The Seaweed Rebellion: Florida's Experience with Offshore Energy Development

There has been a great deal of conflict between the federal and coastal state governments regarding offshore energy development, which is known as the Seaweed Rebellion. The principal source of the conflict is that the benefits of offshore energy development, which include increasing the domestic supply of energy, preserving jobs, generating federal revenues, and reducing the trade deficit, are national in scope. While the costs of offshore energy development, such as adverse socioeconomic and environmental impacts are borne by the coastal states.