American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009

AMERICAN CLEAN ENERGY AND SECURITY ACT OF 2009 -- (House of Representatives - June 26, 2009)

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mark this day, June 26, 2009. My colleagues, we have an opportunity to serve in a historic session of the Congress of the United States. We have an opportunity to take action that will make a major difference in the security and independence and environment of our globe as well as our country.

We have been given the privilege by our fellow citizens to serve at a time of historic change and meeting challenges that were the subject of this past Presidential campaign. And in this past Presidential campaign there were three major candidates. You could perhaps name more, but there were two, certainly, at the end.

And the campaign of Senator McCain and Senator Obama had something in common. They were both for comprehensive cap-and-trade legislation, the candidate you supported and the candidate I supported. They put an agenda of action before the American people that they would pursue if they were elected President of the United States. Only one could be elected, but presumably both would have followed through on their commitment, as this President has, and we are today.

This is a transformative moment. This is a moment to build a clean-energy future for our country. This is a moment to create jobs in America. This is a moment to take on, at long last, a defining challenge of our time--global warming. I know my colleagues can seize this moment, if they only will.

The substitute talks about a Manhattan Project. I think the sentiments expressed in the substitute are good ones. The objectives are good ones. But Americans voted for action, not additional studies. America voted to make a difference, not to make a point. America voted for the change we could believe in. That's what this bill represents.

I know they can look back from a future in which America is independent of foreign oil. There has been much talk about taxes. Tragically, almost every debate we have on this floor devolves into: We're going to raise your taxes.

My fellow Americans know about having their expenses raised and because the foreign potentates who hold us hostage because they provide so much of our energy gave us a new tax at the gas pump--and every American remembers it. Why? Because we have not taken the action necessary to become energy independent.

And so our gasoline prices at the pump for my commuters who drive sometimes an hour or an hour and a half to get to work to support their families paid an additional $2.50 per gallon tax imposed by those from abroad who provide us energy.

This bill is about making sure that foreign interests cannot raise the expenses of our families. This bill is about making sure that we in America provide our energy, efficient energy, clean energy, energy that will not bring our globe to a heating process that will drown out what the Navy calls the littorals, the seashores, where most of our people live.

My colleagues, this bill, the American Clean Energy and Security Act, is a true turning point. This is one of the historic actions we will take not just in this Congress, but as Members of Congress, for however long a tenure we may have.

It's a complex bill because we face a complex problem. But we can sum up its outcome simply: new American jobs, less dependence on foreign energy, a reduction in the carbon pollution that causes global warming.

How does this bill accomplish those goals? Among its most important provisions are a requirement that utilities meet 20 percent of electric demand through renewable sources and energy efficiency by 2020.

I'm old enough to remember the lines of the seventies when you waited in line an hour or two or three to put gasoline in your car so you could get your child to school, get to work, pick up your child from child care. America should have acted, but we did not. Today, we're going to act.

Significant new investments in renewables, carbon capture and sequestration, electric vehicles, and cutting-edge energy research, all of that is in this bill to take action, change that America can believe in. And energy savings standards for buildings, appliances, and industries.

This bill also creates a clean-energy bank to fund promising energy projects across America. Investment in America's ingenuity and innovative entrepreneurial spirit, that's what this bill is about. That is why it's so important to America.

It invests in high-tech transmission lines to build the essential foundation for a more efficient grid. That is essential if the energy we produced can be delivered to those who need it in businesses and in homes.

New transmission lines comprised of superconducting cable and other efficient wires will carry more power within existing rights-of-way with less land use is included. The result will be a more secure, environmentally friendly grid. That's what this bill does.

I worked with the chairman and Representative Inslee to ensure that those transmission provisions were included because they are such an important part of a more cost-effective, energy efficient future that our country needs.

Of course, the bill also includes the reduction of our carbon emissions by 17 percent by 2020. Some would like to do more. Some would like to do less. But we have reached a compromise. That is the legislative process. And it is compromise that can pass this House and pass that Senate and be signed by the President and become law. And make progress. That's what our responsibility is. And then, more than an 80 per reduction by 2050.

We can fight global warming with the same kind of market-based cap-and-trade solution that was so effective in combating acid rain at minimal cost in the 1990s. Global warming threatens every one of us. There was disagreement on that for a long period of time--some 7 years in the Bush administration, until the last year, President Bush, our President, decided that, yes, global warming was in fact a challenge that must be met.

This is not a partisan issue. This is an issue on which we have reached consensus. Global warming threatens every one of us. It will affect the kind of lives our children will lead and the kind of prosperity our country and our world will enjoy.

To those who complain about the cost of the bill, I answer that we are all paying the cost of carbon emissions already, and certainly, as I pointed out earlier, paying the cost of being hostage to those abroad who provide our energy.

The longer we wait to act, the more we will pay year after year after year. But if we take action now, we can get jobs, growth, clean energy, and energy independence for less than the price of a postage stamp a day for each of us, according to the EPA and CBO.

And with this bill passed and signed, the United States will finally be able to argue persuasively and credibly for global action on a challenge that knows no borders. We understand that if the Chinese do not act, or the Indians don't act, the air that they belch will soon come to this continent and our children and families will be at risk.

This is a global problem. But America is the leader. America must lead. America must set the example. This bill does exactly that.

At the same time, action on global warming will send a powerful job-creating price signal to the private sector, spurring innovation in every part of the renewable energy economy. Jobs, jobs, jobs. That is one of the reasons why the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, a business coalition dedicated to fighting climate change has argued that ``the way we produce and use energy must fundamentally change both nationally and globally''--and that this coming change represents an excellent opportunity for economic growth.

And that is why another coalition of 19 businesses, including the Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Duke Energy, National Grid, H.P., Starbucks, and Nike wrote to President Obama that this bill ``will drive investment into cost-saving, energy saving technologies and job-creating innovation, create the next wave of jobs in the new energy economy and will provide the predictability we need to plan for future business success.''

Those aren't my words. Those are the words of leaders in the corporate community in America who know something about innovation, enterprise, and free markets.

It has long been understood that acting on global warming is a moral necessity as well as an intellectual necessity. But now, more and more of us are realizing that it makes powerful economic sense as well.

Madam Speaker, let me as an aside thank you for your presiding at this time on this historic bill and for presiding over so much legislation in such a fair and effective fashion.

This House will miss your service, but the country will enjoy your continuing service. I thank you, Madam Speaker.

Madam Speaker, a future of clean energy is well worth the price. A Republican governor, inaugurated in the State of Maryland, in his inaugural address said that the cost of failure far exceeds the price of progress.

The cost of failure for the last three to four decades has cost this country. Progress will be far less expensive than failure. My children, my grandchildren and the generations to come will be either the beneficiaries of our stewardship or the victims of our neglect.

I urge my colleagues this day to reject this substitute, not because it is bad for the words that it incorporates, but because its effect would be to stop action so desperately needed by this country and this globe.

I urge my colleagues, defeat this substitute, pass this bill, and take this historic opportunity for our children, our grandchildren and generations yet unborn.

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