Biden-Harris Administration Announces New Investments to Protect Freshwater Resources, Enhance Drought and Climate Resilience
Our nation’s lakes, rivers, streams, estuaries, and wetlands are fundamental to the health, prosperity, and resilience of our communities and are held sacred by many Tribal Nations. They are not only the sources of clean drinking water that flows into the taps of our homes, but are also economic drivers supporting jobs and outdoor recreation across the nation. By absorbing and storing carbon, our nation’s waterways and wetlands – and the forests, grasslands, and farmlands they nourish – also play a critical role in the fight against climate change.
Since Day One, the Biden-Harris Administration has worked to secure clean water for all communities, protect our vital freshwater resources, and mitigate the impacts of drought. Given that communities often acutely experience the climate crisis through water-related impacts – from floods and droughts to polluted drinking sources and waterways – this Administration is making historic investments through President Biden’s Investing in America agenda to protect, conserve, and restore our freshwater basins and ecosystems.
Meanwhile, many Republicans in Congress continue to deny the very existence of climate change and remain committed to repealing the President’s Inflation Reduction Act – the biggest climate protection bill ever – which would undermine the health, safety, and economic vitality of their own constituents.
Today, during Climate Week, the White House is announcing new funding and whole-of-government initiatives that build upon its ambitious freshwater agenda and help restore and conserve our freshwater resources and address climate impacts felt across the nation:
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Reconnecting Waterways and Restoring Aquatic Ecosystems: With over $3 billion in funding for ecosystem restoration and fish passage projects, the Investing in America agenda is helping secure cleaner rivers, safer communities, greater recreational opportunities, and improved fish and wildlife habitat, driving change across the landscape for people, communities, species, and ecosystems.
The Administration is announcing a suite of 10 transformational fish passage projects that to date have received over $150 million from eight Federal agencies. When completed, these fish passage and aquatic connectivity projects – located in communities from Maine to Ohio to California – will reconnect nearly 5,000 miles of rivers and streams across the United States. Reconnecting waterways allows natural functions to be restored in freshwater systems, improving their climate resilience and water quality, and therefore their ability to protect communities from catastrophic floods, droughts, catastrophic wildfire, and water pollution. Improving fish passage and reconnecting aquatic systems is one of the most effective ways to help conserve vulnerable species, while building safer infrastructure for communities and improving climate resilience. To date, the Administration has spent over $970 million on more than 600 fish passage projects in 45 states across the country.
The Department of the Interior is announcing an additional $92 million in new resources from the Bureau of Reclamation’s WaterSMART Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration Program to help restore important salmon and other native fish habitat across the West. These projects, when complete, will provide increased water quality, floodplain stability, and drought resiliency.
Collaborating with Stakeholders to Protect Freshwater Systems: At a Climate Week NYC event focused on the Global Freshwater Challenge, White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair Brenda Mallory announced a doubling of new partners in the America the Beautiful Freshwater Challenge – a nationwide initiative to protect, restore, and reconnect 8 million acres of wetlands and 100,000 miles of our nation’s rivers and streams by 2030. Over 100 members from across the country initially signed on to support freshwater restoration in their communities. That number has now more than doubled to over 211, including 14 states, 16 Tribal entities, 27 local governments, and 79 private sector members.