[MARINE_BIOLOGY_INTERNATIONAL] Rescue for the Gulf of Mexico?

(New York Times editorial)

December 9, 2011
Rescue for the Gulf
The Obama administration this week officially began what it hopes will be a sustained push to reverse decades of man-made degradation in the Gulf of Mexico. The trigger for this effort is last year's disastrous BP oil spill. But the administration's strategy goes beyond repairing immediate damages, to the task of restoring the entire ecosystem to good health.

The plan includes the essential task of rebuilding the marshes and barrier islands that act as fish nurseries and defenses against storms. Overdevelopment, levee-building on the Mississippi River and mile upon mile of oil and gas pipelines and shipping channels have done enormous damage.

The plan also calls for a serious effort to reduce the flow of excess nutrients that have created an oxygen-starved "dead zone" in the gulf, where fish cannot survive. The presidential task force behind the plan announced $50 million in assistance from the Agriculture Department to help farmers control polluted runoff.

That is only a fraction of the billions of dollars that will be needed for full-scale restoration. The question is where the big money will come from. Senator Mary Landrieu, a Democrat of Louisiana, has proposed a smart bill that would earmark 80 percent of the civil penalties from the spill to long-term restoration. BP and other companies involved could wind up owing between $5 billion and $20 billion in fines, depending on the degree of negligence. Under normal circumstances, most of this money would disappear into the general treasury.

A Senate committee approved the Landrieu bill in September, though there has yet to be a floor vote. A somewhat less generous bill has been introduced in the House, where committee hearings began this week.

Congress failed to enact meaningful new laws in the aftermath of the BP spill. It also failed to follow through on promises to restore the marshes and barrier islands after Hurricane Katrina. The Landrieu bill gives it another chance to rescue an immensely valuable ecosystem.