Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, I thank my good friend from Rhode Island, my friend from California, Senator Boxer, Senator Schatz from Hawaii, and all the Members who work on these issues.

This is the big one. This is the issue. This is the threat to the entire planet. Young people want us to do something about it. They are wondering when the older generation is finally going to get around to doing something about it, from moving to sending pollution up into the air to moving to clean energy, moving to new energy technologies.

So as they look at this, they look at coal, they look at a 19th century technology--coal--and they say: When are we moving to the new era? Well, that is a good question because in 2005 in the United States of America we deployed a grand total of 79 megawatts of solar. In 2014, we deployed 7,000 megawatts of solar--100 times more--because we started to have a plan.

Democrats put a plan in place by creating tax breaks for solar, by incentivizing more investment in solar across the country. Individual States started to put new regulations on the books--7,000 megawatts. Now we have 20,000 megawatts of solar in the United States. But we only deployed 79 in 2005.

Now, if you really want some great news as to what is possible, in 2015 and 2016, we are going to deploy 20,000 more--in just 2 years. So we are going to double the total amount of all solar ever deployed in the United States in just 2 years.

Over on the wind front, we are going to have about 80,000 megawatts total deployed by the end of next year, bringing it up to 120,000 megawatts. How much is that? When you look at a big nuclear powerplant and you see the picture of it, that is 1,000 megawatts. So we are talking about 120 of them being deployed by the end of next year.

So the young generation looks at us and they say: Can we do this? Can we meet the goals President Obama is setting? Can we meet the objective of having 28 percent of all of our electricity coming from renewables by the year 2030?

Well, if you hear from the coal industry or you hear from the nuclear industry, if you hear from the other fossil fuel industries, they say: Well, that is impossible. You can't do it. It is absolutely just going to be a very small part of the total amount of electricity that we generate in our country.

Well, they are just dead wrong. We are proving that in 2015 and 2016 because of the fight that is taking place at the State level--the tax breaks for wind and solar that were put on the books largely by Democrats here nationally. We are doing it. It is there. We now have over 200,000 people working in the solar industry in the United States. There are only 85,000 people who are in the coal industry. Got that? It is 2015. There are 80,000 people working in the wind industry in our country.

These are the growth industries. These are the Internet corollaries in clean energy. This is where young people are going. This is where innovation is going. This is where venture capital in America is going. This is where the innovation around our planet is going. We can do this. We can reduce greenhouse gases dramatically, increase employment simultaneously, and create wealth and health for our planet.

The President's plan will reduce by 90,000 per year the number of asthma attacks in our country. It will reduce by 90 percent the total amount of sulfur that is sent up into the atmosphere. It will be something that is supported by doctors and nurses and by Presidents and Popes. That is what we have. That is what this plan is. It is a beautiful plan. It is a plan that spans not just the technological and the political but also the moral imperative that is presented by this problem.

So yes, the big question that is being asked is this: Where is the Republican plan? Well, of course, there is none because they are still in denial that there is a problem, notwithstanding the fact that every single national academy of sciences of every single country in the world says there is a problem.

This is basically a small cabal of fossil fuel executives still trying to peddle 19th century technologies in the 21st century. It would be as though there were a cabal to stop us from moving from black rotary dial phones to wireless devices so that people could walk around with the new technologies. Oh, wait. There was a cabal. They fought it for years and years and years and years because they had the monopoly. The black rotary dial phone in the living room was all anyone would ever need. We had to break down those monopolies, and we have to break down these as well.

But here it is more than just having a phone in your pocket. Now it is actually saving the planet. It is ensuring we put in place the preventive measures that will reduce greenhouse gases while creating new jobs.

Senator Whitehouse and I are part of a plan called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative across New England, New York, Delaware, and Maryland. We already have a plan in place that has, in fact, reduced greenhouse gases, which has simultaneously seen dramatic increases in wealth, creating $1.5 billion in savings for consumers. We can do this. We can do this.

The auto industry said we could not increase the fuel economy standards of the vehicles that we drive. We just went right past them. The telecommunications industry did not want us to be moving to this wireless revolution. We just went right past them. The coal industry does not want us to act right now. For the sake of the planet, for the sake of generations to come, we must go right past them and ensure President Obama's plan is enacted.

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