision to study fishing in the Arctic before
beginning to permit fishing at industrial levels. I applaud their
taking the long-term view. I do not currently envision changing the
council process.
Question 2. Catch share systems have been proposed as a way to
advance conservation, safety and market-focused fishery management
goals. Many Alaska fisheries--pollock, halibut and crab--already
operate under such systems. Critics have criticized privatizing a
public resource. Do you support implementation of catch-share programs?
Answer. Yes. Recent scientific studies--and the performance of many
of Alaska's fisheries--show that those fisheries operated with catch
share management have better environmental and economic records than
other fisheries managed without them. On the topic of privatization,
fisheries are a public trust resource, meaning they belong to all
Americans. The law and court decisions make it clear that catch shares
are a privilege not a right. They do not change the fact that fisheries
are a public trust resource. Most management without catch shares has
been proven to be inadequate to meet NOAA's public trust
responsibilities. One of the best ways to ensure the public will
benefit from healthy, profitable fisheries into the future is to add
catch shares to our management tool box.
Question 2a. If so, would you support initial quota allocations
that respect the historical participation of crewmembers, as well as
skippers and owners?
Answer. Yes. Catch share systems are flexible and can accommodate
share allocations to skippers, crew, communities, sectors, and others.
I look forward to working with the Fishery Management Councils on a
wide variety of catch share designs that will ensure we have healthy
marine ecosystems and healthy fishing economies.
Question 2b. Given the variability in fisheries, do you see a need
for national standards for such programs?
Answer. The Magnuson-Stevens Act has standards and guidelines to
assist in the implementation of catch shares. I believe we need more
expertise on these programs but one thing emerging from the research is
that there is no one type of catch share program that works for every
fishery. Catch shares designs need to be tailored to the individual
fishery and marine ecosystem.
Question 3. Will you have a deputy in your office that focuses
solely on oceans and fisheries issues?
Answer. Yes, I intend to appoint an Assistant Secretary for Oceans.
Question 4. Alaska coastal communities that depend on ocean
resources for subsistence, commercial and recreational uses are often
faced with critical resource related issues. The Sea Grant program,
funded in part by NOAA, works to bridge science and technological
information with coastal residents to help them make informed
decisions. In Alaska there are 10 extension agents spread throughout
the state. Nationally Sea Grant is affiliated with 32 top universities
across the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts and the Great Lakes
conducting scientific research, education, training, and extension
projects designed to foster science-based decisions about the use and
conservation of our aquatic resources. Regrettably, Sea Grant's funding
has stagnated over the last 6 years.
As NOAA Administrator, will you support the Sea Grant program and
help it to grow so that, as these big issues come before us--notably
climate change and its impact on our marine resources, our coastal
residents can adapt at the most local of levels?
Answer. Yes. I am a strong supporter of the Sea Grant program.
Question 5. Scientists and Alaska coastal communities are becoming
more and more concerned about the effects of ocean acidification on our
marine life. It is predicted that the average acidity of the oceans
could triple by the end of this century, which could have a devastating
effect on marine life. How should the Nation best approach the issue of
ocean acidification?
Answer. The problem of ocean acidification is quite alarming. The
most obvious way we can address it is by reducing our carbon emissions.
Question 6. NOAA currently conducts significant research in Alaska.
Unfortunately, most of the research vessels doing Alaska research are
home-ported outside of the state, either in Oregon, Washington or
California. Will you work with the Alaska delegation so more research
vessels conducting Alaska research are based in Alaska?
Answer. I am not yet deeply familiar with the specific issues
regarding home porting of NOAA research vessels. But if confirmed, I
will study these issues and look forward to working with the Alaska
delegation on this issue.
Question 7. Icebreakers are a critical need in Arctic research and
our Nation's two polar-class icebreakers, operated by the Coast Guard,
are more than 30 years old, far beyond their service lives. A recent
National Academy of Sciences report concluded that ``U.S. icebreaking
capability is at risk of being unable to support national interests in
the north and the south.'' Will you commit to supporting re-investment
in such infrastructure, critical to the conduct of scientific research?
Answer. Yes. I believe these are critically important for our
Nation.
Question 8. NOAA is responsible for mapping and surveying our
coasts, which is critical data for marine transportation, resource
development, environmental protection and recreation but some critical
shortfalls are apparent across the Nation and in Alaska, especially due
to Arctic warming and erosion. How will you address this survey
shortfall and will you continue to use private contractors to assist in
this effort?
Answer. I will work to obtain the funding necessary for survey
work, particularly in Alaska, where I understand there have been
minimal surveys. This survey work is critical to navigation safety
there, particularly as shipping traffic is expected to increase in the
Arctic.
Question 9. NOAA listed beluga whales as an endangered species last
October. The listing means any Federal agency that funds or authorizes
activities that may affect the whales in the area must first consult
with the National Marine Fisheries Service to determine the potential
effects on the whales. This ruling could affect fishing and oil and gas
development in Cook Inlet, expansion of the Port of Anchorage, a vital
lifeline for most Alaskans and the U.S. military presence there, and
could necessitate expensive modifications to Anchorage's wastewater
treatment facility, which the EPA has determined does not affect
belugas. I am not aware of any scientific information showing that
either of these activities have any effect on beluga populations. As
NOAA Administrator, how will you deal with agencies regulating these
industries and activities as it relates to the beluga listing? Will you
assure Alaskans that all decisions will be based on the best available
science?
Answer. I will always work to ensure that the agency's decisions
are based on the best available scientific information. I pledge to
look into this situation, recognizing that the listing decision is
already made. I will review implementation of the decision,
particularly what mitigation measures are required to try to ensure
that Beluga whales can be protected without causing unnecessary
economic impacts on Anchorage and the surrounding areas.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Barbara Boxer to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. As a Commissioner for the Pew Oceans Commission and
Joint Oceans Commission Initiative, you worked to identify priority
actions for addressing the challenges facing our oceans. Some of the
recommendations highlighted by these Commissions included the need for
a national ocean policy and national and regional ocean governance
reform. What role do you see for NOAA in implementing these reforms,
and what challenges does the agency face in doing so?
Answer. I support a NOAA organic act. As a member of the Pew and
the Joint Ocean Commissions, I have studied this issue. This is another
good idea whose time has come. Ocean issues will not get the attention
and focus they deserve in the government without a NOAA organic act.
Currently NOAA's organization and authorities are a patchwork quilt of
overlapping jurisdictions with other agencies, that can hinder
efficient decision-making on issues concerning the ocean and its
resources.
Question 2. As you know, the oceans play a tremendous role in
controlling Earth's climate and are being severely impacted by climate
change. As the NOAA Administrator, how will you work with other
agencies such as NASA and the EPA to provide the tools necessary for
understanding and responding to climate change? What do you see as some
of the top priorities for NOAA, both in terms of research and
management, on this issue?
Answer. I believe we need a National Climate Service to meet the
needs of our Nation to better understand climate impacts and deliver
information critical to adaptation, mitigation, and management
planning. Climate change is and will continue to be one of the most
important challenges facing our Nation. Working with many other
agencies, including the EPA, Department of Interior, Department of
Energy and Department of Agriculture, the White House, NOAA should lead
a National Climate Service based on its existing statutory mandates to
provide climate information and services and experience managing end to
end climate operations. NOAA can build upon its strong climate
monitoring, research, and assessment capabilities, and translate
climate data and research into information and services that address
the needs of stakeholders at the local, state, regional, and national
level.
Question 3. The number of commercial and industrial uses in Federal
waters has been growing and will likely continue to grow in the future.
Proposals for new offshore activities such as oil, gas, and renewable
energy production, aquaculture, or military exercises have often been
controversial due to their potential impacts on marine ecosystem health
and existing uses of marine resources. For some of these activities,
NOAA is not the lead Federal agency of jurisdiction. As Administrator,
how will you work to promote NOAA's coordination with other agencies in
evaluating and managing these activities? Will you involve states in
decisions about the use of Federal waters off their coasts?
Answer. NOAA should lead the Federal Government's efforts to
coordinate the development of our offshore resources. Our nation needs
an integrated ocean plan so that we can ensure the most efficient and
environmentally sound development and use of these important ocean
resources. I believe states must be our partners in this endeavor. I
will use NOAA's existing authorities to accomplish this planning and
where appropriate permitting.
Question 4. When the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and
Management Act was reauthorized in 2006, Congress reaffirmed its
commitment to rebuild stocks in as short a time as possible, not to
exceed 10 years in most cases. The reauthorization strengthened
existing mandates to prevent and end overfishing through a system of
science-based catch limits and accountability measures. The National
Marine Fisheries Service published a final rule on January 16, 2009
containing the guidelines necessary to implement these requirements.
Would you be willing to provide some additional technical guidance and
policy directives to avoid the misinterpretation of some potentially
unclear provisions in the rule? Also, more broadly, how will you ensure
that the proper guidance and tools are in place to end overfishing by
2011 and rebuild depleted stocks in as short a time-frame as possible?
Answer. I understand the concern about the guidelines but I have
not reviewed them in detail yet. If confirmed, I will give them a hard
look and look forward to working with you on implementation. It is
important that this rule on setting catch limits be done right. If it
is not, then we won't be able to end overfishing by 2011.
Question 5. I am personally very interested in marine mammal
conservation, particularly since over 1/3 of the world's whale and
dolphin species, including 6 threatened or endangered whale species,
spend part of the year in California's waters. Since many of these
species are highly migratory, their protection hinges on our
collaboration with other nations. Two issues that particularly concern
me right now are the future of the United States' dolphin-safe tuna
label, which I worked along with the current Vice President to
establish, as well as the potential resumption of commercial whaling.
What role do you see for NOAA in formulating a United States position
on these issues and working with international governments and
organizations to advance that position?
Answer. I believe NOAA should take the lead in formulating U.S.
positions on these important issues. I look forward to working with
other governments and non-governmental organizations to ensure even
greater protections for whales and other marine mammals and to promote
seafood integrity and safety.
Question 6. As a widely respected research scientist who has worked
to promote greater communication of science to policymakers, you
obviously understand the importance of scientific integrity and
transparency. I appreciate your affirmation of this philosophy in your
testimony. Under the Bush Administration, there were serious concerns
about political suppression and manipulation of scientific work at
agencies. As Administrator of NOAA, how will you work to promote
scientific integrity at NOAA and elevate the role of science in policy
decisions regarding our oceans and atmosphere?
Answer. I believe that unbiased and authoritative science is the
bedrock upon which sound environmental decisions are made. A resilient
society and economy depend on informed decisions regarding
environmental challenges and resource management issues. If confirmed,
I will ensure that NOAA will provide the Nation with scientifically
rigorous, unbiased assessments of the often difficult and controversial
environmental challenges and opportunities facing us.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Maria Cantwell to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. As you know, salmon recovery is a shared effort of
numerous entities at many levels. For example, the Washington
Department of Fish and Wildlife is responsible for a great deal of
scientific monitoring of ESA-listed stocks in the Columbia River. While
I'm sure that as a scientist you're dedicated to ensuring NOAA uses the
best available science for managing these stocks, a major limiting
factor is the availability of the data and monitoring we need to
understand them. How do you plan to address current shortfalls in our
data and monitoring of ESA-listed Columbia River stocks (such as lower
Columbia Coho)? What is NOAA's role in ensuring that data collection
and monitoring is increased and improved--particularly when many of
NOAA's partners like state resource agencies are faced with enormous
budget cuts? Does this mean NOAA will devote the resources needed to
fill in those gaps?
Answer. NOAA cannot do its job without sufficient funding. NOAA
needs more funding and I will work with OMB and the Congress to get it.
NOAA's FY 2009 budget request is $4.1 billion. NOAA's appropriation has
been flat at $3.9 billion since FY 2005, while its mandates and the
demand for its services have grown. With sufficient funding I believe
we can improve the agency's data collection and monitoring. .
Question 1a. What linkage do you see between harvest and
hatcheries? Should salmon and steelhead stocks listed for protection
under the Endangered Species Act--for which Northwest ratepayers are
paying approximately $900 million a year--be subject to such robust
harvest levels? How do you balance these two responsibilities to
achieve recovery? Since NOAA is endorsing many of the proposed hatchery
reforms, what is NOAA's role in helping to provide the resources needed
to actually make those reforms happen?
Answer. I am not familiar with the specific issues regarding
harvest levels and hatchery reforms in Washington, but if confirmed I
will study this issue closely and look forward to working with you on a
balanced approach. In general, I believe that the science does not
dictate policy decisions but should inform them.
Question 2. Individual quota share programs have been implemented,
or are in development, in a number of fisheries important to Washington
state fishers and processors, including fisheries for Alaska pollock,
Pacific whiting, Alaska flatfish and North Pacific crab. What is your
view on Limited Access Privilege Programs (LAPPs)?
In the 2006 Magnuson Act reauthorization process, many cited
Federal fisheries management off Alaska as a model for management of
U.S. fisheries and proposed amendments to incorporate Alaska groundfish
management requirements, including catch limits and catch accounting,
into the Act. Do you agree that the North Pacific Council has a good
record in managing groundfish stocks and do you support the council
process going forward?
Answer. In general, I support catch share programs, but recognize
the challenges of design and implementation. There is no one-size-fits-
all solution when it comes to fisheries management. In addition, I want
to restate my support for the recent decision by the North Pacific
Fishery Management Council to study fishing in the Arctic before
beginning to permit fishing at industrial levels
Question 2a. Some advocate shutting down commercial and
recreational fisheries in some Federal waters using the Antiquities
Act, the National Marine Sanctuaries Act, a new Marine Protected Areas
regime, a national network of Ocean Heritage Areas, and other
processes. What is your view on using these processes as opposed to
continuing to use the regional fishery management council process for
making policy decisions of this nature?
Answer. I firmly believe that the designation and ongoing
management of marine protected areas should involve a highly
collaborative public process, as exemplified by the authority provided
under NOAA's National Marine Sanctuaries Act and the Magnuson-Stevens
Act. I feel strongly and will work to ensure that any marine national
monument--or portion thereof--for which NOAA has been or will be
delegated management responsibilities should have the same protections,
management tools, and robust public involvement that are available for
national marine sanctuaries.
Question 3. Are you acquainted with NOAA's efforts--through a
formal procurement process--to find a new homeport for its Marine
Operations Center-Pacific, now in Seattle? Will you affirm that the
final decisionmaker in the procurement process for relocating MOC-P
will afford a full and fair opportunity to all who submit an offer for
a new location for the MOC-P?
Answer. Absolutely, yes.
Question 3a. I understand that the competitive process for deciding
the new location for the MOC-P will be decided on a ``best value''
basis. While that is a good basis on which to make a final decision, it
is somewhat subjective. Will you commit to having the definition of
``best value'' include a location's comprehensive total cost to the
government (not only for the real estate lease, but for cost of ship
operations and costs borne by the NOAA workforce subject to this
relocation)?
Answer. I am not familiar with the specific issues regarding what
constitutes the best value in determining the home port of a fleet, but
if confirmed I will study them and will work with you on this issue
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Daniel K. Inouye to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. Dr. Lubchenco, you are a world-renowned scientist and
have taken great strides toward integrating ecological systems and
human health, the economy, social justice and national security issues.
Given NOAA's responsibility to balance resource conservation with
fisheries regulations, and a mandate to also ensure economic viability
where possible, how will you seek to move forward with an integrated
approach to the implementation of Magnuson-Stevens? For example how
will you balance the multiple interests for an integrated approach to
management in areas such as turtle protection, marine mammals, and
depleted stocks? How will novel technology or non-traditional elements
(such as local knowledge as observation, aquaculture technology
advances, or on-the-ground partnerships with non-NOAA entities)
contribute to your overall integrated management plan?
Answer. Throughout my teaching, leadership of large organizations,
and participation in public service, I have emphasized the important
role of clear scientific input in decisionmaking. I have stressed my
belief that science should inform, not dictate, decision-making.
