Biden administration announces $2.6 billion toward coastal climate resilience

The Commerce Department has announced it will put $2.6 billion toward coastal climate resilience in funds from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

The funds, announced on a Monday call with the press, will include about $400 million for tribal communities in support of habitat restoration, fish hatcheries and Pacific salmon, and those in the direct path of climate change.

Another $349 million will go specifically to climate resilience in fisheries, while another $60 million will go toward climate-resilience job placement and training.

“As part of our more than $2.6 billion investment in regional coastal resiliency and conservation projects, we will be dedicating $390 million directly to tribal priorities for habitat restoration and bolstering fish populations, and supplying crucial funding to ensure our coastal communities are better prepared for the effects of climate change,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said.

The round of funding will also include $200 million in improvements to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) data-collection process, “ensuring that all Americans have access to environmental intelligence needed to protect lives and livelihoods,” NOAA administrator Richard W. Spinrad said on the call.

The funds are part of $3.3 billion allocated to NOAA by the IRA. The Biden administration previously allocated about $562 million in coastal climate resilience in April through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

On the press call, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), chairwoman of the Senate Commerce Committee, said that while crafting the IRA, the committee “wanted to make sure there was robust tribal funding and to make sure that tribes have a greater say and how those funds are used.”

“We know that our large-scale ecosystems are being impacted by climate, and we need to build what is our natural infrastructure to prevent against those storms or floods and other things that can be mitigated by us making natural resource and infrastructure investments,” Cantwell added.