Jean-Michel Cousteau: On the Record for 805living.com
By Anthony Head

On April 29, I interviewed Jean-Michel Cousteau. As the oldest son of the late Jacques Cousteau, Jean-Michel is every bit as passionate about the world's oceans as his father. In 1999, he founded the Ocean Futures Society in Santa Barbara to conduct marine education and ocean exploration programs. Like his father before him, Jean-Michel has dedicated his life to the arduous task of protecting the world's oceans, and in the process, he has made more than 80 films on the subject. With co-author Daniel Paisner, Jean-Michel has recently published a memoir entitled My Father, The Captain (National Geographic Books, May 2010, $26).

This interview was conducted a week after an oil-rig explosion caused a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, which to this day has continued to gush millions of barrels of oil into the waters.

805 Living: Thank you so much for your time. I know you're a busy man.
Jean-Michel Cousteau: I'm very busy but that's a good sign, you know. Otherwise I could be on State Street begging. [laughter]

I have to ask first about your thoughts on the Gulf of Mexico. Are you following those developments?
I'm not only following that but I am exasperated because we've had many accidents in the past. We have this huge, huge problem, which is costing the industry, the government, the taxpayers over a billion dollars and many more billions to come. I'm exasperated by the lack of foresight from decision makers. I want them to change.
    They have to use their brains. They have to be creative. There is money to be made in renewable energy. There are young people right now coming up with some fascinating ideas. All those energies are free. They are the work of nature. We have to gather them instead of focusing on oil. Instead of going backwards we have to go forward.

How do you think that oil spill will impact the world's oceans?
I wish I knew. But I can tell you one thing, it's impacting the entire Gulf of Mexico. We're not talking about just Louisiana, which has already been punished and looks like it will be punished again.
    I did a [one-hour television] show on the Exxon Valdez (1989, Alaska), and there were twelve thousand people sitting on their butts with paper towels cleaning one rock at a time along the coastline. That's our best technology for cleaning these spills up? I mean, come on! Are we getting a wake-up call? Are we going to change? The world is getting mad at our decision makers.

Let me turn that question back to you: Do you think we're getting a wake-up call?
It depends on the willingness of ourselves. Every one of us can make a difference. We need to communicate with our decision makers, whether it's locally, or federal or international; whether it's industries or government.
    And we need to change ourselves. I'm pretty objective. I know it's not going to happen overnight. So I'm not saying we should stop using oil tomorrow morning. But we do know oil is running out. Are we prepared for that day to come? No way. We're playing games. We're cheating ourselves. We need to deal with reality. If we were manufacturing this new technology right here in this country, we could put a lot of people back to work tomorrow morning.
    Maybe we should pay ten dollars for a gallon of gas before we get a kick in the butt to change.
If the industries finally get their brains into this, they're going to make money off this. In Bora Bora, in French Polynesia, there's an American hotel. The owner was sick of paying so much money for the oil for the energy to cool his hotel. He discovered that there was the technology to go down to, say, three hundred feet of depth and bring the cold water up to the surface. He has a solar-powered pump that brings the water up through a pipe, which goes into every public room, every bedroom, and provides the air-conditioning. The water then goes back into the ocean untouched. It will only take three and a half years to pay for the original investment of the system, and after that, he will save between one and one-point-two million dollars every single year for his air-conditioning. Everybody wins. We the consumer won't have to pay more to get into that hotel; the owner doesn't have to raise prices for the rooms; and we're not polluting the environment.

So the technology is there, but is embracing it just coming too slow?
I think the government hasn't had the courage to face up to the problems as much as it should. The industries are playing games. They say they're investing money into renewable sources of energy, but I don't see much progress. I see more advertising than I see real technology. The old-timers have to get out of the way for the new brains to change for tomorrow. Yesterday's technology is completely outdated.