Decisions should be based on a range of factors including values,
economics, politics, and science. In other words, scientific
information alone should not drive decisions, but it should be
available in an understandable, relevant, salient, and credible fashion
so that it can be taken into consideration. Scientific information
should clearly articulate what is known and what is not known about a
particular topic, and with what degree of certainty. It should describe
what is known about how systems work, how they are changing and the
likely consequences of different policy choices. Policy decisions on
marine fisheries and endangered species are made by government leaders
who attempt to balance various concerns, but these decisions should be
informed by the best scientific information available, in consultation
with all interested parties.
Question 2. In recent years, NOAA has moved toward a regional
approach for providing products and services to the public. One key
element of a successful regional effort is the ability to provide
national leadership and direction, regional priority setting, and the
ability to address local issues of need. Will you plan to continue
NOAA's efforts in regionalization? If so, how will the regional concept
be integrated with other on-the-ground engagement efforts, including
communications, education, extension and training? Given that Hawaii is
unique in its geographic isolation and given that many local issues are
in fact regional issues in Hawaii, how might Hawaii move forward with
regionalization in a manner that serves as an example for the agency?
Answer. I believe that ecosystem-based management is far superior
to managing ocean resources on a sector-by-sector basis. This is
particularly true because each geographic region is unique. I would
like to see states and local governments working toward using this
approach. NOAA should lead by example--NOAA should look at its own
management decisions on a more ecosystem basis rather than by sector or
statute. I hope to implement greater regional governance within NOAA
across its programs. My predecessor, Admiral Lautenbacher, began the
difficult process of breaking down the ``silos'' within NOAA. If
confirmed, I would like to continue and increase those efforts. I would
welcome the opportunity to work with you on this effort.
Question 3. NOAA's portfolio covers a diverse spectrum of
responsibilities and assets, ranging from individual on-the-ground
researchers to large-scale satellite acquisition and operations.
Arguably, NOAA's satellite program expenditure is on a dramatically
different scale than most of NOAA's other programs. As you seek to
ensure that NOAA's satellite program remains on track, how will you
address the issue of scale? What is your plan going forward to ensure
that NOAA's satellite program will be able to deliver the data required
by researchers while still remaining cost-effective and efficient in
its use of resources?
Answer. The cost overruns and delays in the NOAA satellite program
are a huge problem that impacts the entire agency. We must ensure that
the cost overruns end so that other programs do not have to continue to
shrink in order to pay for the satellite program at NOAA. I will make
this a priority. Indeed I would like to convert a staff level political
appointee position at NOAA into an Assistant Secretary position to
oversee on a daily basis the weather and satellite programs. In
addition, the continuity of climate data is critical to our
understanding of the impacts of climate change in society, and will be
a priority under my leadership given the policy efforts this data will
support. NOAA must have an additional $74 million included in its FY09
budget to develop and reinstall key climate sensors back onto the
NPOESS program. The continuation of this funding will be crucial to
continuing this effort to ensure the future of the climate record. I
believe this funding may have been included in the stimulus legislation
recently passed by Congress. If not, I will work with the
Appropriations Committee to see that this funding is included in the
2009 final spending bill.
Question 4. My constituency and that of my colleagues in the House
are small island arcs in the Pacific. Fish and sustainable fishing are
an intimate part of the culture of my region and help define us as
Pacific Islanders.
Fishing methods have changed over the centuries but it is important
that Pacific Island fishing cultures be sustained and that the economic
development of the indigenous people includes greater participation in
sustainable fisheries.
The importance of fishing to the region as a whole is exemplified
by the attention devoted to fisheries in the Pacific Islands Regional
Organizations, The Pacific Community (22 independent Pacific Island
Nations and Territories) and the Pacific Forum (14 independent Pacific
Island Nations plus Australia and New Zealand).
The Pacific Community's largest program is fisheries and fisheries
development.
The Pacific Forum established its own fishery management
organization, the Forum Fisheries Agency to ensure that Pacific
Islanders obtain the maximum benefit from the fishery resources in
their EEZs.
Will you be supportive of mechanisms in the MSA such as the Alaska-
Western Pacific Community Development Programs, which are intended to
foster greater participation and benefits from fishing for native
peoples?
Answer. I am generally supportive of the rights of native peoples
to fish. I am not familiar with the specific programs you describe, but
I look forward to learning more about them if confirmed.
Question 5. As a legislator I am aware of the many statutes with
which fisheries managers must comply when developing fishery management
measures.
These include the Endangered Species Act, Marine Mammal Protection
Act, National Environmental Policy Act and Small Business Regulatory
Enforcement Fairness Act among many others, as well, of course, as the
Magnuson-Stevens Act.
U.S. fisheries are among some of the most stringently managed
fisheries globally, and a major benefit of this management has been a
steady decline in the number of stocks that are overfished and subject
to overfishing.
However, U.S. fishery management continues to be undermined by
misinformation campaigns which distort the excellent science conducted
by NOAA Fisheries. A recent publication, Ocean Conservation and the End
of Overfishing, mistakenly reports Hawaii's bottomfish as being subject
to overfishing, which is contrary to the 2008 NOAA stock assessment.
Second, this publication reports that decline of monk seals in Hawaii
is due to overfishing of their food species, which is contrary to the
information contained in the NOAA monk seal recovery plan and at odds
with the deliberations of the monk seal recovery team.
Can you please outline how you will defend NOAA's fisheries science
and the Regional Fishery Management Councils' management record from
being undermined by such campaigns?
Answer. I am not familiar with the situation surrounding Hawaii's
groundfish or the monk seal recovery plan proposed by NOAA. If
confirmed, I will look into this issue. In general, I support the goal
of ending overfishing but I also recognize this will be a difficult
task and will require the cooperation and commitment of the fishing
industry to rebuild these resources. The health of our marine fish
stocks is directly linked to the health of many coastal communities. I
will work with the councils and all stakeholders to ensure that
overfishing is ended by the statutory deadline of 2010, based on the
best science available, while carefully considering the economic
consequences of our actions.
Question 6. As I've already noted, U.S. fisheries are among some of
the most stringently managed fisheries globally. However, 80-90 percent
of all seafood consumed in the U.S. is imported from other countries.
Many of these countries have either little to no sustainable fishery
management, or fail to comply by their own or even international
fishery management regimes. In my own region, Spanish and Ecuadorian
purse seiners have regularly made incursions into the U.S. EEZ in the
Western Pacific to fish for tuna. Also, there are already signs that
other parts of the Pacific are gearing up to supply the Hawaii market
with bottomfish after the 2011 shutdown of the Northwestern Hawaiian
Islands bottomfish fishery. Please explain how you will work to level
the playing field for U.S. fishermen with respect to imports and import
substitution?
Answer. It is not fair to our fishermen to hold them to a higher
standard than we are willing to require of the rest of world's fish
products that are sold in the United States.
It is imperative that we work internationally to end the
overfishing crisis and soon. If confirmed, I will take hard look at the
problem of how to stop illegal fish from coming into the U.S. The U.S.
must be very tough at regional fisheries management organizations
(RFMOs) and in other international fora on the nations that continue to
break the rules and exploit loopholes in ocean governance systems.
Question 7. In 2007 NOAA was provided $65 million for education and
outreach. It is my understanding that very few if any dollars were
devoted to fisheries. Of all the NOAA line offices, fisheries is the
most complex because it affects not only marine ecosystems but also
seafood safety, people's jobs and management at domestic and
international levels. How do you plan to provide funding to NMFS and
Regional Fishery Management Councils for fishery education and outreach
to engage the public in supporting fishery management and understanding
the diverse and complex nature of the fishery management process?
Answer. NOAA cannot do its job without sufficient funding. NOAA
needs more funding and I will work with OMB and Congress to get it.
NOAA's FY 2009 budget request is $4.1 billion. NOAA's appropriation has
been flat at $3.9 billion since FY 2005, while its mandates and the
demand for its services have grown. With sufficient funding I believe
we can improve our fishery management process.
Question 8. Since the advent of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, in 1976,
the Regional Fishery Management Council appropriation has experienced
some increase for new mandates but not as rapidly as the National
Marine Fisheries Service budget. For example, in the decade between
1996 and 2006, the Council's budget increased by 50 percent from about
$10 million to $15 million, while over the same time period the NMFS
budget jumped from $300 million to $800 million, or a rise of nearly
200 percent. Even funding for the National Marine Sanctuary Program
(NMSP) has risen to a level more than double that of Regional Fishery
Management Councils. However, Council responsibilities deal directly
with issues such as jobs for fishermen and others in the seafood
industry, the importance of sustainable food security and the need to
minimize carbon footprints through fostering local fishing industries.
The 2006 reauthorization the Magnuson-Stevens Act included several new
mandates for the Regional Fishery Management Councils, including
establishing annual catch limits and accountability measures. The NOAA
Planning, Programming, Budgeting and Execution System (PBBES) supports
a base budget of about $30 million for the Regional Fishery Management
Councils. How will you ensure that the Regional Fishery Management
Councils are adequately funded to meet all their responsibilities under
the Magnuson-Stevens Act in 2009, 2010 and beyond?
Answer. I will need the support of key Members of Congress to
obtain additional funding for NOAA and look forward to working with you
and your staff on this important challenge. NOAA cannot do its job
without sufficient funding. NOAA needs more funding and I will work
with OMB and Congress to get it. NOAA's FY 2009 budget request is $4.1
billion. NOAA's appropriation has been flat at $3.9 billion since FY
2005, while its mandates and the demand for its services have grown.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. John F. Kerry to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. Last August, this Committee held a hearing on our
Nation's failure to invest in next-generation climate modeling
capability. As a result, we are falling behind in our ability to
predict climate impacts at the regional and local scale. At that
hearing, the witnesses discussed the need for an integrated,
interagency effort to address the range of research, software, data
storage and computing challenge associated with climate modeling. How
should that be structured? What is the appropriate role for NOAA?
Answer. I believe we need a National Climate Service to meet the
needs of our Nation to better understand climate impacts and deliver
information critical to adaptation, mitigation, and management
planning. Working with many other agencies, including the EPA, the
White House, Department of Interior, Department of Energy and
Department of Agriculture, NOAA should lead a National Climate Service
based on its existing mandates to provide climate information and
services and experience managing end to end climate operations. NOAA
can build upon its strong climate monitoring, research, and assessment
capabilities, and translate climate data and research into information
and services that address the needs of stakeholders at the local,
state, regional, and national level.
Question 2. The New England groundfishery is facing unprecedented
challenges, as it looks to implement a sector-based management plan in
2009. Do you believe that sector-based management will provide an
effective mechanism to support the rebuilding goals of the Magnuson-
Stevens Act while providing a lifeline for the region's fishermen?
Answer. I believe a sector-based approach is a useful idea to
pursue, particularly since the measures that have been used in the past
have not served our dual goals of supporting both fishermen and the
resources.
Question 2a. What role will you personally take in implementing
sector-based management and ensuring the survival of the New England
groundfishery?
Answer. I will be personally engaged in this issue, along with a
strong team I will recruit to NOAA.
Question 3. Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing poses a
tremendous challenge for the sustainability of our ocean and fisheries
resources. The absence of sanction measures within the Regional
Fisheries Management Organizations (RFMOs) appears to be a significant
challenge in enforcing any strong fisheries management measures within
those organizations. Do you agree that this is a problem? Will the U.S.
propose more stringent sanction measures within the RFMOs that it plays
an active role in?
Answer. Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing is a terrible
problem, as is the failure of IFMs to address it with real sanctions.
The U.S. must be very tough at the International Commission for the
Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) and in other international fora
on the nations that continue to harvest species such as blue fin tuna
at unsustainable levels. I believe that it is important to understand
the science and use it to guide decision-making. Unfortunately, ICCAT
has been ignoring the science and now the blue fin population is on the
verge of collapse. I will work to change this if I am confirmed.
Question 4. As you know, the International Whaling Commission (IWC)
is the body charged with the conservation of the world's whales. The
IWC is at a crossroads, and a new proposal regarding coastal whaling
appears to support partial resumption of commercial whaling. As NOAA
Administrator, will you seek to strengthen the existing commercial
whaling moratorium? Do you plan to serve as the head of the U.S.
delegation to the IWC?
Answer. Unfortunately, despite the International Whaling Commission
(IWC) moratorium on commercial whaling, there are thousands of whales
killed each year and their meat ends up being sold in markets in Japan,
Iceland and Norway. I will work to see that the scientific whaling
loophole, and others like it that allow commercial whaling to continue,
are closed. I have not made final decisions on the IWC after Dr.
William Hogarth's term expires later this year.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Kay Bailey Hutchison to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. Would you ever recommend using the Antiquities Act to
designate a marine protected area?
Answer. Antiquities Act decisions are made by the President. He
ultimately has the discretion to use this authority regardless of my
recommendation. However, I would advise the President that he consider
all the tools at his disposal, including the NMSA and MSA. I would also
strongly recommend that decision-making processes be open, transparent
and informed by science as I have discussed in earlier questions.
Further, I would advise where there are many constituencies and many
concerns--for instance in an area that is highly utilized by
recreational and commercial fishermen--the President should ensure that
there is substantial consultation with user groups and accommodations
of their concerns regardless of the authority used to make the
designation.
Question 2. Are you aware of any current proposals, either in the
Administration or from environmental groups, to use the Antiquities Act
to declare marine monuments in the Gulf of Mexico? If such a proposal
would come before the President, would you support or oppose such
action?
Answer. I an not aware of any proposals being considered by this
Administration to use the Antiquities Act to declare a marine monument.
If such a proposal were to arise, I would advise the President as
described above.
Question 3. What role do you feel an adjacent coastal State should
have in determining the location and potential restrictions of a marine
protected area?
Answer. As recognized in many statutes, states have a substantial
stake in decision-making regarding management of coastal and marine
resources. I believe that states and the Federal Government should be
vital partners who work together to restore and protect our coastal and
marine ecosystems and communities. If confirmed, I would look to
existing partnerships as possible models, for example those in
California, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. These partnerships provide
different approaches to improving ocean management, including
establishing protected areas, in state waters. Among other things. I
believe NOAA should provide them any requested technical assistance in
that process.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Olympia J. Snowe to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. To understand policies and priorities, one need look no
further than the budget. I was pleased to see an increase in the
previous administration's budget request for FY 2009 putting NOAA's
overall request above $4 billion for the first time. But such increases
have not been adequately represented across all of NOAA's functions. In
fact, absent an increase in funding for satellite programs, the 2009
request was a flatline, and the National Ocean Service (NOS) and
National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) actually experienced a
decrease of nearly $50 million each. It is in the process of allocating
scarce funding resources that we truly reveal what programs we want to
carry out and in what manner, and how we rank the importance of various
programs. That is why, Dr. Lubchenco, I want to understand how you are
preparing to provide leadership in NOAA's budget process.
What is your opinion of the adequacy of NOAA funding under the 8
years of the Bush Administration? While you have yet to put your mark
on the FY10 budget request, what is your plan for working with the
Office of Management and Budget to make sure that these other non-
satellite programs--fisheries, endangered species research, ocean
science, marine mammals, and so on--receive the appropriate level of
funding?
Answer. Both Republicans and Democrats in Congress have told me,
and I agree that NOAA needs more funding for FY10 and beyond if
confirmed, I will work with OMB and the Congress to get it. The
additional funding for NOAA in the stimulus package will help with
funding satellites that have been eating away at resources for other
programs within NOAA. As you noted, NOAA's appropriation has been flat
at $3.9 billion since FY 2005, while its mandates and the demand for
its services have grown. I will also work to ensure that going forward
NOAA's budget process is robust, forward-looking. and adequately
accounts for the Nation's needs for oceanic and atmospheric information
and services.
Question 2. As NOAA Administrator, you will be responsible for the
Bush-established Climate Change Science Program Office--the CCSP--that
has all but subsumed the U.S. Global Change Research Program--the
GCRP--that Congress established under law in 1990. In reality, the
research office has lacked any high level Agency attention for at least
the last 4 years. Understanding the science of climate change is
critical in developing a response to the massive problem as well as
disseminating the data and information to develop momentum for major
changes in energy and environmental policy as the U.S. Congress begins
to debate climate change legislation this year and the U.S. negotiates
an international climate change treaty.
