Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 2010 And 2011
Floor Speech
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Mr. LARSEN of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Chairman, this amendment will protect intellectual property rights, or IPR, for American businesses by ensuring robust compliance with international legal IPR requirements and the enforcement of those requirements related to energy and environmental technologies.
Congressman Kirk from Illinois and I recently returned from China where we met both with Chinese leadership and American companies doing business in China. Among a number of issues that we heard on the trip, two were consistent during our meetings with the American businesses. First, there is a great deal of enthusiasm regarding the interest in energy and climate change cooperation between the U.S. and China. Second, however, is a concern that the intellectual property rights owned by those companies selling their clean-energy technologies in China and other parts of the world will not be protected, and the green jobs that could be created here at home will be lost.
According to the International Energy Agency, the world needs to invest $45 trillion in energy in the coming decades to cut in half greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. To meet that goal, clean technology innovation must increase by 100 to 1,000 percent. The global market for environmental products and services is projected to double from $1.37 trillion per year at present to $2.74 trillion by 2020. And according to the American Solar Energy Society, by 2003, industries with green collar jobs could provide up to 40 million American jobs and generate up to $4.53 trillion in annual revenue.
IPR protection gives companies the confidence to invest in critical research and development efforts to meet the growing demand for clean-energy technology. For this reason, Congressman Kirk and I have offered this amendment to H.R. 2410 to protect the IPR of these clean technologies and ensure these green jobs stay right here in the United States. It is critical that the investments that American companies are making in clean technology are protected. Protecting individual property rights will help us reward innovation instead of penalizing it.
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