Providing For Consideration Of H.R. 5019, Home Star Energy Retrofit Act Of 2010

Floor Speech

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Ms. PINGREE of Maine. Thank you to my colleague, Representative Matsui, for yielding the time, and to my colleague, PETER WELCH, for doing such a great job on this bill.

I want to talk a little bit about how this affects my home State of Maine.

Madam Speaker, with long, cold winters, some of the oldest housing stock in the country, and the highest reliance on oil heat in the country, paying heating bills can be a real struggle for many families in my State of Maine. Recently, I heard from a family with three kids who live in a 100-year-old home. From the street, their house looks like every other house in the neighborhood. In fact, it not only looks like every other house in the neighborhood, it pretty much is just like every other house in the neighborhood: old, leaky, and hard to heat.

By mid-December of last year, they had already gone through two tanks of oil to heat their 1,200-square-foot home, and they were wearing wool hats on the inside. Facing high heating costs and a new mortgage, they are forced to make tough decisions about improvements.

But energy-efficiency improvements can make a world of difference. Another Maine family told me that by removing inefficient fiberglass insulation and replacing it with cellulose insulation, they turned a drafty 200-year-old house into a snug and comfortable home.

Weatherizing homes isn't just good for the homeowners; it's good for the economy. For example, a company called WarmTECH in Yarmouth, Maine, is a strong supporter of this bill. According to the owners, with the creation of the Home Star program, they expect to increase their staff by at least 30 percent and purchase additional equipment.

Thankfully, my State is taking the lead on helping families save money by making their homes energy efficient. Maine has undertaken an aggressive campaign to weatherize every home in the State and half of all businesses by 2030. With the help of the Recovery Act funding, which I was proud to support, my State has created a program to provide rebates of up to $3,000 for energy efficiency improvements, and it is in the process of setting up a revolving loan fund that will make it easier to finance those improvements and pay them off more quickly.

Improving our Nation's energy efficiency benefits our economy, our national security, and our environment; but much remains to be done, and this bill, the Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010, is one more step in the right direction. By creating rebates and incentives that will make it more affordable to weatherize your home, this proposal will help families start saving money on their heating bills right away and at the same time will create good-paying jobs that can't be exported.

When people are able to invest in making their homes more energy efficient, that creates good business for contractors, energy auditors, and building supply stores. It stimulates the local economy, saves families money, and reduces our dependence on oil. This bill will allow 3 million families to save over $9 billion on their energy bills over the next decade and create 168,000 of those good-paying jobs right here at home.

Madam Speaker, sometimes I think the word ``investment'' gets a little overused around here; but the Home Star program is, in the truest sense of the word, an investment, and it is an investment that will begin paying dividends immediately by creating jobs, saving working families money, and reducing our dependence on foreign oil.

I urge my colleagues to support the rule and the underlying bill.

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