How do you believe NOAA should be updating or restructuring its
policies for its Federal research program office for research and
distribution of climate change data so it can be utilized by other
Administration officials, Congress, and regional and local policymakers
and stakeholders?
Answer. I believe we need a National Climate Service to meet the
needs of our Nation to better understand climate impacts and deliver
information critical to adaptation, mitigation, and management
planning. Working with many other agencies, including the EPA,
Department of Interior, Department of Energy and Department of
Agriculture, NOAA should lead a National Climate Service based on its
existing statutory mandate to provide climate information and services.
NOAA can build upon its strong climate monitoring, research, and
assessment capabilities, and translate climate data and research into
information and services that address the needs of stakeholders at the
local, state, regional, and national level.
Question 3. Dr. Lubchenco, as you and I discussed in depth at the
hearing, we must find ways to improve the relationship between NMFS and
New England's fishermen. As long as this contentious relationship
continues, it will undermine any attempts to move forward with
credibility and cooperation. I truly appreciate your commitment to
improving the ``climate of trust'' in the region, and I hope to work
with you closely to achieve this.
Are you willing to commit to closely examining the culture and
attitudes pervasive in the Northeast Regional Office and its
leadership, and report back to me on the changes you make to improve
the way it interacts with fishermen?
Answer. To improve the relationship between the Agency and the
fishing industry and fishing dependent communities, it would be
beneficial for NMFS to increase its social science capabilities. This
would enable the Agency to understand the impacts of regulations prior
to their implementation and plan accordingly to mitigate the negative
effects. In addition, this would go a long way in building more
productive relationships between the Agency and communities. However,
in order to increase social science capabilities, NMFS will need to
hire many additional individuals with this type of expertise.
Question 3a. Can you commit to putting a greater emphasis on NMFS
socio-economic funding, research, and assessment, so that you have a
greater understanding of the attitudes and behaviors of fishing
community members that NMFS is trying to regulate?
In your response to a pre-hearing question from one of my
colleagues on the Committee, you answered that you believed being asked
to choose between protecting the environment and expanding the economy
was a ``false choice'' and that both could and should be accomplished
simultaneously. I happen to agree with that assessment, so I would ask
you:
Do you believe that ``false choice'' also applies to the manner in
which we manage our fisheries? Can we balance concerns for the long-
term health of the fish stocks with the short term health of our
fishing communities?
The Magnuson-Stevens Act mandates that NMFS minimize the
socioeconomic ramifications of its fishery management plans on our
communities while achieving optimum yield from the fishery. Do you feel
that balance is being achieved today?
Answer. Yes. I am fully committed to improving the relationship
between NOAA and fishermen all over the country, including in New
England. I will personally work to improve the trust between the agency
and fishermen, and look forward to regularly reporting back to you on
the changes we are making. In addition, I intend to hire a senior
advisor, who will report directly to me, whose entire responsibility
will be to conduct outreach to commercial and recreational fishermen
and fishing communities. I will also commit to putting greater emphasis
on understanding the perspectives of fishermen and fishing communities
and the socio-economic dimensions of the regulations imposed by the
agency. If confirmed, I look forward to working with you on this
effort. We must work together to help solve these difficult problems.
The viability of our fisheries depends upon healthy fish populations
and healthy oceans. We must find a way to achieve long term
sustainability for our fisheries in New England and elsewhere. Fishing
is an important way of life and an integral part of our coastal
heritage and culture.
Question 4. As a world-class scientist, Dr. Lubchenco, you have
been at the forefront of scientific advancement and you understand the
importance of data collection, data management, and data
interpretation--and the need to ensure objectivity and integrity
throughout the scientific process. But so often in fisheries
management, NMFS lacks the stock assessment funds and resources that
are necessary to gather enough data to support quality and timely
analyses. As a result, our Council members are forced to make
management recommendations based on incomplete data, different
conclusions from competing models, and--as a result--a significant
range of scientific uncertainty. And now the stakes are higher, because
the Magnuson-Stevens Reauthorization Act of 2006 mandates science-based
catch limits.
What is your philosophy about making policy and management
decisions in the face of scientific uncertainty?
Given the fact that there will always be some degree of scientific
uncertainty in fisheries management, would you direct NMFS to follow a
strict precautionary principle that sets stronger fishing limits until
there is proof that stocks can withstand more fishing? If so, how do
you know when you have enough evidence to serve as this proof, and who
would shoulder the burden of proof?
Are there alternatives to the precautionary principle that you
would support, such as adaptive management, that would allow managers
to strike a balance between harvesting and resource conservation?
Answer. My philosophy as a policymaker is to make the best
decisions possible in the face of scientific uncertainty. As a
principle, it is better to he precautionary, but policymakers must also
be practical. Ultimately, I will be guided by the law, and the Magnuson
Act Amendments mandate an end to overfishing by 2011. If confirmed, I
pledge to work with you and to never surprise you with a decision that
negatively impacts fishermen in your state.
Question 5. Not only does NMFS need to collect more data, but they
need to help make this information accessible and credible in the eyes
of fishermen. Dr. Lubchenco, you and I discussed how cooperative
research can help to bridge this gap between the industry and
scientists. But the fact is, various forms cooperative research has
been around for at least a decade, and it has been occurring at the
same time that trust between scientists and fishermen has evaporated.
This may have something to do with a 45 percent decrease in funding
from $18 million in 2007--already pitifully low given that national
landings value in our fisheries is over $4 billion annually--to just
over $10 million in 2008.
Since traditional cooperative research has had limited and mixed
success in improving the scientist-fisherman relationship, how would
you propose improving the way cooperative research is done in the
Northeast and throughout the Nation?
What steps would you take to evaluate the effectiveness of
cooperative research, and ensure that it is actually used in making and
improving management decisions?
Answer. In my own experience I have seen cooperative research
programs work very effectively on the West Coast. I have not studied in
depth the problems with them in the Northeast region, but if confirmed,
I pledge to do so. I will use my experience to evaluate what has worked
and what has not with these cooperative research programs, and report
back to you.
Question 6. As you become more familiar with the New England
groundfishery, I'm sure you'll learn about its history with management
based on allocating days-at-sea and the steps the Council is taking to
shift to sector-based management--a management method allowing
fishermen more control through self-selecting, cooperative
organizations. Completing this transition may not be possible, however,
if NMFS's proposed interim rules are allowed to proceed. By slashing
days-atsea by sixty percent in many cases leaving fishermen with just
20 days to go fishing, NMFS's rules would bankrupt the industry--
including infrastructure, shoreside support, and seafood industries--
and this change could be irreversible, especially in Maine where so
many fishermen have already left.
Dr. Lubchenco, I understand that NMFS's interim proposed rules are
a product of the Bush Administration, so you cannot speak to their
formation. But under your leadership, what direction would you give
NMFS for guiding its work in developing the final groundfishing rule?
Specifically, would you direct them to use direction, already in
the Magnuson-Stevens Act and regulatory guidelines, for appropriately
considering and weighing the social and economic impacts of these
rules?
Would you direct NMFS to use the flexibility it has under the MSA
which specifically allows temporary interim rules to allow limited
overfishing on a limited bases--in combination with accountability
measures--so other management objectives could be achieved in future
years?
Can you commit to giving more consideration to approving the
interim rules proposed--and overwhelmingly approved twice by the
Council--that would allow more fishing but still mandate accountability
measures for overfishing and meet other legal requirements?
Answer. I understand that the New England groundfish rules have
been an ongoing controversy, most recently in the courts and also in
the New England Fishery Management Council. If confirmed, I will review
the proposed interim final rule and ensure it fully complies with all
the provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, including the requirement
to weigh the social and economic impacts of these rules.
Question 7. The concept of ecosystem management has, as you know
better than any of us, been around for decades. I agree that fisheries
management should consider and incorporate diverse information inputs
and explore new models to understand and explain ecosystem function.
Beyond these basic ideas, however, the definition of ``ecosystem
management'' is still unresolved in the academic community. Several
groups, including your Pew Ocean Commission, have advocated for
ecosystem management of fisheries, and I'm curious to learn where you
stand on this as a pillar of fisheries policy.
What is your definition of ``ecosystem management'' today and how
would you apply this to marine fisheries?
Do you think that there is consensus across the academic, industry,
and environmental communities about what ecosystem management is and
how it is carried out?
Do you think that fisheries ecosystem management should be mandated
by law, or do you think NOAA has sufficient authority to move in this
direction now, as evolution of the field permits? If you do not think
NOAA has the authority to incorporate more ecosystem information in
management as it becomes available, exactly what is preventing this?
Answer. I believe strongly in the use of ecosystem-based
management, and there is growing consensus on its use. Ecosystem-based
management is far superior to managing ocean resources on a sector-by-
sector basis and I would like to see states and local governments work
toward using this approach. I believe NOAA should lead by example--NOAA
should look at its own management decisions on a more ecosystem basis
rather than by sector or statute. I hope to implement greater regional
governance within NOAA across its programs. My predecessor, Admiral
Lautenbacher, began the difficult process of breaking down the
``silos'' within NOAA. If confirmed, I would like to continue and
increase those efforts.
Question 8. The economic impacts of endangered species listing can
exacerbate an already fragile economy. Clearly, we must protect our
endangered species and live up to the intent of the landmark Endangered
Species Act, at the same time I think we can all agree that it is
incumbent on Federal agencies that they provide the resources to
implement the species recovery plans. In my home state of Maine,
however, we have failed to receive even a modest amount of funding to
restore our salmon fisheries, while massive amounts of resources are
dedicated on the West Coast. Clearly, there needs to be a comprehensive
plan to restore the salmon fisheries, and the State of Maine has worked
tirelessly to coordinate with the Federal agencies. At the same time,
bureaucracy has prevented the Federal Government from effectively and
efficiently working with the State of Maine to develop a recovery
strategy. One major cause of this failure on the part of the Federal
Government is that both the Interior Department and NOAA jointly
implement ESA issues involving Atlantic salmon, while on the Pacific
coast, NOAA is the clear lead authority. While I strongly believe that
the Interior Department should be a partner in recovery efforts, NOAA's
expertise in both ocean and river ecosystems, should be the lead
agency.
Do you believe that NOAA should be the lead agency in implementing
recovery of the Atlantic salmon? Do you believe that current Federal
resources dedicated to species recovery are sufficient to develop
sustainable populations?
Answer. I am not yet familiar with the specific issues regarding
recovery of Atlantic salmon in Maine, and the interagency
jurisdictional issues involved. But if confirmed I will study these
issues and will answer your questions regarding them. I will also work
with you to obtain additional funding for recovery efforts because in
my experience these are generally underfunded.
Question 9. International Conservation and Trade Sanctions:
Sections 609 and 610 of the High Seas Driftnet Fishing Moratorium
Protection Act--which were added as part of our last Magnuson
Reauthorization--provide your agency with an extraordinary new set of
powerful tools to combat IUU fishing and to improve protected species
conservation through bycatch reduction. In particular, as we have
learned through the painful failures of ICCAT to conserve bluefin
tuna--the use of trade sanctions to control the market for fish
harvested illegally appears to be the only effective tool left to
prevent the wholesale destruction of some international fisheries.
Similarly, the blatant disregard for bycatch conservation in foreign
fisheries such as the failure to use circle hooks and other proven
techniques in their pelagic longline fisheries completely undermine
very comprehensive U.S. efforts to protect bycatch species such as sea
turtles developed in close cooperation with our own swordfish and tuna
longline fisheries. Will you aggressively implement and enforce these
provisions? What are the consequences if you don't?
Answer. It is not fair to our fishermen to hold them to a higher
standard than we are willing to require of the rest of world's fish
products that are sold in the United States. At the same time the U.S.
has an important leadership role to play by setting the best possible
example for the rest of the world. It is imperative that we work
internationally to end the overfishing crisis and soon. If confirmed, I
will take hard look at the problem of how to stop illegal fish from
coming into the U.S. The U.S. must be very tough at regional fisheries
management organizations (RFMOs) and in other international fora on the
nations that continue to break the rules and exploit loopholes in ocean
governance systems. If confirmed, I will aggressively implement and
enforce the relevant provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act and the
High Seas Driftnet Fishing Moratorium Act.
Question 10. A similar provision lies in the Marine Mammal
Protection Act which requires other nations to achieve the same
standards of marine mammal bycatch protection as are required in U.S.
fisheries in order to enjoy the benefits of selling their fish on the
U.S. market. (MMPA section 101(a)(2) 16 U.S.C. 1371(a)(2)). Although
Congress clearly intended that the failure to achieve U.S. standards
would result in a trade sanction, it appears your agency and others
have never implemented this provision of law. The Center for Biological
Diversity filed a petition almost a year ago (March 4, 2008) asking the
Departments of Commerce, Treasury and Homeland Security to ban imports
of swordfish from countries that have failed to submit proof that they
have met the U.S. standards as required by law. Do you support
aggressive implementation of this authority?
I understand a proposed rule has been issued to seek comments on
this petition, but given the extraordinary delay in responding so far--
what do you envision is the time-frame for implementing this law? Are
there other fisheries than swordfish that should be addressed as well?
Answer. I am not yet, familiar with the specific issues regarding
trade sanctions in fisheries, and would look to my colleagues in the
Administration for their expertise in these issues. In general. I
support the use of all available tools to stop the unfair trade in
illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing for swordfish, tunas and
other pelagic species. If confirmed, I would move quickly to make
progress on these issues.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Johnny Isakson to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. Describe your expectation of how sound science should
inform marine and endangered species issues.
Answer. Throughout my teaching, leadership of large organizations,
and participation in public service, I have emphasized the important
role of clear scientific input in decisionmaking. I have stressed my
belief that science should inform, not dictate, decision-making.
Decisions should be based on a range of factors including values,
economics, politics, and science. In other words, scientific
information alone should not drive decisions, but it should be
available in an understandable, relevant, salient, and credible fashion
so that it can be taken into consideration. Scientific information
should clearly articulate what is known and what is not known about a
particular topic, and with what degree of certainty. It should describe
what is known about how systems work, how they are changing and the
likely consequences of different policy choices.
Policy decisions on marine fisheries and endangered species are
made by government leaders, and should be informed by the best
scientific information available, in consultation with all interested
parties.
Question 2. NOAA Marine Fisheries recently declared that flow
reductions in the drought-stricken Savannah River would be adverse to
the endangered Short Nose Sturgeon. Yet no science-based analysis was
conducted to justify this adverse finding, and neither I nor my staff
has been given any data by NOAA to support the decision. Given your
view on the use of science in policymaking and regulation (see above),
was the adverse finding appropriate?
Answer. I am not familiar with the NOAA decision regarding the
Short Nose Sturgeon. If confirmed, I will immediately look into this
issue and provide an answer.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. David Vitter to
Dr. Jane Lubchenco
Question 1. Recreational fishermen and conservationists were
pleased on September 26, 2008 when President Bush signed an amendment
to Executive Order #13474. It stated that ``recreational fishing shall
be managed as a sustainable activity in national wildlife refuges,
national parks, national monuments, national marine sanctuaries, marine
protected areas, or any other relevant conservation or management area
or activities made under any Federal authority, consistent with
applicable law.'' Do you plan to ask the new Administration to uphold
this EO or will you move to repeal it?
Answer. If confirmed, I do not intend to seek changes to this
Executive Order.
Question 2. In establishing any Marine Protected Area (MPA), the
Magnuson Act requires: (1) an open, public process that is based on the
best scientific information available; (2) criteria to assess the
conservation benefits of the closed area; (3) establishment of a
timetable for review of the closed area's performance that is
consistent with the purposes of the closed area, and (4) that it be
based on an assessment of the benefits and impacts of the closure. Do
you plan to follow the statutes?
Answer. Absolutely.
Question 3. President-Elect Obama stated in the October 2008
edition of Sport Fishing magazine that ``The decision to establish
marine reserves should be made as a result of a transparent, science-
based process and be the least intrusive possible to get the job
done.'' Given your advocacy in favor of No Fishing Zones, will you
support the President-Elect's position as outlined in his interview?