Considering just how much water is on the planet, are people truly aware of our oceans on a daily basis?
We need to make the connections: When someone is skiing, they're skiing on the ocean. When someone takes a drink of water, no matter where they are, they are drinking the ocean. Once we can establish these connections, we can understand the importance of the oceans, whether you live in Beverly Hills or Topeka, Kansas.
    Easy to say, difficult to do. But the sooner we do it, the faster we can take care of the human species.
    Do we want to stay and enjoy life on this planet, or do we want to be one of the many thousands of species that disappear? We'd be the only species to do it to ourselves. My father used to say, "We know about [extinction]. The other species don't."

That's a good point on which to bring up your new memoir, My Father, The Captain. Tell me a bit about this book.
I wanted to set the record straight because there have been several unauthorized biographies and comments and write-ups that really don't reveal the facts about this tremendous gentleman and his team—and my mother.
    His wife, my mother, was the real captain behind the scenes. The first thing in the book is a drawing of my mother standing onboard the Calypso saying to my father, who is dressed up as a diver: "Wipe your fins before you come in." That's very symbolic. She spent more time on that ship than my father, my brother, and myself together. I could have written, My Mother, The Captain.

As a son and someone working in the same field as your father, does "Jacques Cousteau" sometimes cast too long a shadow?
No. I hope it lasts forever. I really do. He's a great inspiration to a lot of people—to my own children, my nephew, and my niece—those are the people carrying the flame.

I read that you were "thrown overboard" at the age of seven wearing a prototype of the Aqua Lung . It was sort of your initiation into the sea from your father, and it certainly set the stage for your life's work. But you also got a degree in architecture in Paris. Why did you pursue a land-based degree?
That too came from my childhood. My father was very interested in underwater habitats. He always wanted to spend more and more time underwater. One day I said, "Oh, we're going to move underwater and I'm going to be the first architect to build cities underwater. Where can I learn marine architecture?" I couldn't find a school, so I went to Paris to study traditional architecture. Then I went to a shipyard in Saint-Nazaire to learn about ship construction. I felt that with these two disciplines I was ready to start building major structures underwater.
    It was only after that that I came to realize that we're made to be on land. You know: If you spend too much time in a bathtub, you start to wrinkle all over.

What do you consider yourself to be first, a sailor? A writer? A filmmaker? A Renaissance man? An explorer? A navigator? An earthling?
I wish I could say everything you just said. But I want to believe I'm a communicator.

Why have you chosen Santa Barbara as your headquarters to help save, study, and explore the world's oceans?
There is lots of cultural presence here, which we can learn a lot from—navigation, marine life—the peoples who lived here and still live here have known the ocean for thousands of years, so we'd better listen to them. That's why I picked Santa Barbara. And I'd just like to make sure everyone realizes there is no more room here. The city is full. There is no place left here for people to come. [laughter]

Have you actually been all over the world?
No. I wish. But I need another two lives.

Where is the next place you'd like to visit?
Probably in the Orient. I've visited there so little. Vietnam, China, Laos, Thailand—all those places. I really feel a little out of touch with what's going on over there when it comes to the ocean. I know there are people who are desperate for their survival and they use a lot of chemicals in farming and such. I can't blame them because they're trying to feed their families.

What is an important part of environmental conservation that most people probably don't understand?
People complain about their tax dollars being spent on this and that. What about the fact that the United States of America has created the National Marine Sanctuary System? There are thirteen places in the world's oceans that have been protected. Now, we're finding out the fishing industry is starting to appreciate them because there is what's called the "spill-out effect," and the fishermen [in these locations] are not out of business because of that. That's where your tax dollars are going, too.
    So, ten years ago we created the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation (nmsfocean.org), which is outside of government, trying to help popularize this critical work the United States government has done.

Read more from Jean-Michel Cousteau in the July issue of 805 Living. To learn more about the Oceans Future Society visit oceanfutures.org.

Photo: Copyright Carrie Vonderhaar, Ocean Futures Society