of the sensual resources in the southwest the department has cancelled and withdrawn oil and gas leases from utah to montana and the new o c s plan which was scheduled to start this last july opening for the first time in a generation new areas of the us has been delayed by as long as two years i hope that this year we can work together to focus the of this subcommittee on domestic job creation and energy development now today's hearing could not be more timely considering the terrible devastation we saw last week caused by the earthquake in haiti and the chairman was good to reference the need for having this hearing and how it is so timely the terrible toll on human lives ended or forever changed in an instant of natural disaster this is a reminder to all of us of the important protections the earthquake hazard reduction programs have given our citizens over the last decade we've seen tens of thousands killed in earthquakes in china and haiti and violent earthquakes caused tsunamis that wreaked havoc on indonesia and samoa but here in the domestic u s deaths from earthquakes have been relatively few much of this is thanks to our national commitment to hazard reduction programs we are here today to examine the natural hazard reduction act of two thousand nine hundred thirty eight twenty our consideration of this legislation was action by the house science committee from late last year the science committee reduced the authorization levels for the earthquakes hazards program to operate with the largest reduction taken directly from the u s geological survey specifically the science committee to lower the authorization for the u s g s by twenty million dollars annually the question we must consider is if this is a good decision now while the science committee may look at the snapshot of earthquake programs committee  president climate change program a forty one percent increase while the u s g s hazards program for earthquakes and other disasters so an increase of just over two percent this raises some important questions how much of the rapid increase in climate change funding a five hundred percent increase in three years is diverting funding from earthquake hazard programs earthquakes are a clear and present danger while the dangers and timing of climate change remain unclear and the science behind the bunting has been called into question by the recent climate gate scandals federal budgeting is a question of priorities how we allocate our federal dollars clearly in the last two budgets the democratic majority has decided that climate change is more important than earthquake hazards today will give us an opportunity to consider if we should cut authorization levels to match the appropriations witness the statement of dr david applegate senior science adviser for the earthquake and geological hazards within the u s geological survey within the department of interior and dr applegate we look forward to your testimony i believe you're familiar with a five minute rule written statement as longer of course we will submit that for the record but we have the system that issues during the house with  national earthquake has a reduction program last week's devastating earthquake in haiti is a stark reminder of the importance of this issue as a matter of public safety while earthquakes are inevitable there are consequences on our build environment or not and there is much that we can do as a nation to improve our resilience to earthquakes and other natural hazards the heart of the need her partnership is a shared commitment to reduce losses from earthquakes by translating research results into implementation actions that commitment involves collaboration with other federal partners state and local government universities and the private sector carrying out its role within the herb the u s g s strives to deliver the information in tools that emergency managers public officials and citizens need to prevent earthquake hazards from becoming disasters in the minutes after an earthquake strikes knowing where shaking was most intense can save lives the u s g s provides rapid reports of potentially damaging earthquakes to the white house state and local emergency managers the news media and the public these notifications are delivered to over one hundred thousand users or around the globe and the u s g s earthquake web site receives an average of two million hits per day the two thousand need her pre authorization establish the advance national seismic system to modernize and expand our network infrastructure in order to improve the delivery of earthquake information to those who need it most a substantial increase in the number of an s s stations will be realized as a result of recovery act funding as we replace outdated equipment at hundreds of sites even so its conclusion of these upgrades and assess will be approximately twenty five percent complete in california the upgrades will allow existing systems to provide timely earthquake alerting and support development of a prototype system capable of delivering automated warnings after an earthquake occurs but before strong shaking arrives at sites away from the epicenter in order to report on all significant seismic events worldwide the u s g s national earthquake information center in colorado relies on the global seismographic network which the u s g s has developed jointly with the national science foundation and the iris consortium of universities based on data from the and assessed in the g s and our prompt assessment of global earthquakes for response or pager system shown shown here provides rapid estimates of population exposure to shaking it overlays the estimated shaking intensity with a population database to illustrate the expected human impact the first page or estimate for the haiti quake was available in twenty minutes showing that roughly two million people had been exposed to violence shaking even before news reports began to filter in the scope of the humanitarian disaster was clear to aid agencies relief organizations and others who mobilized