Answer. Yes.
Question 4. What is the largest number of people you have ever
actually been responsible for? What was that role and what kind/level
of staff were you leading?
Answer. I have led numerous large, complex projects and
organizations and served on Boards of Directors for major foundations,
governmental organizations and non-governmental organizations. These
projects, organizations and boards and my roles include:
American Association for the Advancement of Science
(President and Chair of Board of Directors)
International Council for Science (President and Chair of
Board of Directors)
National Academy of Sciences (Board of Directors)
Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans
(Founding Principal Investigator and Chair of Steering
Committee)
National Science Board (Board of Directors for the National
Science Foundation)
David and Lucile Packard Foundation (Board of Trustees)
Communication Partnership for Science and the Sea (Chair of
Principals)
Aldo Leopold Leadership Program (Founding Chair)
Monterey Bay Aquarium (Board of Trustees)
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (Board of Trustees)
Ecological Society of America (President, Chair of Board of
Directors)
Environmental Defense Fund (Director and Vice Chair of Board
of Directors)
Climate Central (Founding Director and Vice Chair of Board
of Directors).
The size of staff and budget of these organizations varies. The
larger ones that I have led include:
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Offices in North America, Europe, Asia
143,000 members
330 employees
Budget $66.4 million
As President and Chair of the Board of Directors, I
had direct responsibility for the senior staff, budget,
policy, and strategic direction of the organization.
International Council for Science
116 countries are the ``national members''
30 international disciplinary unions are ``union
members''
Offices in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America
Responsibility for 18 international organizations or
programs such as the International Polar Year, the
International Geo-Biosphere Program, the Scientific
Committee on Ocean Research, the Scientific Committee on
Atmospheric Research.
As President, I had direct responsibility for the
senior staff, budget, strategic direction, policy and
management of the organization.
In my more than thirty-year career as a scientist, simultaneously
managing multiple ongoing research projects, and other scientific,
academic, and policy endeavors, I have gained a wealth of experience in
running an enterprise. I understand firsthand how to manage budgets,
build a management team, maximize human resources, do strategic
planning and solve problems to deliver tangible results.
Question 5. I'd like to know if there are any efforts being made on
finding ways to accurately predict fog and confirm its density/
duration/extent, particularly on shipping channels leading to major
ports. Is there any infrared or other commercial vision technology
available that can see through fog accurately and enable ships,
aircraft and vehicles to move safely? This is one area where marine
technology is lagging and causing long, unexpected delays for marine
and other transportation services, especially in winter months.
Answer. I do not know if NOAA is conducting research on fog
prediction. If confirmed, I will look into your question immediately
and provide you with an answer. Ensuring maritime safety is a very
important part of NOAA's mission--it is a responsibility I take very
seriously.
Question 6. What is your opinion of Congressman Oberstar's `Clean
Water Restoration Act' and making every stream, pond or puddle subject
to Federal regulation under the Clean Water Act?
Answer. I have not studied Congressman Oberstar's proposal. If
confirmed, I will. But since NOAA does not have authority to act under
the Clean Water Act, I will defer to my colleagues in other agencies
for their interpretation of this legislation.
Question 7. If you have a choice between protecting the environment
and in turn shrinking the economy or expanding the economy and
improving the environment as technologies advance, which would you
choose as the appropriate policy decision?
Answer. I do not believe that protecting the environment shrinks
the economy--in my view this is a false choice. Our environment is
better managed than it was in the early 1970s when the country first
started passing modern environmental protection laws. Yet this
environmental protection has not caused economic collapse. In fact, our
economy has increased in size nearly 10 times over that period. In my
years of research and study, I have found that the failure to protect
the environment and our precious natural resources is far more
expensive to society and the economy in the long run, than the
immediate costs associated with environmental protection. Any short-run
costs to protect the environment generally result in human health
benefits as well as a sustainable economy that will provide jobs and
profits not just today but for our children and their children. The key
for the government is to create incentives to ensure that technology
improvements keep pace with overall economic growth, and to invest in
cutting edge science and technology.
Question 8. The state of California has proven what a disaster cap-
and-trade can be for an economy. California moved forward, despite an
economic downturn, on a cap-and-trade program that was justified by
issuing what almost all experts agree was a rigged study on the
economic impact of the cap-and-trade system. When the California Air
Resources Board (CARB) asked five independent economists to do an
analysis of the regulations and the study, Harvard's Robert Stavins,
chairman of the Federal Environmental Protection Agency's economic
advisory committee under Bill Clinton, stated that ``None of us knew
who the other reviewers were, but we all came up with almost the same
conclusion. The report was severely flawed and systematically
underestimated costs.'' These ``underestimations'' have been a disaster
for the state of California forcing the state to shed more jobs than
any other since 2007. The fact is that climate change legislation will
be expensive and energy intensive industries will move overseas. What
can we do to prevent what has happened in California from happening to
the rest of the country? In addition, what can we learn from the
California debacle?
Answer. I have not studied the California situation you describe.
It is my understanding that California's cap-and-trade policies will
not go into effect until 2012. However, because NOAA does not have
authority for regulating greenhouse gas emissions or for setting energy
policy, this is not an issue for which I would have responsibility.
NOAA's role is to ensure that policymakers have the best possible
scientific understanding of the extent and impacts of climate change so
that regulation and policies can reflect this information. If l am
confirmed, I would work hard to discharge this responsibility
efficiently and effectively. Some of the impacts of climate change that
are relevant to these discussions include sea level rise, changes in
air and water temperature, changing patterns of drought and intense
precipitation, and increasing acidity of oceans. NOAA should play the
role of honest broker in climate discussions by providing credible
scientific data and analysis to assist policymakers in Congress, state
and local governments, and the private sector in developing appropriate
policies.
Question 9. How does an increase in the cost of energy affect low-
income families?
Answer. NOAA's mission does not include energy policy matters. If
confirmed I would look to Congress and my colleagues in the relevant
agencies for this information. NOAA does have a key role to play here
in helping Americans across the socio-economic spectrum make cost-
saving decisions about a wide variety of matters from weatherization to
storm preparation by providing high quality weather and climate
forecasting services
Question 10. What kind of ``flexible mechanisms'' for industry and
energy producers would you like to see available in future climate
change legislation? In addition, serious concerns have been raised in
regards to the loss of manufacturing jobs here in the United States to
our international competitors over the last decade, in large part due
to the cost of doing business (regulatory and energy) here in the
United States. How do you think climate regulation, such as ``cap and
trade'' or a carbon tax, help make manufacturers more competitive so we
can retain industry and jobs?
Answer. There is no doubt that our planet is warming, and the
impacts of that warming are profound and must be dealt with. If I am
confirmed as NOAA Administrator, my primary concern will be to ensure
that businesses as well as Federal, state and local governments have
the information they need to deal with the impacts of climate change. I
also hope that NOAA can play the role of honest broker in the climate
debate by providing uninhibited scientific data and analysis that can
assist policymakers and Congress in developing regulatory mechanisms
for dealing with greenhouse gas emissions.
Question 11. It has been noted by a number of industry
representatives that some of the climate change proposals over recent
years would result in the most expensive regulatory scheme in U.S.
history. In light of the incoming Administration's efforts to pass a
`stimulus' package that may well exceed $1 trillion, would the cost to
industry of complying with climate change regulation be
counterproductive?
Answer. I understand that regulations impose costs on the
businesses that must comply with them. However, it has been pointed out
that the costs of NOT dealing with climate change are immense and
potentially devastating to our economy and society. l note that there
are also strong arguments that controlling greenhouse gas emissions
will spawn a new wave of technologies and business opportunities that
will both expand our economy and improve our competitiveness. Market
based mechanisms to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will create
incentives for the development of new technologies that are more energy
efficient and less harmful to the environment, and eventually will
result in more jobs and revenue for the economy than our current
dependence on fossil fuels. Regardless of these considerations, NOAA is
not directly responsible for setting these policies. Its role is to
assisting policymakers by providing information about ongoing changes
in the climate and likely impacts of future climate changes.
Question 12. Do you support the use of the National Marine
Sanctuaries Act, including all the critical public and transparent
processes under the Act, to establish future marine protected areas or
other marine restricted areas?
Answer. Yes.
Question 13. Aerial photography is a commercial activity. It is
recognized as such in OMB Circular A-76 and by virtue that other
agencies (USGS, FEMA, TVA, USDA, Corps of Engineers) contract such work
to the private sector in Louisiana and other states. Yet NOAA is still
in the business of owning and operating their own aerial photo planes,
and recently buying new ones, and owning cameras, including new digital
aerial cameras, and collecting their own aerial photography when this
capability already exists in a superior capacity in more than 100
private firms. Do you believe it is appropriate for NOAA to be
competing with and duplicating the private sector in Louisiana and
other states, and operating a commercial activity within the Commerce
Department?
Answer. I am not yet familiar with the specific issues regarding
NOAA's aerial photo planes and equipment or OMB Circular A-76. If
confirmed, I assure you that I will study this issue carefully and
ensure that NOAA resources are used wisely and efficiently.
Question 14. Since 1998 U.S. Department of Commerce Inspector
General Reports and GAO reports recommended that NOAA's aircraft fleet
and hydrographic ships be privatized, not expanded. In 2000, a NOAA-
financed report was conducted by an organization called ``Mitretek''
found that NOAA's aircraft used for aerial photography, is twice as
expensive to operate as the equipment used by the private sector in
Louisiana and other states. Will you look at NOAA eliminating these
activities, and help our private sector, and our small business in
Louisiana and other states, by potentially privatizing these
activities, particularly when the GAO, Commerce IG and NOAA's own study
show the taxpayer can be better served by contracting these services to
the more efficient private sector?
Answer. I understand the need to save costs and minimize
duplication with the private sector. If confirmed. I assure you that 1
will study this issue carefully and ensure that NOAA resources are used
wisely and efficiently.
Question 15. For over a decade, Congress has been encouraging and
indeed mandating that NOAA transition from in house performance to
contractor performance of its surveying and mapping related
requirements, including charting and hydrographic surveying. This has
been a bipartisan push as not only Congress, but it was also a Clinton
Administration's National Performance Review (also known as Reinventing
Government) championed by then-Vice President Gore. What steps will you
take to follow this bipartisan initiative?
Answer. If confirmed, I pledge to review the studies you
mentioned--the GAO Report, Commerce IG report, and other relevant
information--and review the merits and cost effectiveness of targeted
contractor performance.
Question 16. Over the past decade, there has been a tendency to
seek advice from the National Academy of Sciences to help resolve
uncertainties and internal disputes. This tendency reflects the hard
reality that science is not always easy and that people can differ and
still be responsible and well-meaning. Do you support the continued
role of the NAS to address science issues? Given the delay this often
causes, do you have an idea of an alternative dispute resolution forum
that could assist?
Answer. I value the important role that the National Academy of
Sciences plays in providing external assessments of the state of
scientific knowledge about key issues or reviews of important existing
or proposed programs. I also respect the scientific expertise within
NOAA. Each has its place. As a scientist, if I am confirmed. I intend
to pay close attention to ensuring that NOAA bases its decisions on the
best possible scientific information regardless of the source.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. John D. Rockefeller IV
to Dr. John Holdren
Question 1. What do you foresee as your greatest challenge as
Director of OSTP (Office of Science and Technology Policy)?
Answer. In a way, the biggest challenging facing OSTP is and always
has been how to meet its very diverse and substantial responsibilities
with the small staff and budget at its disposal. This challenge
translates into the need to recruit extremely talented, organized, and
dedicated staff members--starting with the Associate Directors but
extending right down through the secretaries--who will be both
ingenious and hard-working in order to get it all done.
Another (and related) challenge is to develop the needed working
relationships--with the President and Vice President, with the OMB and
NSC and NEC, with the other S&T-rich Executive Branch departments and
agencies, and with the Congress--without which there is no hope of OSTP
doing the job that is needed from it. Meeting this challenge is a
matter of investing the effort to create and nurture those
relationships (an effort that must start with but cannot be limited to
the OSTP Director), which means a lot of listening, not just talking.
These challenges of process are large, but not larger than the
challenges of substance faced by OSTP in formulating advice--augmenting
that of the other relevant departments, agencies and offices and
recognizing the prerogatives of the Congress about S&T and the economy,
S&T and national and homeland security, S&T for national and global
public health, the role of S&T in addressing the energy/climate-change/
oil-dependence challenge, and more. The challenge facing OSTP and all
other organs of government that deal with science and technology is to
help figure out how government, business, academia, and foundations and
other NGO's can more effectively collaborate in developing and applying
science and technology in ways that address all these dimensions of the
well-being of our citizens.
Question 2. Dr Holdren, it has been said that climate change is an
issue that we need to innovate our way out of, not regulate our way out
of. As the Director of OSTP, what role do you see yourself playing in
technology innovation to address climate change?
Answer. Science, technology, and innovation are all going to be
crucial in mastering the climate-change challenge. We need to work
harder on the science of climate change in order to better understand
the ways in which the climate is changing and is likely to change going
forward and to better understand all of the leverage points and
possibilities for mitigation and adaptation. We need to make more
extensive use of technologies already in hand for more efficient energy
conversion and end-use, lower-carbon electricity generation and liquid-
fuel production, and soil and forest management to minimize greenhouse-
gas emissions. And we need innovation--research, development,
demonstration, and accelerated deployment--of improved and new options
for doing all of these things more efficiently, less expensively, and
with smaller unwanted side effects.
With respect to the science dimension, it is in the nature of the
problem that much of the relevant work will need to be funded and
coordinated by the Federal Government, and this means that OSTP should
play a role. While most of the funding in this domain will come through
the budgets of NOAA, NASA, NSF, DOE, Department of Interior, Department
of Agriculture, EPA, and more, OSTP has a responsibility to work with
OMB and the Congress to see that the needed budgets materialize and
that the tasks are appropriately allocated and coordinated across
agencies. This obligation will entail, among other things, working to
ensure that the provisions of the Global Change Research Act (GCRA),
including modifications to it likely to be enacted in the new Congress,
are properly carried out, and that the Climate Change Science Program
(CCSP) that operates under that act fulfills its responsibilities and
reaches its full potential. OSTP also has a responsibility to ensure
that the findings of these scientific efforts are made known to the
decisionmakers in both the Executive Branch and the Congress who need
this information in order to craft appropriate policies for meeting the
climate challenge.
With respect to the technology and innovation dimensions, the role
of the private sector will be larger and that of the government small
in comparison to that, but nonetheless critical in relation to
augmenting the incentives for firms and individuals to choose climate-
friendly technologies and for firms to invest in the R&D needed to
develop better ones, as well as in contributing funding for early-stage
and high-risk R&D where the private sector on its own would do less
than society needs. The government's role in the technology and
innovation aspects of the response to the climate challenge must also
include fostering public-private partnerships in innovation where the
comparative advantages of both sectors are brought to bear, as well as
helping with the financing of costly demonstration projects (such as
for CO2 capture and sequestration) where the scale and risk
of the needed efforts would inhibit solely private approaches. While,
again, many Executive Branch departments and agencies as well as the
Congress must be and are involved in shaping and implementing these
functions, a number of which are carried out under the auspices of the
Climate Change Technology Program (CCTP) created under the GCRA, the
OSTP has an important facilitating and coordinating role.
Two further roles of OSTP in relation to the climate-change
challenge should be mentioned, and both have to do with the ``P'' in
OSTP. The existing technologies germane to addressing the challenge
will not be deployed, nor will improved and new ones be developed and
deployed, with the pace and in the magnitude that the challenge
requires unless and until there are national policies in place that
either require increased use of such technologies or reward their use
by penalizing emissions of greenhouse gases. In this respect, meeting
the challenge is not a matter of innovation or regulation but rather of
innovation and regulation. And OSTP has a role in helping to ensure
that the people crafting the policies have the information they need--
about the science of climate change and its impacts and about the
technologies available to respond to it--in order to make those
policies both adequately responsive and technically and economically
realistic.
