Terminating the National Emergency Declared with Respect to Energy
Floor Speech
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Mr. HEINRICH. Mr. President, I have come to the Senate floor today to say what every New Mexican I know can easily tell you: Americans are reeling from an affordability crisis. It doesn't matter if you are talking about the price of groceries or rent or healthcare, everybody is stretched thin.
They need help and they need it now and they need it from Congress and the President. But help is not what the President and his administration are delivering. Instead of working to lower healthcare and energy costs for American families, the President, his administration, and Republicans in Congress are choosing to drive those costs through the roof.
They repeal energy tax credits making it harder and more expensive to build and deliver energy to the grid or even just to put solar panels on your own roof. They made it more expensive to make your home energy efficient. They imposed steep tariffs on steel and aluminum, driving up energy costs, infrastructure costs, and they are blocking energy from coming onto the grid.
Now, if it feels chaotic, it is probably because it is. They are trying to sow chaos. While all of the numbers and projects and policies float around in the headlines, the real story, the real impact is in your budget. It is in your electric bill.
According to the Energy Information Administration, residential electricity bills have already increased by almost 10 percent since President Trump took office. Household energy costs are expected to increase by another $170 annually by 2035 thanks to tax credit repeals and tariffs.
And when it comes to the impacts on energy supply, it is the same story. As of August, clean power estimated that 25,000 megawatts--that is like 25 gigawatts, it is 25 nuclear powerplants' worth of energy-- 25,000 megawatts of planned energy generation have been lost to projects being canceled or delayed since the President's election.
That is more than enough power for 8.4 million homes in the United States. And I have bad news: It is about to get a whole lot worse. That is because President Trump is strangling the energy supply we badly need to drive down costs for everyone.
From canceling energy projects to withholding energy permits, to issuing illegal stop work orders on fully permitted generation projects, President Trump is waging a war on affordable, American-made energy. Most recently, that came in the form of canceled energy projects. Last week, the Trump administration unlawfully canceled nearly $8 billion in Federal investments in 223 energy projects across 21 States, including 10 in the State of New Mexico.
In Albuquerque, two projects by the same company were targeted. They have already had to make their first round of layoffs. If these awards are not restored in the next 45 days, they will be forced to lay off 50 percent of their workforce. These are people's lives we are talking about.
And their local partners and collaborators who were anticipating growth opportunities because of the investment are being left in the cold. In Socorro, NM, one technical university lost funding for four projects--$67 million in total. One project alone will impact 36 student researchers, all of whom now have to search for new funding or lose their research roles altogether.
In Fruitland, NM, another canceled project could have unlocked the key to keeping 600 people working. In Taos, NM, more chaos is playing out. Funding for Kit Carson Electric Cooperative's project to provide a battery energy storage system and microgrids to rural communities, canceled.
This project would have directly improved reliability in Picuris Pueblo, the Taos Ski Valley, and El Rito West. Millions of dollars have already been expended, and countless New Mexicans were depending on that project. Now they are all left wondering whether those funds will ever be reimbursed or if New Mexicans will simply be left to pay the price and pick up the pieces.
But it looks like cancellations may just be getting started. This morning there was another article about rumors of even more cancellations coming.
According to reports, this next round of cancellations could involve another 260 awards and $13 billion in revoked funds. Whether that happens or not, I can tell you, without a doubt, that the harm done from the first round will be irreparable.
The cancellations will mean lost jobs for Americans, lost educational opportunities for students. It will mean higher energy bills for households and businesses across this country.
It will make it even harder for folks who are already struggling to make ends meet because of the affordability crisis instigated by this administration's tariffs and economic policies.
It will mean less domestic manufacturing and innovation, all while diminishing America's competitive leadership globally, and it will make it harder for impacted developers and utilities to secure their financing.
That is not just true for the now-canceled projects but also for any future opportunities that depend on the stability of things like government permits and regulatory structure, investments, grants because that is another casualty of this administration's war on American-made affordable energy: the reliability of the permitting process.
In January, on his first day in office, President Trump paused all new leasing and permitting of wind energy projects on public lands.
