Sponsors (2)
Introduced February 25, 2026 by Brian Emanuel Schatz · Last progress February 25, 2026
The bill accelerates federal research, coordination, and market-readiness for ocean-based carbon removal—potentially advancing scientific understanding and private market opportunities—while increasing fiscal costs and raising environmental, equity, and governance risks if deployment outpaces careful oversight and community protections.
Scientists, researchers, and federal research programs receive sustained, multi-agency funding and support (NSF, NASA, NIST and others) to advance marine carbon dioxide removal (mCDR) science, monitoring, and modeling over multiple years.
Project developers, protocol creators, and government partners gain clearer, standardized definitions, protocols, and centralized program leadership (Secretary of Commerce and Regional Ocean Partnerships), reducing regulatory uncertainty and duplicative agency actions.
Coastal, local, and Indigenous/Tribal communities are given greater voice and resources through required meaningful engagement, consultation, funding for local impact studies, and provisions to integrate traditional ecological knowledge.
Coastal communities, fisheries, and marine ecosystems face elevated ecological and health risks if commercialization or field trials proceed before environmental impacts and long-term permanence are fully understood and managed.
Taxpayers may bear substantial and open-ended federal costs through authorized appropriations (NSF, NASA, NIST and other programs), and funds for mCDR research could divert resources from other climate mitigation, basic science, or agency priorities.
Private firms and technology developers could capture disproportionate commercial benefits from public R&D and standards-setting (including potential standards that favor particular technologies), while local communities absorb environmental and social risks.
Based on analysis of 8 sections of legislative text.
Establishes a federal multi-agency program to research, test, measure, and standardize marine carbon dioxide removal, fund grants, and require community and tribal engagement.
Creates a coordinated federal effort to study, test, and standardize marine carbon dioxide removal (mCDR). It directs NOAA to launch a Program to fund and oversee research and field trials, requires NSF and NASA to support related research and monitoring, and tasks NIST with developing measurement and standards, while emphasizing tribal and community engagement and environmental safeguards. The Act sets definitions (including a carbon removal credit usable on voluntary carbon markets), requires adherence to existing maritime and research-security laws, funds competitive grants with minimum engagement funds for community/tribal consultation, and authorizes unspecified appropriations for NASA and NIST to support their roles through 2027–2031.