The other relevant role of OSTP in the policy domain relates to
policy for the strengthening of science, technology, engineering, and
mathematics (STEM) education our country will need if we are to have
the workforce required, going forward, to expand and sustain research
and innovation addressing the climate challenge, and if we are to have
the degree of public understanding of that challenge, and the role of
science and technology in addressing it, required to gain and sustain
the public's support for the needed efforts.
Question 2a. Can you outline a strategy to make coal compatible
with a safe climate?
Answer. The key here is to finish developing and demonstrating, and
then to widely deploy, technologies that can capture and sequester away
from the atmosphere the carbon dioxide (CO2) that burning
coal ordinarily releases to the atmosphere. I'm on record in the
reports of the independent, bipartisan, foundation-funded National
Commission on Energy Policy (in which I have served as Co-Chair), and
elsewhere, as favoring increased public and private investment in--and
public-private partnerships for--research, development, and
demonstration of such technologies. President Obama is also on record
favoring this approach, and funding for pursuing it will be part of the
$150 billion he has committed to spend over a ten-year period on clean
energy technologies.
Demonstration and pilot-scale facilities have established or are in
the process of establishing the feasibility of all of the major
components needed for CO2 capture and sequestration (CCS) by
a number of different routes, and CCS is being practiced on a near-
commercial scale using CO2 sources other than coal-burning
in several locations around the world. It is time to put all of the
ingredients together in some integrated demonstrations of CCS in large
coal-burning power plants, using coals of different types, technologies
that would be suitable for retrofit of existing plants as well as
others that would only attractive in plants built from scratch, and
different geologic formations for the sequestration stage.
Such projects will help to determine which approaches to capture
are going to be most versatile and economical and to better
characterize the sequestration performance of a variety of candidate
geologic environments. In parallel, work will be needed to determine
how best to address legal and regulatory issues that would arise with
large-scale use of these technologies.
CCS will not be inexpensive. Given the cost, CCS technologies for
coal-fired power plants will not be deployed on a large scale unless
this is required by regulations or motivated with incentives in the
form of significant financial rewards for reducing CO2
emissions (achievable, for example, with tradable emissions permits or
a carbon tax). In other words, getting CCS implemented will require
significant policy initiatives aimed at that result.
Question 2b. Dr Holdren, you have said that a market signal is
necessary for the development and deployment of carbon capture and
storage technologies with ongoing coal use. What role can OSTP (Office
of Science and Technology Policy) play as Congress and the Federal
agencies determine what that market may look like?
Answer. The national climate policy that the country will need in
order to get on a path of reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions
corresponding to the President's announced goals in this domain will
emerge from collaboration and interaction between the Executive Branch
and the Congress. Within the executive branch, many different
departments and agencies will be involved, and in recognition of the
size of the associated coordination challenge a new position of Energy-
Climate Policy Coordinator has been created in the Executive Office of
the President and filled by former EPA Administrator Carol Browner. The
role of OSTP in this process will be to ensure that all of the relevant
science and technology information needed as input to the crafting of
sensible climate-policy proposals is available to the President and
Vice President, to Ms. Browner, to the inter-agency process they will
lead, and to see that this science and technology information is shared
as well with the Congress.
Question 3. Dr. Holdren, coordinating climate science research
across the Federal Government is challenging given the number of
Federal agencies involved and different agency priorities. As the
Director of OSTP (Office of Science and Technology Policy), how do you
propose prioritizing climate science research efforts and strengthening
U.S. research efforts on climate change?
Answer. If confirmed, I will see that OSTP works with NOAA, NASA,
NSF, DOE, EPA and the other relevant executive-branch departments and
offices, as well as with the Congress, to ensure . . .
1. that the Nation has a strong, integrated climate-science
program to observe, understand, predict, and respond to climate
change;
2. that OSTP and OMB lead an interagency process of budget
coordination, identification of areas in need of augmentation,
and justification of the budgets proposed to Congress;
3. that currently missing and much needed capacity is added in
adaptation research as well as in assessment, outreach,
communication, and climate services;
4. that the requisite 10-year plan, annual report, and National
Assessments are produced regularly and provide Congress with
useful, policy-relevant information; and
5. that the USA is a strong partner in international
assessments and global monitoring.
I would expect to give early priority, in these efforts, to: (a)
bolstering our capacity to monitor climate change and its impacts,
including not only expanding our monitoring networks on land and on the
oceans but also strengthening our faltering system of Earth-observation
satellites; (b) substantially boosting efforts in adaptation research;
and (c) producing the sorts of integrated assessment of the pace,
patterns, and regional impacts of climate change that will be needed by
the Obama Administration and the Congress as input to their
deliberations on the goals and measures to be embraced for both
mitigation and adaptation.
Question 4. Do you believe that the current level of Federal
funding for research and development is adequate? Are there any areas
you feel need immediate attention?
Answer. I believe we are substantially under-investing in research
and development. Both President Obama and Congress have recognized this
funding shortfall and have committed to doubling Federal R&D
investments in coming years. As one recent report concluded, ``Unless
substantial investments are made to the engine of innovation--basic
scientific research and development--the current generation may be the
first in our country's history to leave their children and
grandchildren a lower sustained standard of living.'' \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Norman Augustine, former CEO of Lockheed Martin, in a follow-up
to ``The Gathering Storm'' report entitled, ``Is America Falling Off
the Flat Earth?''
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Federal support for the physical sciences and engineering has been
declining as a fraction of GDP for decades, and, after a period of
growth of the life sciences, the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
budget has been steadily losing buying power for the past 5 years. As a
result, our science agencies are often able to support no more than one
in five of the proposals that they receive, arresting the careers of
our young scientists and blocking our ability to pursue many remarkable
recent advances.
There is now a growing recognition that new investments in
federally sponsored research can be a direct investment in America's
future economic prosperity. It is now well understood that since World
War II, more than half of overall economic growth is attributable to
innovation.
One key area where we are under funding research is in the area of
stem-cell research. Human embryonic stem cells have great potential for
treating a wide variety of diseases and health conditions and for
providing new insights into human development and disease. The Obama
Administration will reverse the Bush Administration's ban on Federal
funding for embryonic stem cell research on cell lines created after
August 9, 2001 by Executive Order and will allow all scientists to
participate in this important new field, in accord with the rigorous
ethical guidelines proposed by the National Research Council.
Question 4a. Do you believe that the current balance of Federal
funding for research and development across science and engineering
disciplines is appropriate? If not, how do you believe the portfolio of
funding should be rebalanced?
Answer. One of the important roles of OSTP and its director is
helping to achieve balance in our Federal R&D portfolio. I am not yet
familiar enough with all of the portfolio's pieces to offer any
specific thoughts at this time on what rebalancing might be needed. If
confirmed, I will certainly work closely with the relevant cabinet
departments and agencies, the OMB, and the Congress to arrive at a
coordinated and balanced R&D funding portfolio for contemporary
conditions and challenges.
Question 4b. Do you believe that interdisciplinary research is
sufficiently supported? If not, what actions would you take to increase
the funding to support such research?
Answer. Many of the most exciting opportunities in research lie at
the boundaries between disciplines. Multidisciplinary research is
important for achieving many critical national goals, moreover, because
the challenges we face--whether in innovation for economic growth, or
developing a climate-friendly energy system, or making our society more
secure against terrorists--can only be successfully addressed by
combining tools, techniques, and insights from researchers in different
fields.
Funding interdisciplinary work can be challenging, in part because
of the added complexity of peer review in interdisciplinary domains and
in part because such work can be seen as competing with established
fields of research in a ``zero-sum game.'' This problem can be greatly
reduced if total Federal investments in research are expanding in the
manner that President Obama and the Congress have envisioned, so that
interdisciplinary efforts can be expanded without reducing support for
more traditional areas of research.
Question 5. Dr. Holdren, do you see a role for the Office of
Science and Technology Policy to help the Federal Government improve
acquisition, management and oversight of civilian satellite programs?
Answer. OSTP can play an important role in coordinating interagency
satellite policy. I believe we must increase government oversight and
improve the interagency partnerships central to the management of
civilian satellite programs, which among other things are critical to
the Nation's climate and weather forecasting.
We need to proactively manage our programs to avert future cost and
schedule overruns. Agencies must work together to manage the
contractors building these satellites and demand cost and schedule
accountability.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Barbara Boxer to
Dr. John Holdren
Question 1. There are many areas where the jurisdictions of
scientific agencies overlap, particularly with respect to environmental
issues such as climate change. Federal agencies have been criticized in
the past for a lack of coordination on these areas of overlap, leading
to duplicative efforts or incomplete information. As the Director of
the Office of Science and Technology Policy, part of your
responsibilities will entail leading interagency efforts to develop
sound science policies and budgets. How will you promote coordination
among agencies on long-term climate change data collection and
analysis, as well as research on the environmental and health impacts
of nanotechnology?
Answer. We face enormous challenges in energy and climate and need
to act both quickly and carefully. An effective strategy will affect
many parts of our economy, and many different Executive Branch
agencies, as well as the Congress, will have roles in developing and
implementing it. Fortunately the President has assembled a team of
leaders in the energy and climate domain who are not only experienced
but who have nearly all worked with each other previously; this will
make coordination easier. As Director of OSTP (if confirmed), I'd also
plan to harness the interagency National Science and Technology Council
(NSTC), which has traditionally been coordinated by OSTP, to the task
of helping ensure effective, coherent preparation of plans, budgeting,
and execution of multi-agency efforts. (On this issue, please see also
my answers to Senator Rockefeller's questions 3 and 4, above.)
Nanotechnology has the potential to lead to major economic and
other societal benefits, such as low-cost solar cells, smart anti-
cancer therapeutics, sensors for environmental monitoring, and
breakthroughs in our ability to store and process information. It is
clear, however, that we need to increase our understanding of the
environment, health and safety (EHS) risks associated with
nanotechnology. I am committed to using the NSTC to identify gaps in
our current nano-EHS research portfolio and to increase the exchange of
information among science agencies, regulatory agencies, and external
stakeholders. Our strategy will build on the existing work of the
Nanotechnology Environmental and Health Implications (NEHI) Working
Group, and will incorporate information from a recent National Research
Council review along with inputs from stakeholders in industry,
academia, and non-governmental organizations.
Question 2. As you know, the economic stimulus bill includes
funding for basic scientific research and development across several
agencies and missions. How do you plan to help coordinate these
investments and ensure that this money is allocated effectively,
efficiently and responsibly across the many agencies with science and
technology related missions?
Answer. The stimulus investments in basic R&D in various agencies
are not only crucial for creating new jobs and opportunities for today,
they are essential for creating the new industries and long-term
opportunities that we will need for tomorrow. If confirmed, I will work
closely with these agencies to ensure that these investments produce
results. In addition, I intend to work closely with the Nation's Chief
Technology Officer and a new Open Government Initiative to transform
government through transparency, participation, and collaboration. At
the heart of this effort is a new website called recovery.gov which is
an unprecedented effort focused on ensuring that stimulus dollars are
used effectively, efficiently, and responsibly.
Question 3. I appreciate the commitment you expressed in your
statement to elevating the role of science in formulating policy
decisions and revitalizing our economy. I would just like you to
elaborate more on one aspect of science that you only touched on
briefly--ocean science. How will you work to ensure that adequate
funding and technical resources are devoted to achieving the Ocean
Research Priorities Plan and Implementation Strategy, including
reevaluating and revising the strategy as necessary?
Answer. Oceans are crucial to our well-being because they play a
central role in global weather and climate, are a major source of
protein for much of the world's population, provide employment in
fisheries and recreation, serve as home to much of the planet's
biodiversity, and more. If confirmed, I will work with NOAA and other
relevant agencies, as well as with the Congress, to complete and
implement the strong, integrated, well-managed program of ocean
research and stewardship that is essential to sustain a healthy and
productive marine environment and the communities that depend upon it.
The Ocean Research Priorities Plan and Implementation Strategy
developed by the NSTC's Joint Subcommittee on Ocean Science and
Technology in the last administration appears to provide a useful
framework for analyzing needs and moving ahead with meeting them, but I
would want to study it more closely and seek input from the relevant
Executive Branch agencies and committees of Congress before reaching
any conclusions about what revisions in it might be warranted.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Maria Cantwell to
Dr. John Holdren
Question 1. Costs for the National Polar-orbiting Operational
Environmental Satellite System have spiraled out of control from $6.5
billion to at least $92.5 billion. Isn't one of the challenges facing
this program the fact that it's a tri-agency acquisition involving
NOAA, NASA and DOD?
Answer. Yes. The management of the NPOESS program and ensuring
continuity of weather and climate data need to be important priorities
for the administration's leadership team. The tri-agency leadership in
NOAA, NASA, and DOD needs to be better coordinated and more clearly
focused on oversight of and accountability from the program
contractors, and if confirmed as Director of OSTP I would expect to
help with that.
Question 1a. I'm going to be holding Dr. Lubchenco's feet to the
fire on this, but wouldn't you agree that because this troubled program
involves three agencies, she can't do this alone?
Answer. I have known and worked with Dr. Lubchenco for more than 20
years, and I have immense confidence in her abilities. But certainly in
the multi-agency activity in question there is a role for both OMB and
OSTP in helping with management and coordination.
Question 1b. Wouldn't you agree that she is going to need help from
higher-up in the Administration to make this work?
Answer. I am confident that whatever help she needs will be
provided.
Question 1c. Can you promise me that you and others in the White
House will help apply the pressure needed to fix this program and make
this tri-agency acquisition work?
Answer. Yes.
Question 2. If nominated, will you work with me and Committee to
pass climate change adaptation legislation that will help ensure our
government takes climate change into account when investing taxpayer
dollars in various infrastructure projects and in managing our Nation's
public lands?
Answer. Absolutely.
Question 3. I recall you were a member of the Presidential
Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) Energy Research
and Development Panel that issued the November 1997 report entitled
`Federal Energy Research and Development for the Challenges of the
Twenty-First Century'. Among other things, that report proposed funding
levels for a variety of clean energy technologies that to its credit
has sewed as the basis for these types of investments for over the past
decade. Looking back at the report, where do you believe that the PCAST
panel hit the mark, where do you believe that its aim was a little off,
and looking forward, do you see a need for a major recalibration of
priorities within our Nation's clean energy portfolio?
Answer. I appreciate these kind comments about the 1997 PCAST
report on Federal energy R&D that I chaired. In the intervening decade
and more it has become clear that the climate-change driver of energy
R&D requirements--which is far from the only driver but was recognized
by our Committee already in 1997 as the most demanding one--is even
more demanding than we thought in terms of the kinds and degree of
energy-technology improvements that will be required if the climate-
change challenge is to be adequately and affordably addressed.
And, although we recognized at the time that the Federal Government
needs to play a role, in concert with the private sector, in
commercial-scale demonstration as well as in R&D of some of the needed
advanced technologies, it is now clearer how large and costly that role
needs to be. That is why the Obama campaign talked about $15 billion
per year for clean energy research, development, and demonstration
(RD&D) for the next 10 years. One place we certainly missed the mark in
1997 was in seriously understating what should be spent on research and
development of CO2 capture and sequestration.
Several substantial efforts at designing a suitable portfolio of
clean-energy RD&D going forward have been underway over the past couple
of years in the National Research Council, in a set of university and
NGO efforts funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, and
elsewhere, and some of these are expected to release their findings
over the next few months. I know that Secretary Chu and his staff at
DOE will be reviewing the existing portfolio there, and the plans for
the next few years, in light of all these findings as well as their own
internal analyses. The Obama Administration's energy-climate
principals' group being convened by Carol Browner will be looking at
this question in the context of all of the relevant Executive Branch
agencies. As I am part of that process and will continue to be if
confirmed by the Senate as Director of OSTP, I don't want to pre-empt
it here with too many of my personal views. I can certainly assure you
that this question of the clean-energy RD&D portfolio is one I and
others in the Administration are giving the closest scrutiny and will,
obviously, be in close touch with the Congress about.
