Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016
Floor Speech
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Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, the evidence and impacts of climate change are clear and they are undeniable. Scientists can measure the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. They can measure the rising temperatures. They can measure the increasing level of the sea. They can measure the increase in extreme rainfall. All of this increases the risk for extreme weather events that threaten people and the economy. While addressing the challenges of climate change will take a comprehensive approach, we have many of the policies, the workforce, and the technologies we need to address the problem already.
To illustrate that point, I want to tell you a tale of two tax policies--one for wind and solar and one for oil, gas, and coal. Let's look at the last decade of our tale of two tax policies.
In 2005, we, the United States, installed 79 total megawatts of solar in the United States. Seventy-nine megawatts was a teeny amount back in 2005. Last year we deployed nearly 100 times that amount--7,000 new megawatts in the year 2014. Look at that. We have nearly 100 times more solar.
Well, what happened? First, technology costs plummeted. Everybody has heard of a Moore's law for semiconductors. It told us that today's iPhones would be more powerful than last generation's supercomputers. We all know Moore's Law. We knew we would move from this pocket phone to an iPhone because the technology keeps getting more powerful.
There is a Moore's law for solar as well. Every time solar panel deployment doubles globally, the cost of solar falls by 18 percent. It is predictable. It is why we are seeing the cost of a solar panel drop 70 percent since the year 2010, and it is why costs will continue to fall.
Next, 30 States enacted renewable electricity standards. Yes, now more than half of the States in our country have a standard to get a sizable portion of their electricity from renewable sources, and finally, and most importantly from a national policy perspective, we passed an 8-year extension of the Solar Investment Tax Credit in 2008. We gave this industry and these companies certainty. We now have more than 20,000 megawatts of installed solar capacity in the United States. More than 60 percent of it was added in just the last 2 years, and we are projected to double that installed solar capacity over the next 2 years. We are forecast to add 8,000 megawatts this year and 12,000 megawatts next year, and that is because we put smart tax policies on the books 7 years ago.
Look what happened. If we go from the beginning of the American Revolution until 2005, we were still only installing 79 megawatts--just a teeny, tiny amount of solar energy. But when we started putting State renewable electricity standards on the books and a new tax policy, it started to explode 100 times--1,000 times more solar in America, by the way, with all the experts saying: This can't happen. Solar isn't real. Wind isn't real. You Senators, you House Members, you have to get real. Well, this is the proof that bad policies had stopped this explosion of these technologies.
By the way, the same thing is true for wind power. We are projected to add 9,000 new megawatts of wind power in our country this year, and we are projected to add another 8,000 megawatts of wind power next year. We can see what is happening with the combined totals of wind and solar once we put the new policies on the books. It was basically an era where almost no electricity in the United States was generated by wind and solar to the next year having 5 to 6 percent of all the electricity in America coming from wind and solar. It is like the explosion of cellphones that turned into smartphones. People didn't have anything in their pockets just 20 years ago--it was like the wind and solar industry--but we changed policies in the United States. We said: We can do it. We can untether ourselves from a telephone line in our living rooms. We can let people walk around with their phone, and we began to make the same decisions on wind and solar. We can untether ourselves in the United States from coal-generated electricity that emits greenhouse gases that dangerously warm our planet, and we are now doing it. It is accelerating, and that is the beautiful part of the story.
By the end of next year, there are going to be 300,000 people employed in the wind and solar industry in the United States. Right now, there are 73,000 people building these wind turbines. Steel and iron workers are out there doing this work right now, and it generates clean, renewable, nonpolluting energy. We can do this. We are the United States of America. We are the innovation giant on the planet. We can solve this problem.
What has happened with the wind industry? Well, their tax break has now expired. Has the tax break for the oil industry expired? Oh, no. Has the tax break for the coal industry expired? Oh, no.
Those tax breaks have been on the books for 100 years. They will never expire--never. There are too many people who want to help the fossil fuel industry here in the Senate and over in the House of Representatives, but the tax breaks for the wind and solar industry--the ones that are showing the tremendous growth, innovation, and capacity to develop new technologies that we can export around the planet--are expiring.
If we look at the green generation--young people within our society--which technology do they want us to invest in? Do they want black rotary dial phones and coal-burning powerplants or do they want the new technologies of the 21st Century, their generation? Do they want the past dirty carbon pollution or do they want future clean energy? It is not even close. This is a choice that has to be made by this generation. The green generation expects us to be the leaders on this issue.
The oil and gas industry get $7.5 billion a year in tax breaks. The oil industry doesn't need a subsidy to drill for oil any more than a bird needs a subsidy to fly or a fish needs a subsidy to swim. They are going to do it anyway. What they do though is lobby to take away the tax breaks for solar and wind because they know that will displace them. Our goal, of course, should be to have a massive ramping up of these energy technologies.
Do you want to hear an incredible number? The Chinese government, while the Pope was in town here in Washington, announced that China was going to deploy wind and solar and other renewable technologies by the year 2030 that would equal the total of all electrical generation capacity in the United States of America. They are going to deploy all their coal, natural gas, hydropower, wind, and solar. Again, I said earlier that every time there is a global doubling of the deployment of solar on the planet, the price of solar drops by 18 percent. China is going to be doing that.
Last week India announced that they are going to have a massive increase in their renewable energy resources as well.
Unfortunately, the tax breaks in our own country have already expired or are going to expire for the wind and solar industries. Our country is supposed to be the leader. We are supposed to be the technological giant on this planet.
All I can say is, if we want the jobs, this is the sector where the jobs are being created. There will be 300,000 jobs in this sector by the end of next year. If we want to reduce greenhouse gases, this is the sector that can make it possible for the United States to be the leader.
If we want to be the leaders to ensure that we are acted on the message that Pope Francis delivered to the Congress just 2 weeks ago, we have to move toward these technologies. The Pope asked us to use our technological capacity in order to solve this problem. The Pope pretty much said three things. No. 1, the planet is warming dangerously, and the science is clear. No. 2, the cause of the warming is largely by human beings, and the science is clear. No. 3, we have a moral responsibility.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is a huge day because we have Members coming out to the floor to talk about this revolution and how we can find a solution so we can deal with this issue in a positive, affirmative job-creating way. We can engage in massive job creation in order to save all of God's creation. We can do it, but we have to decide that we are going to be the leaders in this sector, and all I can say is that in the end we are going to win because technology always triumphs--always. You can hold it back for a while, but in the end it is going to ultimately change our world. By the year 2100 people will look back and wonder why we ever did generate electricity by the use of fossil fuels on our planet.
I thank the Presiding Officer, and I see that Senator Schatz and Senator Whitehouse have arrived.
With that, I yield back the remainder of my time.
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