Ron Johnson Blocks Resolution To Recognize That Oceans Are Warming–Then Sheldon Whitehouse Responds

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:00]Without objection.

[00:00:02]Mr. President, here is a simple truth.

[00:00:05]Climate change is real.

[00:00:09]Earlier this year, I came to the floor and asked my colleagues if they could all agree on this simple scientific fact.

[00:00:18]This being the temple of Mammon, run by fossil fuel, to no one's surprise, they could not.

[00:00:27]So, I hoped that if I broke down the reality of climate change into smaller simple truths, we could then find areas of agreement.

[00:00:40]But, 2 weeks ago, when I asked on the floor if we could all agree to the simple truth that sea levels are rising, I was once again met with an objection.

[00:00:52]So, let's give it another go.

[00:00:56]Today's simple truth.

[00:00:58]The oceans are warming.

[00:01:02]Can we agree on that?

[00:01:05]I have come to the floor several times to talk about the fact that the oceans are heating by the zeta joule.

[00:01:15]So, let's talk for a minute about what a zeta joule is.

[00:01:20]A joule is the standard unit of energy, heat energy.

[00:01:29]A zeta joule has 21 zeros behind it.

[00:01:37]It is a spectacularly enormous number.

[00:01:44]In the past, I've reported that our oceans are measured absorbing around 14 zeta joules of excess heat every year.

[00:01:59]>> [clears throat] >> If you want a comparison, you can imagine that that is the equivalent of seven Hiroshima atomic bombs detonating in the ocean every second.

[00:02:21]That's the size of the heat transfer.

[00:02:24]And indeed, that's the number in this resolution.

[00:02:30]Sadly, since we introduced this resolution, that measure has increased.

[00:02:40]Our oceans now are warming by 23 zettajoules a year.

[00:02:49]We're breaking the ocean heat content record for the ninth consecutive year.

[00:03:00]To put that in context, the total energy consumption of all humankind on planet Earth is about 1/2 of a zettajoule per year.

[00:03:17]All of it.

[00:03:19]Every turbine, every boiler, every engine, all of our energy is 1/2 of a zettajoule.

[00:03:31]Which means that for the fossil fuel component of that 1/2 of a zettajoule that human beings create, we add 23 zettajoules of excess heat to the oceans.

[00:03:51]It's a 50 to 1 magnification, nearly.

[00:03:58]And it's driving ocean temperatures skyward.

[00:04:07]Since 1955, the top 2,000 m of the global ocean have gained approximately 372 Zettajoules of heat.

[00:04:24]And as you can see, the trajectory is that things are going to get a lot worse.

[00:04:32]By 2100, it's projected that the rate of ocean warming will be somewhere between two and six times greater than the rate of warming at the 14 Zettajoule level of annual excess heat.

[00:04:58]A world in which the ocean is warming at six times 14 Zettajoules of excess heat every year, rapidly becomes an unlivable world for a great many human beings.

[00:05:18]This amount of heat has horrific effects on biodiversity and sea life, happening already.

[00:05:26]Happening already.

[00:05:29]Fishermen know that fish populations are moving across international boundaries or out into the high seas, causing economic uncertainty and harm for fishermen.

[00:05:43]Warming sea surface temperatures shrink populations of the world's most abundant phytoplankton, significantly damaging the ocean food webs on which so many humans ultimately depend.

[00:05:59]Warming and acidification combined prevent species from being able to create their calcium carbonate shells.

[00:06:11]I've often spoken on the Senate floor about the humble pteropod, a species that I think nobody cares very much about here.

[00:06:21]But they're enormously abundant in the oceans.

[00:06:24]They've been measured as suffering extreme shell damage in the oceans, and they are not a very long trophic hop from things we do care about, like salmon.

[00:06:39]When you kick the foundation out from under a food chain, it collapses.

[00:06:47]Harmful algal blooms grow in warmer water and become more and more severe, taking a toll on fisheries, on public health, on recreation and tourism.

[00:07:00]If you want a description of what rotting algae on beaches does to tourism, just look at the stories about what Florida has experienced.

[00:07:14]Warmer oceans increase evaporation rates, which increases atmospheric humidity, which fuels extreme precipitation and stronger hurricanes.