Question 4. Should we as a Nation be concerned with the increasing
globalization of R&D and innovation? What are some of the things you
plan to do as the President's science advisor to ensure continued U.S.
competitiveness in the global marketplace of R&D and innovation?
Answer. Ensuring that the U.S. continues to lead the world in
science and technology will be a central priority for me if I am
confirmed as Director of OSTP. Our talent for innovation is still the
envy of the world, but we face unprecedented challenges that demand new
approaches. I am especially concerned that we have been reducing
support for science at a time when many other nations are increasing
it, a situation that already threatens our leadership in many critical
areas of science. This competitive situation may only worsen over time
because the number of U.S. students pursuing technical careers is
declining. The U.S. ranks 17th among developed nations in the
proportion of college students receiving degrees in science or
engineering; we were in third place thirty years ago.
That is why I believe we must increase funding for basic research
in physical and life sciences, mathematics, and engineering at a rate
that would double basic research budgets over the next decade. We need
to increase research grants for early-career researchers to keep young
scientists entering these fields. We need to increase support for high-
risk, high-payoff research portfolios at our science agencies. And we
need to invest in the breakthrough research we need to meet our energy
challenges and to transform our defense programs.
Question 5. What do we need to do as a Nation to convince more
women and underrepresented minorities to pursue career paths in
Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematical fields? And if they
do choose to pursue careers in STEM fields, what, if any, policies can
be put in place to make it easier for them to remain in these career
paths.
Answer. I would be especially proud, if confirmed, to serve a
President who understands the importance of women and minorities in
science. For example in the U.S. Senate, Senator Obama passed three
amendments to the America COMPETES Act to increase participation of
women and underrepresented minorities in the professions of science,
technology, engineering, and mathematics; to offer competitive state
grants to support summer term education programs to help students
develop skills in math and problem solving; and to establish a
mentoring program for women and minorities as they advance in those
fields.
All Americans will need strong STEM backgrounds to participate
effectively in a competitive global economy. President Obama has made
it clear to me that this will be one of my most important
responsibilities if confirmed.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. John F. Kerry to
Dr. John Holdren
Question 1. Last August, this Committee held a hearing on our
Nation's failure to invest in next-generation climate modeling
capability. As a result, we are falling behind in our ability to
predict climate impacts at the regional and local scale. At that
hearing, the witnesses discussed the need for an integrated,
interagency effort to address the range of research, software, data
storage and computing challenge associated with climate modeling. How
should that be structured? What is the appropriate role for NOAA?
Answer. I understand the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
includes $170 million for NOAA to address critical gaps in climate
modeling and establish climate data records for continuing research
into the cause, effects and ways to mitigate climate change. NOAA will
clearly have an instrumental role. But we can do more across agencies
as well to build on our climate modeling capabilities. This new funding
is another important piece of the interagency efforts to be coordinated
with other climate science efforts as needed to ensure an integrated
research effort. Improving our climate modeling capability is critical
to furthering our understanding of the impacts of climate change in
society, and will be a priority under my leadership at OSTP, if
confirmed.
Question 2. The underlying authorizing legislation for the National
Nanotechnology Initiative allows the President to ``establish or
designate'' an advisory board composed of members with expert knowledge
of nanotechnology from academia, industry, and non-profit/advocacy
organizations. President Bush opted to designate PCAST (President's
Council of Advisors on Science and Technology) instead of appointing a
new advisory board. However, many criticized this move, citing that
PCAST did not have the specific expert knowledge to review the NNI.
According to a National Academies of Science review on the NNI, they
state that:
Answer. While the designation of PCAST as the NNI advisory panel
testifies to the importance of the initiative, it lacks an independent
advisory group with specific expertise in nanoscience and
nanotechnology. Such a dedicated panel could provide advice on setting
priorities, balancing large-scale and individual investigator research,
and the value of high-risk, high pay-off interdisciplinary research.
As a result, the NAS recommended that ``The Federal Government
should establish an independent advisory panel with appropriate
experience to facilitate cutting-edge research on and responsible
development of nanotechnology.''
OSTP transition team members have indicated that they prefer not to
establish a new board and will continue to rely on PCAST. They believe
that the new PCAST would be a vastly improved advisory mechanism, but
the concern still remains that given PCAST's wide mandate to advise on
all aspects of science and technology, there is insufficient expertise
in nanotechnology to provide proper oversight over the NNI.
Question 2a. Do you believe that the President should appoint an
independent advisory board to review the NNI, as mandated by law? If
no, please explain why you feel that conducting oversight over the NNI
through PCAST is sufficient? In my nanotechnology bill that I
introduced last year, I make it very clear the need for an independent
advisory board with specific nanotechnology expertise. Will you commit
to working with me on this matter as we move forward on this
legislation?
Answer. My current view is that the President will be best served
by having PCAST, with its diverse group of distinguished experts in
science, technology, and innovation from industry and academia,
function as the sole Presidential-level advisory committee on S&T. I
believe that establishing multiple Presidential advisory committees
will diminish the influence and effectiveness of any one of them. As a
practical matter, given all of the competing demands on the President's
schedule, he is unlikely to be able to have meaningful interaction with
more than one such committee.
On important topics such as nanotechnology, however, I will
recommend that the President establish committees under the aegis of
PCAST that will have the stature and in-depth expertise needed to
provide the Administration with high-quality, independent advice on the
important issues you raise. I look forward to working with you on this
topic to meet our shared goals.
Question 3. Nanoscale science, engineering and technology--commonly
referred to collectively as nanotechnology--is believed by many to
offer extraordinary economic and societal benefits. Congress has
demonstrated continuing support for nanotechnology and has directed its
attention primarily to three topics that may affect the realization of
this hoped for potential: Federal research and development (R&D) in
nanotechnology; U.S. competitiveness; and environment, health, and
safety (ENS) concerns. In 2000, the United States launched the world's
first national nanotechnology program. Since then, the Federal
Government has invested nearly $10 billion in nanoscale science,
engineering, and technology through the U.S. National Nanotechnology
Initiative (NNI). U.S. companies and state governments have invested
billions more. As a result of this focus and these investments, the
United States has, in the view of many experts, emerged as a global
leader in nanotechnology. However, the competition for global
leadership in nanotechnology is intensifying as countries and companies
around the world increase their investments. The Federal Government has
invested, through FY2009, nearly $10 billion in nanotechnology R&D.
What role can the Federal Government play in further helping industry
commercialize this research?
Answer. The NNI can expand its role in promoting nanotechnology
transfer and commercialization for societal benefit by:
a. Coordinating with regional, state, and local organizations
supporting nanotechnology development and commercialization;
b. Working with industry through mechanisms such as the
Nanomanufacturing, Industry Liaison and Innovation Working
Group;
c. Taking advantage of programs such as the Small Business
Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology
Transfer (STIR);
d. Supporting additional public-private partnerships using
mechanisms such as the Nanoelectronics Research Initiative and
other government-industry-university collaborations.
Question 3a. Environmental, health, and safety issues have become a
top concern about nanotechnology. How much additional funding should be
provided to support EHS research? How should this money be allocated
among agencies? Should a portion of these funds be used as a central
funding source to respond to needs that agencies are not currently
addressing? If so, how should such a funding source be structured and
managed?
Answer. I share the goal of promoting the responsible development
of nanotechnology. OSTP is carefully evaluating proposals for targeted
funding increases for nano-related EHS research. There are important
knowledge gaps in the EHS dimensions of nano identified that we should
address quickly as possible. I do not believe that there is a single
agency that is in a position to sponsor or conduct all of the necessary
research. This is because of the important roles played by a variety of
different agencies on the environment, occupational safety, the
oversight of drugs, medical devices, and consumer products, and the
management of the National Toxicological Program.
Question 3b. Do you believe that rapid advances in nanotechnology,
biotechnology, and other emerging fields present any challenges to the
U.S. and global regulatory systems? If so, how might you seek to
address them?
Answer. In many instances, emerging technologies have advanced more
rapidly than our ability to establish a policy, legal, and regulatory
framework that maximizes the economic and societal benefits while
managing the risks. For example, it is clear that there are gaps in our
understanding of the EHS dimensions of nanotechnology. It is likely
that several key regulatory agencies will need to increase their
capacity to promote the responsible development of nanotechnology.
There are also important questions a out how to apply existing laws and
regulations to nanotechnology-based products. If confirmed, I am
committed to working closely with the relevant agencies to create a
sound policy and regulatory framework.
Question 4. Patients and researchers have been frustrated for 7
years as they try to forge ahead in one of the most promising areas of
biological research--embryonic stem cell research. The progress that
has been made in just a decade is astounding and the expectations for
therapeutic applications for the results of this research have never
been higher for the millions of patients around living with disease for
which this research holds out hope. But, researchers are grappling with
Federal restrictions on funding the equivalent of tying one hand behind
their back. Can we assume relief is forthcoming so we can get the
Federal Government fully behind this research?
Answer. Yes. Stem cell research holds the promise of improving our
lives in at least three ways--by substituting normal cells for damaged
cells to treat diabetes, Parkinson's disease, spinal cord injury, heart
failure and other disorders; by providing scientists with safe and
convenient models of disease; and by helping to understand fundamental
aspects of normal development and cell dysfunction.
For these reasons, I strongly support expanding research on stem
cells. I believe that the restrictions that President Bush has placed
on funding of human embryonic stem cell research have handcuffed our
scientists and hindered our ability to compete with other nations. I
expect President Obama to lift the current funding ban soon.
______
Response to Written Question Submitted by Hon. Mark Warner to
Dr. John Holdren
Question. In follow up to our previous exchange, I would appreciate
a further elaboration of President Obama's and your vision concerning
the role of the CTO. Virginia and other states that have created a
cabinet-level Secretary of Technology can provide valuable insight
regarding this position. I recognize that this individual has not yet
been chosen, but can you elaborate on what you consider to be the most
important qualities and characteristics for the position? Will this
person look outward toward the private sector to identify innovative
techniques and practices to be incorporated within the Federal
Government? Also, how will this person interact with other agencies and
what role will the CTO have in terms of policy execution in each realm?
Answer. Indeed, Virginia has been a leader and provides an
important model for the Federal CTO. As you know in the 21st century,
our economic success will depend not only on our ability to invent new
technologies but also in our ability to harness the power and potential
of new technologies to address some of our most pressing problems.
That is why President Obama has promised to appoint the Nation's
first Chief Technology Officer (CTO)--to ensure that our government and
all its agencies have the right infrastructure, policies and services
for the 21st century. The CTO will have a specific focus on
transparency, by ensuring that each arm of the Federal Government makes
its records open and accessible as the E-Government Act requires. The
CTO will also focus on using new technologies to solicit and receive
information back from citizens to improve the functioning of democratic
government.
While a CIO may be more inward facing, the CTO may be more outward
facing and can help ensure technological interoperability of key
government functions. For example, the Chief Technology Officer will
oversee the development of a national, interoperable wireless network
for local, state and Federal first responders as the 9/11 Commission
recommended. This will ensure that fire officials, police officers and
EMTs from different jurisdictions have the ability to communicate with
each other during a crisis and we do not have a repeat of the failure
to deliver critical public services that occurred in the aftermath of
Hurricane Katrina.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. David Vitter to
Dr. John Holdren
Question 1. In 1971, in an article with Paul Ehrlich titled Global
Ecology, you predicted that ``some form of ecocatastrophe, if not
thermonuclear war, seems almost certain to overtake us before the end
of the century.'' Now that it is 2008, what is the reason neither of
those things happened?
Answer. One of the many things I have learned in the nearly four
decades since I wrote those words is that, as Enrico Fermi famously
said, ``Predictions are difficult, especially about the future.'' But
even then, at the age of 26, I knew enough to hedge a little bit: I did
say ``almost certain.''
I do think that we were at least as lucky as we were smart in
managing to get through the decades of the Cold War without a nuclear
war--there were certainly a number of close calls. I think that most of
the presidents, generals, and admirals who commanded our nuclear forces
through those years would agree we were lucky. A number of them have
told me as much.
As for ecological catastrophe, there's no agreed definition on
precisely what would qualify, but certainly there are reasonable people
who would argue we are in the middle of a number of them: the
staggering rate of species extinctions (for which the best estimates
are in the range of 100 to 1000 times the extinction rate over most of
pre-human time); the expanding dead zones in coastal seas; the decline
in the global populations of sharks, billfish, and tuna to perhaps 10
percent of their pre-human levels; and the continuing rapid
deforestation of the tropics.
To the extent that nothing that everybody would agree is a full-
blown catastrophe has yet materialized, I would say, as in the case of
nuclear war, that we have been partly smart and partly lucky. On the
smart side, since 1971 the world rate of population growth has fallen
by almost half; we have developed and deployed technologies that have
reduced the amount of energy and other physical resources needed to
make a dollar of GDP and that have reduced the amount of pollution
emitted in the course of providing a kilowatt-hour of electricity or a
pound of steel; we have established Marine Protected Areas where fish
stocks can recover from over-exploitation; and we have invested
substantial resources in cleaning up inland waters and toxic waste
dumps.
Those are outcomes that those of us who were issuing warnings about
environmental dangers in the 1960s and 1970s were recommending at the
time as ways to reduce those dangers. Our aim in discussing the harm
that was likely to occur if society did not take evasive action was to
help bring that evasive action about. I am happy to say that
environmental laws passed by the U.S. Congress--including NEPA, the
Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Surface Mining Act, the
Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, the Resource
Conservation and Recovery Act, and CAFE standards--played a large part
in this country's doing what was needed to reduce some of the biggest
dangers.
Question 2. In 1986, you predicted that global warming would cause
the deaths of one billion people by 2020. Paul Ehrlich attributes this
claim to you in his article The Machinery of Nature. Do you believe
that number is still accurate? If not, can you give us a revised
number?
Answer. I believe what I wrote was that global climate change could
cause the deaths of a billion people by 2020. This was not a prediction
but a statement about what could happen if climate change crossed a
tipping point in the intervening period, leading to large declines in
food production. I think this is not likely, but I believe it is a
``downside'' outcome that we should be investing significant effort to
avoid.
Question 3. In 1978 you stated in a University of Houston Law
Review, that ``people are the bane of rational energy policy.'' Can you
explain what you meant by that and who or what would be appropriate for
drafting rational energy policy?
Answer. The sentence as a whole said the following: ``However, if
people are the bane of rational energy planning, they are also its
goal.'' As explained in the surrounding text, what I meant was that the
best-laid plans are often thwarted by human frailty and
unpredictability (oil tankers running aground, actions of the OPEC
cartel, etc) and also that people often want contradictory things from
energy policy: they want their energy to be convenient, reliable, free
of environmental impacts and political liabilities, and dirt cheap; and
if there are going to be some environmental impacts, they want them to
be in somebody else's back yard. The surrounding text also explained
that saying people are the goal of energy planning means we should not
be interested in expanding energy supply for its own sake, but rather
in doing so in ways and for purposes that increase the sum of human
well-being.
One reason energy policy is so challenging, as I argued in that
article, is that there is no ``free lunch'' in energy supply. The
energy options that are the cheapest are often the dirtiest ones (as
coal power plants without environmental controls demonstrate) or the
most problematic from the political and security standpoint (as the
cheap imported oil of the early 1970s demonstrated). And if nobody is
willing to accept any environmental intrusion at all from energy
systems--no coal mines or drilling rigs anywhere, no pipelines across
the tundra, no transmission lines or windmills spoiling the view--
that's eventually going to mean not having the energy we need.
Developing sensible energy policy would be easier if we who have
studied the issue--scientists and Senators alike--did a better job of
educating the public to understand that there are tradeoffs in getting
the energy we need and that cheaper is not always better (particularly
if the low monetary cost comes from not including in the price of
energy the cost of limiting environmental damages and national-security
liabilities that otherwise not just the users of the energy but the
whole society will have to live with). I note that the thrust of my
1978 article in the Houston Law Review, which was entitled ``Coal in
Context: Its Role in the National Energy Future,'' was precisely that
coal is so important to U.S. energy supply that we simply must make the
effort to reduce its environmental impacts to the point that continued
use of coal will be environmentally tolerable and acceptable to the
public.