to respond to the crisis here in the u s seventy five million people live in moderate to high hazard areas across thirty nine states one of the most important achievements that need her position aid is the translation of research into models of the location and expected severity of earthquake shaking nationwide these models are incorporated into the seismic safety elements of building codes the national are complemented by urban seismic hazard apps which provide details on local site conditions for use in engineering and planning as reported by family california is home to over half the nation's earthquake risk due to high hazard and a large at risk population as was noted california has more than a ninety nine percent chance of a magnitude six seven a great earthquake within the next thirty years with the most likely sources of large damaging earthquakes being the southern san andreas fault and the hayward fault and that understanding is being translated into public preparedness just one example in southern california u s g s scenario for the southern senator a us served as the basis for the largest public preparedness exercise in u s history which attracted over five million californians many school children to practice earthquake safety drills and take additional actions in two thousand and nine the shakeout went statewide with nearly seven million participants another way that the u s g s works with its partners to make earthquake hazards understood through education an outreach products millions of copies of earthquake preparedness handbook have been distributed millions of these handbooks been distributed in california alaska utah and other states a version for the central u s is being developed in time for the bicentennial commemoration of the new mattered sequence of earthquakes that struck the heartland in the winter of eighteen eleven twelve both u s g s and assessment and monitoring activities depend on the targeted geoscience research which is the third major u s g s responsibility within the new her partnership external research supported by the u s g s through grants to universities state surveys and geotechnical consultants augments our own internal research capabilities targeted research underpins development of our seismic hazard maps and rapid earthquake response products and conclusion the u s g s strongly supports reauthorization of need her which is proving to be a successful partnership that continues to make valuable contributions to the nation's resilience to earthquakes and other hazards i'll be pleased to answer any questions you might have thank you for inviting me to testify in the reauthorization of her and the natural hazards reduction act of two thousand and nine and the time i have available like to give a brief summary of my written testimony as we said our job is to make sure that the folks who are responding to a disaster have as much situational awareness as possible both about the earthquake itself and about the in this case the aftershocks and associated hazards the investments that we've been able to make reauthorization that we're looking at here how does that relate to our capacity to do what we're doing in haiti and elsewhere will the existing authorization which we've been under is for full implementation of our advanced national seismic system that would fully modernize and expand the network so that we can basically provide the fastest possible information with a twenty million dollar cut back that's going to result in a shortfall correct at the that's right it would it would lead us not to be able to to reach the full implementation that was identified in the congressional iraq was required yes required implementation are there any implications to you know i mean i know it's only been a week since the earthquake but it was over two that's occurred in one's lifetime or even one's parents lifetime these hazards exist as we say earthquakes are a national issue and there are a number of areas around the country including particularly the new mattered seismic zone where although we've got lots of small winter of eighteen eleven to eight hundred twelve with damage very broadly felt throughout the mississippi river back today was felt all the way to charles south carolina course at the time there were four hundred people living in the mississippi river valley today we have cit possibility in your testimony of the earthquake early warning system and wondering if you could elaborate on that and how it relates to the funding levels that we're talking about in the authorization of this legislation i noted to you earlier when we spoke that i had a the feasibility of developing that methodology methodology and technology however if the funding disappears because right now it's considered to be a relatively low priority item compared to the other tasks that are involved with activities and we're looking at the application of early warning for high speed rail so basically we can create a system in this country similar to what the japanese have in the bullet train while i'm very active in the high country and what they're doing in other parts of the world and other places where technology and research is being done and in canada as well as it relates to what sort of collaborative models we we most rapid information we can we can get out in fact that the idea that it would actually reach people ahead of the shaking this is something that we have that is exists in japan is something in turkey and a number of other countries we have we can learn from their experience and we can we can be successful in providing these warnings that you know as i mentioned there are a number of different uses where we feel that that information is going to help public safety my time's expired the gentleman from colorado mr lambert thank you mr chairman and this question is for both of you what would the national earthquake hazard reduction program look like if it had been fully funded at the authorized levels since two thousand it had been fully funded since two thousand we would at this