[00:07:28]Those stronger, wetter storms and other climate change-induced threats crashing into insurance markets pose a roughly 25 trillion dollar risk.

[00:07:44]to the global housing market over the next 25 years.

[00:07:51]When the climate risk gets so severe that it crashes insurance markets, that cascades into mortgage markets, that cascades into property values, that's where the 25- trillion-dollar estimate comes from. And if you want to look more locally, Florida now leads the country in property value loss as the first and worst exposed to this climate risk.

[00:08:21]The threats don't end there.

[00:08:24]The risks that stronger, wetter storms pose to agriculture and food production, insurance, tourism, infrastructure, the energy sector, and more are very, very real.

[00:08:37]Mature and responsible warnings abound.

[00:08:44]As we noted in my last resolution, 30% of Americans live in coastal areas.

[00:08:49]10 trillion dollars of goods and services are produced in coastal counties across the United States each year.

[00:08:58]There's a lot in jeopardy due to our warming oceans.

[00:09:06]It's the simple truth.

[00:09:09]Climate change is real.

[00:09:12]Sea level rise is real.

[00:09:17]Ocean warming by the zettajoule is real.

[00:09:24]And all of it is already disrupting American lives, pocketbooks, and families, and it's getting steadily worse.

[00:09:36]So, I ask as if in legislative session and notwithstanding rule 22, unanimous consent that the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to Senate Resolution 552. Further, that the resolution be agreed to, that the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to re consider be considered made and laid upon the table.

[00:10:10]Is there an objection?

[00:10:11]Mr. President. Senator from Wisconsin.

[00:10:13]Reserving the right to object.

[00:10:16]Mr. President, I'll keep this short. I was down here a couple weeks ago when Senator from Rhode Island had a similar type of what he called a simple truth resolution.

[00:10:26]Uh but it's not that simple.

[00:10:30]The purpose of of him providing this or putting forth this resolution is he wants to do something about it.

[00:10:36]Um I'm not a climate change denier.

[00:10:42]I'm just not a climate change alarmist.

[00:10:44]I'm I'm not subscribing to the Chicken Little uh scare tactics here.

[00:10:50]The problem with trying to do something about climate change is there's nothing we can really do to impact it.

[00:10:57]Um we've spent, according to testimony in Budget Committee when Senator from Rhode Island was chair, 5 to 6 trillion dollars globally. I saw a recent speech or panel given by Secretary Energy Wright saying that we'd spent about 10 trillion dollars trying to hold back the tides, trying to address this climate change emergency.

[00:11:24]Which, by the way, two Nobel laureate physicists, Dr. Ivar Giaever and Dr. John Clauser signed on to a world climate declaration, quote, "There is no climate emergency."

[00:11:39]There isn't.

[00:11:40]What we've done though is we've taken a $6 to $10 trillion cost, the the largest malinvestment in human history, and we obviously haven't even dented climate change because we still have the Chicken Littles here claiming a climate change emergency.

[00:12:02]So, again, this isn't a simple truth.

[00:12:08]The simple truth is, yeah, climate has always changed, always will, and I would argue the simple truth is there's not much we can do about it.

[00:12:18]When there's no consensus in terms of the extent that man may impact the climate, we certainly can impact the environment, and we all are, you know, from my standpoint, we're all environmentalists. We want a clean environment.

[00:12:31]But, just think what we could have done with that $6 to $10 trillion rather than spending it, wasting it, trying to hold back the tide. So, for those reasons, Mr. President, I object.

[00:12:56]Uh Mr. President, I would just um note for the record that the um University of Wisconsin in the good senator's home state teaches the science of climate change.

[00:13:18]Teaches courses with names like climate and climate change, climate change, human and planetary health, climate change ecology, ice and climate dynamics, climate change and health disparities, soil and climate change, climate change medicine, climatic environments of the past, agricultural weather and climate, climate action planning, sustainable transportation, case studies exploring infrastructure sustainability and climate change, climate change governance, climate change sustainability and education, and as a lawyer I would add climate change human rights and the environment.

[00:13:54]I would strongly recommend that all of my colleagues who are unfamiliar with what's happening in the real world in climate change, go to their home state universities who teach the stuff and listen to what their home state universities have to say. I yield the floor.