In February, the Army Corps of Engineers singled out and delayed 168 energy projects on private land.
In March, the Environmental Protection Agency withdrew the permit for Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind.
In April, the Department of the Interior imposed a stop-work order on the Empire Wind 1 project.
In July, the Interior Department released a directive requiring the Secretary's personal review and approval of every wind and solar energy project on public lands--a move that will undoubtedly cause long delays.
In August, the Department of the Interior issued an illegal stop-work order on Revolution Wind's offshore wind project--a project that was already 80 percent done. It was fully permitted, and it was 80 percent complete, and they told people to go home. They said: Your job doesn't matter.
In September, the Trump administration asked a court to cancel the permit on a wind farm off of Ocean City, MD. It is a project that would generate 2.2 gigawatts of energy--enough to power 718,000 homes and, just as importantly, support almost 2,700 jobs every year over the next 7 years.
That is just among the ones that have actually been in the news. I have heard from companies across the Nation about delays and difficulties getting their projects permitted.
So let's be clear. Spending your time canceling ready-to-go energy projects isn't doing anything to address the energy crisis.
Instead of fixing any of this, President Trump's Executive order makes it worse. Here is what his order actually does: hikes energy costs for millions of Americans by doubling down on expensive fossil fuels when it makes no economic sense, sends hundreds of thousands of American jobs overseas as other countries continue to develop their next-generation energy sources, decreases our American-made domestic energy supplies, forces us to be more reliant on foreign energy sources, and erodes our economic competitiveness and energy dominance.
It does not have to be this way. The last time we faced an energy crisis in the United States, it was the 1970s. Energy prices were skyrocketing because of the 1973 oil crisis, when barrels of oil--then, our most in-demand energy source--quadrupled in price. U.S. energy production could not meet domestic demand, and the country saw blackouts and brownouts.
With an energy crisis on its hands, Congress actually acted. In a bipartisan effort, Congress created the Department of Energy. It funded significant research around the country to explore new ways to power things--solar, geothermal, nuclear--including the Energy Research and Development Administration. It worked on advancing transmission systems to create more competitive energy markets, saving money for everyone.
Congress met the moment and defined our energy future for decades to come. As part of that, in 1976, construction began on a 5-megawatt thermal solar test facility at the Energy Research and Development Administration's Sandia Laboratories in Albuquerque, NM. Before it was even complete, the facility became the largest operational solar installation in the world. This solar test facility was just one small example of the huge bipartisan effort to meet that moment.
Today, we are at a similar crossroads. Demand for new technology has once again outpaced available power reserves. Infrastructure is aging. Across the country, utility prices are rising as demand for energy rises too.
Again, Congress can meet this moment. We cannot do that by doubling down on expensive fossil energy or generation sources that take 5, 6, 7, even 10 years to build. If you order a gas turbine today, it would take you 5 to 7 years just to receive it, and its price is going through the roof because of the tariffs that the President has put on things like aluminum and steel. That is not going to solve the rising costs we are dealing with right now.
In contrast, solar, wind, and battery are modular, faster to permit, and easier to construct with fewer supply chain restraints. That is especially true when they are--or were--already permitted, with shovels in the ground, workers ready to build.
Instead of accepting this reality, President Trump and congressional Republicans are flailing, and it is leaving everyday Americans to shoulder the costs.
By eliminating energy sources instead of adding more, this administration is raising your energy prices, raising your electricity bill, not lowering it. The impacts are real, and they are far-reaching.
For many households, the choice to pay hundreds more in energy costs means the choice to not pay for other things--groceries, doctor's bills, school supplies. That is not a choice you should have to make. You shouldn't be a pawn in President Trump's political games.
Senator Kaine and I introduced S.J. Res. 71 to put an end to Trump's war on American-made, affordable energy, to bring down costs for American families, to save jobs that American families rely on, and to call out this administration for its chaos and its incompetence and the fact that it doesn't seem to care about the impacts on everyday Americans.
So I call on all of my colleagues here in the Senate to join us. Vote yes on S.J. Res. 71. Do not make American families pay the price for Trump's war on affordable American energy.
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