January 15, 2020 — The United States Senate last week unanimously passed the bipartisan Save Our Seas 2.0 Act to “to address the plastic debris crisis threatening coastal economies and harming marine life.”
According to a press release from Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), who introduced the bill, the act is the “most comprehensive marine debris legislation ever to pass the U.S. Senate.”
The new legislation builds on the Save Our Seas Act of 2018, introduced by Sullivan and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.). The bill is now before the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Save Our Seas 2.0 Act has three main goals, according to Sullivan’s office:
- strengthening domestic marine debris response capability with a Marine Debris Foundation, a genius prize for innovation, and new research to tackle the issue;
- enhancing global engagement to combat marine debris, including formalizing U.S. policy on international cooperation, enhancing federal agency outreach to other countries, and exploring the potential for a new international agreement on the challenge; and
- improving domestic infrastructure to prevent marine debris through new grants for and studies of waste management and mitigation.