I believe that the most appropriate people to be making energy
policy are our elected representatives, meaning, at the national level,
the Congress and the President and Vice President. Obviously, these
elected leaders need to be informed by the best advice they can get
from their appointed staffs and the agencies over which these
appointees preside and, of course, by the views of business people,
academics, NGO's of all varieties, and the wider public. Making sure
that our elected leaders and all those who report to them or seek to
influence them are well informed about the scientific and technological
dimensions of the energy-policy choices (and other policy choices!)
faced by our Nation will be important to getting the best possible
results. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy that I
hope to have the privilege of directing has an important role to play
in helping to ensure that this information flow works as it should.
Question 4. In 1973 you encouraged a ``decline in fertility to well
below replacement'' in the United States, because ``280 million in 2040
is likely to be too many.'' This was in your article ``Population and
the American Predicament.'' Currently the U.S. population is 304
million. What are your thoughts at this juncture on the appropriate
population level?
Answer. Population growth brings both benefits and liabilities. In
the 1973 article cited, I offered the personal judgment that the then
U.S. population of 212 million was more than large enough to provide
most of the benefits associated with high population and that further
growth was likely to increase costs more than it increased benefits.
Balancing costs and benefits of population growth is a complex
business, of course, and reasonable people can disagree about where it
comes out For my part, I don't pretend to know what the best eventual
population for the United States would be. That is partly a matter of
how good our technology and our management can be in the future, partly
a matter of environmental and resource constraints that are still
imperfectly understood, and partly a matter of social preferences that
are well outside the domain of science and technology policy in which
I'd be engaged if the Senate confirms me as Director of OSTP.
Question 5. In 2006, in the article The War on Hot Air, you
suggested that global sea levels could rise by 13 feet by the end of
this century. However, in the IPCC's 2007 report the suggested
potential is a rise of 13 inches. Can you explain the severe disparity,
and if you still believe the rise will be 13 feet?
Answer. The indicated article was not written by me, but it quoted
a figure I had given in a speech as near the upper end of the
uncertainty range for the amount of sea-level rise that could occur by
2100.
There is no disagreement in the Earth-science community about the
amount of sea-level rise that would eventually result from
disappearance of the great ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica. The
answer given by the IPCC and ice experts everywhere is 7 meters (23
feet) if the Greenland ice sheet disappears, another 5 meters (16 feet)
if the most vulnerable part of the Antarctic ice sheet disappears, and
a total of about 70 meters (230 feet) if the world got so warm that all
of the Antarctic ice sheet as well as that of Greenland, plus all of
the mountain glaciers, melted entirely.
What is much more uncertain is how rapidly the increase in sea
level from ice loss could happen, given warming at rates projected to
be possible in this century and beyond. The IPCC's 2007 report gave a
range of 7 inches to 25 inches for the amount of sea-level rise
projected for 2100, taking into account the thermal expansion of a
warming ocean and gradual melting of mountain glaciers and the
Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. But the report also noted that
phenomena known to have occurred in natural warming periods in the past
are capable of causing much more rapid disintegration of the ice
sheets--and correspondingly faster sea-level rise--which the IPCC did
not put into its estimate because the dynamics of these processes are
not yet well enough understood to include them in the quantitative
models.
Scientists who study the climate of prehistoric times (using a
variety of kinds of evidence preserved in tree rings, ice sheets,
corals, sediments, and the like) reported in 2005 that there were two
natural warming periods in the last 19,000 years when these faster
modes of ice-sheet disintegration raised the level of the oceans at a
rate of as much as 2 to 5 meters (6.5 to 16 feet) per century. This was
the basis of statements I made subsequently to the effect that
increases in this range could not be ruled out under the similarly
rapid warming forecast for the 21st century.
Studies published since then have indicated that the upper limit of
sea-level rise to be expected by 2100 is 1-2 meters. This remains a
very active area of research, and the best estimate could change again,
but since these latest reports came out I have been citing the 1-2
meter (3.3 to 6.6 feet) estimate of the upper limit as the most up-to-
date that is available.
Question 6. You have consistently held the position that
environmental damage is directly proportional to economic growth. Are
you of the position that we can no longer grow the economy without
doing damage to the environment?
Answer. What I have said is that environmental impact would grow in
proportion to economic growth if ``technology'' stayed constant, where
``technology'', as explained in my writings about this, is shorthand
for the particular mixture of goods and services and technologies for
providing them that generate the economic activity recorded in GDP and
are also responsible for the impact of this activity on the
environment. Of course, technology does not stay constant over time.
The mix of goods and services changes and the technologies used to
provide them changes. The technology factor can get better (smaller
impact per dollar of GDP) if the economic mix becomes less impact-
intensive (e.g., less heavy manufacturing, more services) or if the
particular technologies used become environmentally less disruptive per
unit of good or service. It can also get worse. If we want to hold
environmental impact constant or reduce it as our economy grows, the
only way to do so is to make sure that the technology factor improves
at a rate equal to or faster than the rate at which the economy is
growing. This is one of the key reasons it's so important to invest in
science and technology--so we will have the technologies available to
achieve these improvements at the needed pace. President Obama is
committed to seizing the opportunities presented by science,
engineering, and innovation to protect the environment and grow the
economy, and if confirmed by the Senate I will all I can to help in
that effort.
Question 7. What is your definition of ``fear mongering?''
Answer. To fear-monger is to arouse concerns about dangers one
knows are imaginary, or to arouse concerns out of proportion to the
magnitude one believes the real dangers to have. It would be fear
mongering to say, without evidence, that an asteroid is about to strike
the Earth and wipe out life here. But it is not fear-mongering to tell
a home-owner that his/her house could burn down, perhaps killing the
occupants as well as destroying the investment, and that therefore it
would be wise to dispose of the oily rags in the garage and buy some
smoke alarms and some fire insurance. Nor should such warnings be
characterized after the fact as fear mongering even if, in the whole
tenure of the home-owner in the house, it does not burn down, or if it
does but the smoke alarms save the occupants and the insurance recoups
the financial loss.
Question 8. Specifically list forms of energy that you find
acceptable as a way of growing the economy. in addition, please list
the forms of energy that cannot be used to grow the economy without
destroying the environment.
Answer. I have been saying and writing for forty years that we
don't have the luxury of insisting on perfection in our energy sources,
because all of them have liabilities of one sort or another and the
fact is we need energy to meet basic human needs and to expand and
sustain economic prosperity. I think the answer is to continue to
invest in research and development to improve the energy sources we
already have and to invent additional ones, in order to have the best
portfolio of options possible at any given time, and then to let the
marketplace, as modified by policy and other manifestations of the
public's wishes, choose the mix that will be used.
I wrote in 1971 that I thought we'd find the quickest, least
expensive, least environmentally disruptive energy source for the
decades ahead to be increased energy efficiency--using lights,
appliances, building envelopes, cars, airplanes, and manufacturing
processes that deliver more product or service for less energy--so that
the energy saved could be used elsewhere in the economy. That proved to
be true. From 1970 to 2005 the amount of primary energy needed to make
a real dollar of GDP in the United States fell two-fold. This meant
that more energy was made available to our economy in this period from
these savings than was provided by the expansion of all other energy
sources combined. I believe that this will continue to be true for at
least the next few decades, as well.
But efficiency improvements cannot do the whole job. Even compact
fluorescent bulbs and LED lighting still use electricity, and the most
fuel-efficient hybrids on the road still use hydrocarbon or alcohol
fuels. We will continue to need a portfolio of ways to provide
electricity, portable fuels, and heat. I think that, for the immediate
future, the ingredients of that portfolio will need to continue to
include:
petroleum-derived fuels for our motor vehicles and aircraft
especially, but with due attention to reducing the ecosystem
impacts of getting those fuels domestically, the foreign-policy
liabilities and economic vulnerabilities of getting them
abroad, and the emissions from burning them;
biofuels derived from currently practical as well as new
feedstocks in ways that reduce petroleum dependence and
greenhouse-gas emissions while minimizing competition with food
production and destruction of forests;
natural gas, which is the cleanest-burning and least
CO2-intensive of all of the fossil fuels, as well as
the one most conducive to electricity generation and combined
heat and power (CHP) at high efficiency and relatively low
capital cost;
coal, from which more than half of U.S. electricity
currently comes, but which is also our most environmentally
disruptive energy source and warrants efforts to move as
rapidly as practicable toward less damaging ways of mining it
and toward the capacity to capture and sequester away from the
atmosphere most of the CO2 that would otherwise be
released from burning it;
nuclear energy, currently accounting for 20 percent of U.S.
electricity supply, a proportion that could be expanded with
the benefit of reduced emissions of CO2 and criteria
air pollutants;
hydropower, for which the best sites for large installations
in the United States are mostly already in use, but which has
additional potential in small-hydro and run-of-river
installations with due attention to minimizing environmental
impacts;
wind power, which is currently the least expensive of the
``new renewables'' for electricity generation and also has
arguably the lowest environmental impact of any of the
currently available electricity-generating technologies
(although still not zero, as objections on grounds of visual
intrusion and impacts on birds and bats demonstrate).
Other energy sources of promise that we should be working to
develop or improve in terms of their competitiveness include hot-dry-
rock geothermal energy, solar-thermal electricity generation, solar-
photovoltaic electricity generation, direct solar production of
hydrogen, energy from ocean currents and waves, and fusion. I believe
that President Obama's plan to invest $150 billion over 10 years in
improving existing energy sources and developing new ones will be a
great boost in getting us where we need to go.
Energy sources I think would be problematic to increase
significantly in connection with fueling U.S. economic growth, because
of the environmental or security impacts of such expansion, include:
oil imports from politically unstable regions and from
countries that use their oil-import revenues for purposes
inimical to the interests of the United States;
new coal-burning power plants that do not capture and
sequester CO2 and are not designed to be retrofitted
to do so;
coal-to-liquids and other synfuels technologies that do not
use CO2 capture and sequestration to achieve at
least neutrality in ``well-to-wheels'' CO2 emissions
compared to gasoline produced from crude petroleum;
biofuels technologies that compete directly with food
production and thus drive up food prices, or that result in
deforestation or other forms of land-use change that lead to
net increases in CO2 emissions;
Question 9. Do you believe California has been a good model for
cap-and-trade, and how are low-income families affected by the cost of
energy? In addition, what are your thoughts on the statement that
``economic development is the key to human well-being?''
Answer. California's cap-and-trade policies, which are part of a
bill passed by the California legislature in 2006 (AB32), will not go
into effect until 2012. The program is designed to return California to
1990 emissions levels by 2020, which is the same figure as mentioned by
President Obama during the campaign as a prospective intermediate goal
for the country as a whole. The President has also made clear that he
favors a cap-and-trade approach to emissions reductions, but the extent
to which the details of the Federal approach do or do not resemble
those of the California plan remains to be worked out by the
administration in concert with the Congress.
Of course, charging a price for emitting CO2 will
necessarily increase the cost of using fossil fuels. But this will not
necessarily increase the overall cost of energy services, because
higher fossil fuel prices will motivate increased private investments
in energy-efficiency improvements that will save money at the higher
energy prices by reducing the amount of energy needed to deliver a
given service and because part of the revenues from auctioning the
emission permits is likely to be invested by the government in
additional energy-efficiency programs that will have similar effects.
As a general matter, poor people are the most vulnerable segment of
our society to increases in energy costs. That vulnerability can be
reduced, however, with progressive rate structures ensuring that any
overall price increases are born mainly by the larger users and by
devoting a part of permit revenues to programs that provide insulation,
energy-efficient windows, compact fluorescent bulbs, and the like to
poor people.
I certainly believe that economic development is one of the keys to
improving human well-being. I have been emphatic in my writings and
speeches over the years that human well-being rests on a foundation of
three pillars--economic, environmental, and sociopolitical (where the
last includes national and personal security, personal freedoms, access
to a working system of justice, etc.). It is my position that all three
pillars are indispensable, in the same sense that a three-legged stool
falls down if any one leg fails. It is therefore important to be sure
that, in seeking to strengthen any one of the legs, we do not do so in
ways that seriously weaken either one of the others. That is a
challenge to which science and technology have much to contribute.
Question 10. In regards to malaria deaths, how many people have
died of malaria globally since banning DDT for the use of malaria
suppression?
Answer. Malaria remains a terrible scourge across much of the
world's tropical and subtropical area, killing 900,000 people per year.
But I don't believe lack of use of DDT has been a significant
contributor to our failure to better control this disease. Under the
international agreement governing DDT use--the Stockholm Convention on
Persistent Organic Pollutants--governments believing that they need DDT
for malaria control can and do get exemptions to use it, and they are
not expected to stop using it until they are satisfied that
alternatives are workable for their specific needs.
The World Health Organization's attempt in the 1950s and 1960s to
eradicate malaria with a massive DDT-spraying program did help to
control malaria for a time, but it ultimately failed mainly because
many species of mosquito around the world evolved resistance to DDT.
This plus growing evidence of harm to humans and other animals from DDT
and its breakdown products led most countries to give up DDT use for
malaria control in favor of integrated approaches combining elimination
of mosquito breeding sites, biological controls, spraying of
alternative chemicals, and early detection and prompt treatment of
malaria cases. The plan that President Obama has announced to eliminate
the scourge of malaria worldwide by 2015 entails working in partnership
with developing countries, donor nations, and private and non-profit
organizations to achieve universal access to these proven, integrated
approaches to prevention and treatment
Question 11. Do you still support government funded sterilization
as a useful tool for de-development of industrialized economies?
Answer. I have never supported government-funded sterilization. The
term ``de-development'' was used by me and some of my co-authors for a
few years in the 1970s but then abandoned as unhelpful. At the time,
further development in the industrialized nations was seen as entailing
large increases in emissions of toxic and climate-altering substances,
habitat destruction, extinction of species, and unsustainable practices
in agriculture, fisheries, and forestry. My co-authors and I explained
that by ``de-development'' we meant scaling back these harmful
practices by, for example, reducing per-capita energy use through
improvements in energy end-use efficiency, doing the same with water
use, and making products that last longer and are designed for easy
recycle. The term I have lately been using in discussing what I think
we should be aiming for in these and related respects is not ``de-
development'' but ``sustainable prosperity.''
Question 12. One of the few guarantees of climate change
legislation is that if will increase the cost of electricity to
consumers and energy to industry. How does this create jobs and at what
point is an increase in the cost of electricity on low-income families
unacceptable?
Answer. As discussed in my answer to question 9, above, measures to
reduce the emissions of CO2 will initially increase the unit
costs of electricity and fuel, but responses to these increases are
likely to include energy-efficiency improvements that reduce the amount
of electricity or fuel needed to provide a given service, thus reducing
the adverse economic impact on the consumer. Impacts on low-income
families can be ameliorated through utility (electricity and natural
gas) rate structures and through programs that use some of the revenues
from the sale of emissions permits to help the poor with energy-saving
investments.
Creating economic incentives to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by
charging for emissions permits will stimulate investment in research,
development, demonstration, and deployment of improved and new
technologies both for using energy more efficiently in the production
of the goods and services that people want and for providing
electricity and fuel in ways that emit less greenhouse gases than
today's energy-supply technologies do. These investments will lead to
the creation of new jobs and the founding of new businesses, just as
control of conventional air pollution and water pollution starting in
the 1970s led ultimately to a set of environmental- protection
businesses that today generate hundreds of billions of dollars of
annual revenue in this country.
Question 13. Dr. Holdren, you have made a number of astonishingly
dire predictions over the past four decades of approaching
environmental catastrophes that would lead to widespread human
suffering and death. Have any of these predictions come true? Why do
you think that is? Do you think that any of your predictions are still
likely to come true in the future? Which ones? Do you think it would be
advisable to base important public policies on any of these predictions
or on similarly wild-eyed predictions that you may develop while
serving as White House science, not science fiction, adviser?