point have a fully modernizing and expanded system we would have seventy one hundred sensors here in the u s that includes about half of those would be in structures like bridges buildings and others so that engineers would be able to understand when ground shaking occurs how buildings respond to that the other half would be in the ground it would be focused in high hazard areas we have a number of regional networks maintained by partner universities throughout throughout the u s and they would be able to provide rapid shaking intensity information and indeed early warning is other geological hazards that are in your purview such as landslides flooding and volcanic eruptions volcano early warning system that again like a s s would fully modernize and expand our capabilities for issuing warnings on volcanoes in the case of landslides we have a partnership with the national weather service we have a prototype early early warning system for debris flows civically in wildfire impacted areas that we're doing with that with the weather service so those are we're in all of these areas where we're working to develop the integrated network there certain characteristics of aftershock that are worse than others considering the damage that might have been done from the initial shocks and in particular a question about today's issue with aftershocks is you already have buildings that have been weakened through the main shock and can in fact be brought down by the additional shaking in the case of the haiti earthquake the aftershock sequence has been concentrated to the west of the epicenter so that's away from port au prince so that has been very important that the shaking is therefore not been as intense in those most densely populated areas this morning's magnitude five point nine quake hit in that same level it was we had did you feel it reports on our site from all over anyone who felt an earthquake and moderate shaking their location of course is very important one of the things we worry about though is that we know that stress has been increased on areas of the fault adjacent to what ruptured and would there be more attention paid with the higher the higher authorized level or would there be less attention paid everywhere with additional investment certainly would would be reflected in the eastern u s we have a number of regional networks that are part of this vast national seismic system that their origins really go back to they were often funded initially by the nuclear regulatory commission for understanding earthquake threats near power plants they were their old academic networks some of the stations forty years old the recovery of funding has helped us to make to modernize some of those stations but the ideas with full modernization networks like the ones that are run by lamont columbia university run by boston college run down in south carolina these areas where the hazard may not be as high but we know that the risk is very considerable because of the population exposure and the type of buildings so certainly a fully  course we're going to be to some extent just the nature of the way funding is worked i guess opportunities have been taken for example salt lake city currently has fairly good coverage because of the winter olympics and there was some geological survey as a as a partner in this effort they're also our partners for looking at the seismic activity in the in the tetons as well so it's not only yellowstone but you've got quite an active west western part of europe part of your state there so those partnerships have been absolutely crucial because that's the only way that we're going to be able to deliver the kind of information that's really needed by folks you know at the county level and i should add to the montana geological survey maintains one of our regional seismic networks as been indeed a real shot in the arm for our ability to modernize existing stations and assess both modernization and expansion because of the one time nature of those stimulus funds were being very careful we're only modernizing existing state so we're not taking on any additional long term costs it will get us about a quarter of the way we'll have about seven thousand eight hundred of the seventy one hundred stations that have been identified in the congressional correlation one in thirty years or ninety nine what are we looking at from what we've been able to learn as it relates to the potential chances of a devastation could take a whole host of efforts that they've done because of the size and the similarities there as california and other parts of this country how well are we doing as best as we can to collaborate with china and  absolutely and i would say that specifically the effort we've got in california to both develop the algorithms that will be used for early warning and then to implement a prototype that's being done with the best minds that we've got a partnership with cal tech with berkeley with the university of southern california and and with several other universities as well so we're really trying to tap into the best brains we can and i would say even more importantly we're trying to tap into the best partners our idea is with a prototype we're really going to understand how users would put this to the test for example dr mentioned the bay area rapid transit system because of the gas and electric itself a number of other hospitals fire department think we want to continue to encourage those kind of private public partnership and we'll work on the author authorization of this legislation i think my colleagues on a bipartisan basis their questions and comments prayers are with those folks and haiti and we'll continue to do everything we can possibly to who have been devastated by this terrible earthquake and we'll do everything we can to ensure that americans in the future are provided with the most level of early warning and notice and the types of protection that we can ensure realizing that today sadly we cannot predict earthquakes but we know for certain they will occur so this conclu