Answer. Statements I have made about dangers from nuclear weapons,
pressures on supplies of food and water, pollution, and impacts of
climate change have been intended not as predictions but as projections
about where we were heading and, thus, why it would be a good idea to
change course in ways that would reduce these dangers. To the extent
that some of the potential harm identified in these projections has not
yet happened or has not happened to the degree I said was possible, I
believe this is at least partly because society did take construction
actions to reduce the dangers. (I listed a number of those constructive
actions, including a number of environmental laws passed by the U.S.
Congress and signed into law by six U.S. presidents of both parties, in
my answers to the pre-hearing questions.) I believe that identifying
possible adverse outcomes of actions taken or not taken, as well as
identifying and analyzing appropriate strategies for reducing the
dangers, is as appropriate in the domain of science and technology
policy as it is in the domain of economic policy, and if confirmed by
the Senate as Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy I
would take this responsibility seriously.
Question 14. Dr. Holdren, you have been a tireless advocate for
drastic reductions in population. You have also advocated de-
development and reductions in the standard of living in the developed
economies. Do you favor mandatory government-enforced reductions in
population in this or any other country? Have you ever commended
China's one-child policy? 1 assume you support abortion. Have you also
commended Dutch-style euthanasia policies? Do you welcome the financial
crisis and economic recession as a way to accomplish your goals of de-
development and lower living standards? Why not?
Answer. Actually, I have written relatively little on population
issues since the 1970s. I do not favor government-enforced reductions
in population in the United States or elsewhere. I do not favor the
harsh measures employed in China in favor of that country's one-child-
per-family policy. I do not favor euthanasia. I am appalled by the
current financial crisis because of its adverse impacts on the well-
being of U.S. citizens and people around the world. My use of the term
``de-development'' three decades ago was in the context of aspects of
economic growth, as it was then being pursued, that were causing
considerable harm. As indicated in my answers to pre-hearing questions,
I concluded long ago that the term was poorly chosen, and I have ever
since been using the terms ``sustainable development'' and
``sustainable prosperity'' to convey what I think we should be trying
to achieve. My interest in the interaction of science and technology
with the human condition has always been to try to ensure that science
and technology are used to increase the sum of human well-being, taking
into account well-being's environmental and sociopolitical aspects as
well as its economic aspect. I wish anyone who doubts this would read
my 2007 Presidential address for the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, ``Science and Technology for Sustainable Well-
Being", which was published in the 25 January 2008 edition of SCIENCE
and is available online at http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/
319/5862/424.
Question 15. Dr. Holdren, you are a man of strong political
convictions. It appears that you have often put your scientific
position and expertise in the service of your political commitments. It
appears that you have sometimes forced the science to fit your agenda.
Don't you think this disqualifies you for the roles of WH science
adviser and director of OSTP? The science adviser is charged with
providing the President with objective and useful scientific
information and analysis to inform policy choices. The OSTP serves as a
conduit for the entire scientific community, not just one politically-
engaged part of it, to share its knowledge and views and concerns with
the administration. The science adviser and OSTP director is not
supposed to push a policy agenda or to fit or cherry pick the
scientific facts and evidence to support a particular agenda. Do you
think that a person of such strong political commitments as you have
can check those commitments at the door? If so, do you think that some
of the scientists you have attacked and criticized would be able to
check their views at the door if they were nominated to serve as
science adviser. For example, Professor Richard S. Lindzen of MIT has
much more professional competence as a climate scientist than you do.
In fact, I note that you are not a climate scientist. Professor Lindzen
has published many highly regarded papers in atmospheric physics and
has been a member of the National Academy of Sciences for approximately
thirty years. He has also commented on the public policy debate on
global warming, although he has never promoted a political agenda in
the way you have. Do you think Professor Lindzen is qualified to be
White House science adviser and director of OSTP? Would you support his
confirmation if he were nominated at some point in the future?
Answer. With respect, I disagree with the question's
characterization of how I have conducted myself over my four-decade
career working on issues of science and technology as they affect
public policy. My policy preferences on issues where insights from
science and technology are germane have been shaped by my understanding
of the relevant science and technology, not the other way around. (That
is not to say that insights from science and technology always tell us
what policies to prefer; more often than not they do not suffice for
that. But they do often tell us something about what policy needs to
achieve or to avoid.)
As to whether I am a climate scientist, the question appears to
embody a rather narrow definition of what a climate scientist is. I do
not have a degree in meteorology, but I do hold a tenured full
professorship in one of the leading university departments of Earth
Science in the world. I have two degrees in aeronautics and
astronautics from MIT in which my major fields of study were fluid
dynamics and aerospace engineering, and a PhD from Stanford that
included further study of fluid dynamics and a doctoral thesis on
theoretical plasma physics. Fluid dynamics is what governs the motions
of the atmosphere. The mathematics of plasma physics is very similar to
the mathematics used in modeling the Earth's climate. I have been
teaching environmental science, including the science of climate
change, for more than 35 years at Caltech, the University of
California, Berkeley, and Harvard, and I have been publishing peer-
reviewed articles and reports about the causes and consequences of
climate change, and the remedies for it, for even longer.
While I am not willing to engage, in this venue, in a comparison of
my qualifications to be Director of OSTP with those of others, I will
note that I am a long-time member of both the National Academy of
Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the
American Physical Society and the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences, and a former President and Chair of the Board of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science (elected by the membership
of this, the largest general science society in the world and the
publisher of the journal SCIENCE). I believe I was nominated by
President Obama to serve as his Assistant for Science and Technology
and Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy not only
because of my knowledge of and contributions to the issue of climate
change (although that is certainly one of the important science and
technology issues facing this administration and this country) but also
because of my experience with a variety of other environmental issues;
with nuclear and nonnuclear energy technologies; with space science and
technology; with nuclear weapons, nuclear arms control, and
nonproliferation; with international cooperation in science and
technology; and with the study and practice of how science and
technology policy work in the White House.
Question 16. Dr. Holdren, you have been dismissive and have
sometimes sneered at the views of highly qualified professional climate
scientists, who are often described in the media as climate skeptics,
and even though you are not a climate scientist. People such as
Professor Richard Lindzen of MIT, Professor John Christy of the
University of Alabama at Huntsville, Dr. Roy Spencer of the University
of Alabama at Huntsville, Professor Patrick Michaels of the University
of Virginia, and Professor Emeritus and former director of the U S.
Weather Service Fred Singer. Have you ever called any of these
distinguished scientists (or any scientists I haven't named)
``deniers'', thereby implying that they are somehow similar to
Holocaust deniers, simply because they have expressed views you
disagree with. If you are confirmed, what evidence can you offer that
you would be able to consider fairly and to represent their expert
views? Will you continue to denigrate expert scientific views you
disagree with and the scientists who hold them while serving President
Obama?
Answer. I would not say I have ``sneered'' at the views of any of
the individuals named in the question, although I have certainly
disagreed publicly with a number of specific arguments that some of
these individuals have advanced. Most of the individuals named do not
deny that climate change is occurring or that human activities have
something to do with it, but rather take the view that the
uncertainties are larger and the most likely consequences smaller than
what most climate scientists believe to be the case. In the rare
instance that one finds a climate scientist of any sort who actually
denies that human activities are changing the climate of the Earth, I
would say that the term ``climate-change denier'' is accurate without
imputing any similarity or relationship to those who deny the reality
of the Holocaust. These are very different kinds of denial.
Question 17. Dr. Holdren, you have made many strong claims about
global warming and its impacts. Rather than listing those claims, can
you provide evidence for some of them? You have stated that global
warming is accelerating and happening faster than predicted. Can you
show any satellite or surface global temperature data sets that support
your claim? Are you aware of any data sets that do not support your
claim? What criteria have you applied to prefer one temperature data
set to another? You have stated that the impacts of global warming are
already apparent and worse than predicted Can you comment on some of
these? For example sea level rise. What is your view? Is it supported
by the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report? For example, you have claimed
that droughts, Moods, and storms are also increasing as a result of
global warming. What professional expertise has allowed you to pick out
and prefer a few studies that support your claim out of the many
studies that do not? Since you are not a climate scientist, you may not
be aware of the scientific literature that does not support your
alarmist views. Therefore, we would be happy to share some of those
studies with you and invite your comments on them.
Answer. The question mentions the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report.
It is a fine compilation of much of the evidence for the statements I
have made about global climate change and its impacts.
Where the question implies that the IPCC Fourth Assessment does not
support what I have said (namely, about the potential extent of sea-
level rise in the 21st century), I have already explained in my written
answers to pre-hearing questions, as well as in the oral Q&A portion of
my hearing, that the IPCC report itself makes clear that the authors
chose to present quantitative estimates only for those contributing
phenomena that they felt could be modeled reasonably accurately at the
time they wrote. This excluded the mechanisms for rapid ice sheet
disintegration that paleoclimatological studies have indicated were
responsible for rates of sea level rise of 2 to 5 meters (6.6 to 16
feet) per century during natural warming periods in the past 20,000
years (see R. B. Alley et al., Science, 310: 456-460, 2005; J. T.
Overpeck et al., Science 311: 1747-50, 2006). The IPCC authors actually
made clear that their lower figures, which included only thermal
expansion of sea water and the gradual melting of land ice, were
neither a ``best estimate'' nor an ``upper bound'' of sea-level to be
expected by 2100 because of the exclusion of the faster mechanisms from
their quantitative analysis. As I indicated in my earlier answers, a
series of studies published since the IPCC report was finalized suggest
that the best current estimate of the maximum sea-level rise to be
expected by 2100 is 1-2 meters, i.e, 3.3 to 6.6 feet (see, e.g., S.
Rahmstorf, Science 315: 368-370, 2007; W. T. Pfeffer et al., Science
321: 1340-43, 2008, and references therein).
In addition to the reports of the IPCC, accessible accounts of the
evidence for the character and impacts of global climate change, with
extensive references to the peer-reviewed scientific literature, can be
found in the reports on the subject of the U.N. Scientific Expert Group
on Climate Change and Sustainable Development, for which I was one of
the coordinating lead authors (www.unfoundation.org/SEG/); the U.S.
National Academy of Sciences (http://dels.nas.edulglobalchange); the
U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research (www.ucar.edu); and the
U.K. Meteorological Office (www.met-office.gov.uk), as well as on a
myriad of websites run by some of the most respected climatologists
(e.g., www.columbia.edu/ jeh1/, stephenschneider.stanford.edu,
www.realclimate.org).
Besides these relatively comprehensive accounts of the scientific
evidence relating to climate change and its impacts, I offer the
following as recent substantiation, in the peer-reviewed literature, of
what I have characterized as the ``mainstream'' or ``center of
gravity'' position on specific points to which the question calls
attention:
For recent accounts of the evidence that climate change is
accelerating, please see, e.g., Canadell, J. G., et al. (2007)
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 104(47):
18866-18870; Raupach, M. R., et al. (2007) Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences, 104(24): 10288-10293; Rahmstorf,
S., et al. (2007) Science, 316: 709.
On the consistency of surface temperature records and
satellite measurements, showing global warming at a pace
unusual against the backdrop of recent natural variability,
please see, e.g., National Research Council, Board on
Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Surface Temperature
Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years, 2006 (http://
www.nap.edu/catalog/11676.html); Karl, T. R., et al., editors,
Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere: Steps for
Understanding and Reconciling Differences. A Report by the
Climate Change Science Program and the Subcommittee on Global
Change Research, Washington, DC, 2006 (http://
www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-1/finalreport/
default.htm); Mears, C.A. and F.J. Wentz, Science 309: 1548-51,
2005.
On increases in droughts, heat waves, and wildfires linked
to global climate change, please see, e.g., Barnett, T. P., et
al. (2008) Science 319: 1080-1083; Karl, T. R., et al. (2008)
Weather and Climate Extremes in a Changing Climate (http://
www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap3-3/final-report/
default.htm); Westerling, A., et al. (2006) Science, 313: 940-
943.
On the link between global climate change and powerful
tropical storms, please see, e.g., Elsner, J. B. et al., Nature
455: 92-95, 2008; Saunders, M. A. and A. S. Lea, Nature, 451:
557, 2008; Mann, M. E. and K. A. Emanuel, Eos, 87 (24), 233,
2006; Sriver, R. and M. Huber, Geophysical Research Letters,
33, L11705, 2006.
I do not agree with the question's suggestion that only a few
studies support my characterizations of current understandings in
climate science while many do not. Indeed, I believe that the opposite
is true, at least if one confines attention to the peer-reviewed
scientific literature.
Of course, one does not determine what is most likely to be correct
only by counting up the numbers of scientific papers on each side of an
issue; if one has the background needed to do so, one reads the
analyses, examines the data and the arguments, and tries to reach a
reasoned conclusion about which findings should be taken most
seriously. In every scientific field, many things make it into the
peer-reviewed literature that subsequently are shown to be incorrect.
(This was the case with some of the early interpretations of satellite
data on tropospheric temperatures, appearing to show a cooling rather
than the expected warming.) That is why it is so important to stay up
to date, and also why the reports of the National Research Council and
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change--in which leaders in the
field devote great effort to sorting out the science that stands up to
scrutiny from the science that does not--have such high credibility.
Question 18. Dr. Holdren, on global warming and several other
scientific issues with important public policy consequences, your views
in my opinion are not well supported in the expert scientific
literature and in fact have been described, perhaps uncharitably, as
being on the kooky fringe. As scientific adviser, how will you put
aside your own non-mainstream personal views and represent mainstream
scientific views on global warming and other scientific topics that
have serious ramifications for public policy?
Answer. As indicated in the preceding answer, I do not agree with
the question's premise that my views on climate-change science are not
well supported in the expert scientific literature and that they differ
from mainstream scientific views on the topic. I consider the
mainstream views to be those presented in the reviews of climate
science issued by the National Research Council and the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and summarized periodically
in statements issued by, e.g., the presidents of the national academies
of science of most of the countries that have such academies, the
leaderships of the principal professional societies dealing in the
physical and Earth sciences, and so on. (A compilation of those
statements is available at http://www.logicalscience.com/consensus/
consensusD1.htm.)
I believe it would be my responsibility as Director of the Office
of Science and Technology, if confirmed by the U.S. Senate, to
communicate to the President and others the content of these mainstream
views as well as the range of scientific opinion diverging from the
mainstream, in both the more optimistic and more pessimistic
directions, and my best judgment about the implications for policy of
the ranges of disagreement and uncertainty that exist. As in other
subject areas, in developing these formulations I would expect to draw
upon the insights and judgments of experts on the OSTP staff, on the
President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, in cabinet
departments and other Federal agencies as appropriate, and across the
wider science and technology communities.
Question 19. Dr. Holdren, during your nomination hearing you
mentioned that you still believe one billion people will die from
global warming by 2020. You also mentioned that in your scientific
predictions you have ``hedged your bets'' and ``were within the
scientific feeling at that time.'' When you advise the President do you
plan on ``hedging your bets'' and going with the ``feeling at the
time?''
Answer. With respect, I did not say I believe a billion people will
die from the impacts of climate change by 2020; I said I believe such a
terrible outcome remains possible, and I explained that the way this
could come about would be if global climate crossed a tipping point
into a climate regime that drastically reduced world food production.
(On climate tipping points and their possible imminence, please see,
e.g., Lenton, T. M., et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences 105(6): 1786-1793, 2008; on the vulnerability of world food
production to climate change, please see, e.g., Lobell, D. L., et al.,
Science 319, 607-610, 2008, and D. S. Battisti and R. L. Naylor,
Science 323: 240244, 2009.)
More generally, the future being inherently uncertain, all
statements about it should be ``hedged''; that is, the uncertainty
should be acknowledged, and the assumptions on which particular
projections or scenarios are based should be stated. I have always
tried to do that, although this is not necessarily apparent when
someone quotes a single sentence or part of a sentence out of context.
I have also always tried to base my statements about trends and
associated risks on the best scientific information and judgments
available at the time. (If, in the press of oral Q&A at my hearing, I
ended up saying ``scientific feeling'' rather than ``scientific
understanding'' or ``scientific judgment'', I regret the imprecision.)
Of course, scientific information gets better as time goes on, and I
hope that my capacity to assess such information--and to draw upon
others to help me assess it--has also improved over time.