Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act of 2013

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, the chairman of the Energy Committee, for his comments on not only this very important legislation but his leadership on energy issues as we have worked together on the Energy Committee, a committee that I know the Presiding Officer enjoyed his time on, recognizing that there is so much we can be doing as a Nation on a bipartisan basis to make a difference within our communities, across our regions, not only for the economy and jobs but to make a difference globally in terms of how we handle our energy and our energy resources.

We talk a lot about the ``all of the above'' strategy, and perhaps that has different interpretations depending upon what part of the country you are from. But one of the slogans that was going around a few years back was: Produce more. Use less. Well, now we are talking about the ``use less'' side of that ledger, equally important. I come from a producing State. But let me tell you when you come from a State where our energy costs are some of the highest in the Nation, if not the highest in the Nation, we are also pretty good and wise about how we use less.

I am very pleased that we are at this point today where we are finally taking up the energy efficiency bill. The chairman has mentioned it has been a long time since we have seen energy legislation debated here on the floor. I do find it troubling that we have gone so long without meaningful and sustained debate about energy policy.

Each year our committee sends dozens of bills to the floor with our signature stamp of bipartisan approval which I think is key. Yet for years we have kind of seen the bills come to the floor and that has been the end of the road for those particular efforts. While a small number of our public lands bills are able to pass through by unanimous consent, those that are related to energy, those that often need a little more work to pass this Chamber, are virtually never brought up for further consideration.

I do understand we have all kinds of pressing matters in front of us--obviously the debate over the Syria resolution clearly one of them, the continuing resolution that we will have in front of us as we work to fund the government, critically important. If we do reach agreement on how we should proceed to either of those measures, I will certainly be the first to agree they need to be brought forward for debate. But when we have finished those, I am hopeful we will return, if we have not yet concluded, to energy legislation because it has been too long neglected in this Chamber.

I came to the position as ranking member of the Energy Committee back in 2009. I was very optimistic about what we would accomplish in this area. All of those of us on the committee had worked to deliver three major energy bills during the proceeding years I had been on the committee. We had the Energy Policy Act of 2005, we had the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act of 2006, we had the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. All of them were partially or entirely written by our committee. They all received strong support in the Chamber, and they all eventually became law.

Fast forward to where we are today. Our floor debate in 2007 remains the last time, the last time the Senate truly engaged on energy policy. In the interim, about the best we have seen are some amendments here and there along the process or perhaps dueling side-by-sides that seem are inevitably voted down.

But the lack of action on energy legislation is not because we have abandoned a bipartisan approach in committee. It is not because we have perhaps run out of good ideas. It is certainly not because we are somehow unable or unwilling to report legislation to the full Senate. We reported a comprehensive bill back in 2009 that sat on the calendar untouched for 17 months. We unanimously reported a bill to help prevent another offshore spill in 2010. That too was ignored.

The reality is we have one of the most bipartisan and active committees in the Senate. But, unfortunately, we are almost regularly in a situation where we are not provided the floor time needed to complete our work.

I am not complaining here, I am just pointing out some facts. But the chairman noted there has been this pent-up demand, this frustration, about not only where we are in the process but the opportunities that are lost. When you think about the changing dynamic in this country since 2009, I think about what has changed in the energy sector during that course. The fact that we have not addressed real, fulsome energy legislation is quite telling.

But I am hopeful the Senate is now finally on the verge of reversing its unfortunate approach to energy policy. As the chairman has noted, we have already ordered more than 50 bills--50 bills--to be reported to the Senate this year alone. Today, as we begin debate on the Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act--I do not even know why we are calling it that; we just call it Shaheen-Portman around here. The work the authors of this legislation have done I certainly applaud.

But we are here at this point because of the very concerted efforts of the authors of this bill, Senators Portman and Shaheen, their great bipartisan work, months and months of negotiation, months of waiting. So to be here today, to stand in support of this bill, is wonderful.

I have spent some time on this floor talking about an energy blueprint I had crafted back at the beginning of the year, Energy 20/20. I said this is 115 pages of energy policy, but it can be summed up in one bumper sticker. It says: Energy is good. The fact we are here on the floor talking about energy efficiency is absolutely key.

When I mentioned that 20/20 blueprint, in it I make the point, I make the push that we need to strive to make our energy more abundant, more affordable, clean, diverse, and secure. While we often focus on the more obvious efforts to advance energy policy, in my case more production on Federal lands, passage of approval of the Keystone XL Pipeline, the restoration of some real balance in new regulation, and I think a much greater focus on innovation, it is also critically important that we look to the efficiency side. It must be a larger part of our energy debate. It deserves to be a larger part of our Nation's energy policy.

The reasons why are no mystery. Efficiency is good for the economy and for our environment. It enables us to waste less and to use our resources more wisely--great conservative principles.

At the same time it can help create jobs and deliver lasting financial benefits. Study after study--and the chairman has pointed out some of those--has shown we could save billions of dollars every year through reasonable efficiency improvements, whether in small appliances, large buildings, or someplace in between. These potential savings cannot be overlooked at a time when we see so many of our families and businesses are struggling to make ends meet, when our debt is escalating and the price of energy remains well above where most of us want it to be.

As policymakers, I can't think of efficiency as an energy issue alone. It is also a bottom-line issue that affects every one of us and every one of our constituents back home.

While we can all agree on the importance of efficiency, we can also agree there is a legitimate debate over the Federal Government's role in this area. In my judgment, that role should be limited and the costs associated with it should be minimal.

The Federal Government must itself be efficient as it pursues efficiency. I think these are areas we can work to enhance. We cannot simply lavish subsidies, pass bill after bill, or impose mandate after mandate, and suggest that is somehow a pursuit of a greater good.

Instead, I think the Federal Government should strive to fulfill three pretty distinct roles. It can act as a facilitator of information that consumers and businesses need to make sound decisions. It can serve as a breaker of barriers that discourage or prevent rational efficiency improvements from being made. As the largest consumer of energy in our country, it can lead by example by taking steps to reduce its own energy usage.

Those are the criteria by which we can evaluate whether the Federal Government is on the right track on energy efficiency and also the criteria by which we can judge whether this particular bill, the Shaheen-Portman bill, would improve our current policies.

Let me move to the bill for a moment and explain why I support it. First, the scope. The scope is both limited and appropriate. It does not contain new mandates for the private sector, not for buildings, not for appliances, not for anything. The provision on building codes is a good example of what the bill does and does not do.

I would not be supporting a provision if it required the mandatory adoption of those codes, but in this bill it is voluntary, with the Federal Government stepping in to help facilitate new models that others can choose to follow.

The second point here is the cost. We are all focusing on costs nowadays. The costs of this bill are fully offset. It contains no direct spending. The only provision that received a score from the Congressional Budget Office has been dropped. A grants program that passed our committee has now been dropped as well. Some of these things we look at and say we would rather they had been in there, but we are trying to deal with the cost side.

I appreciate both Senators Shaheen and Portman for working with us on that. The authorizations that remain in the bill have been fully offset by cutting a provision from the 2007 Energy bill. Any Federal dollars that are ultimately spent on this legislation will have to be secured through a future appropriations process within the context of our larger debate about the overall Federal budget.

The third point here is I support this bill because of the process that was followed to bring it to this point. Again, I wish to give the chairman credit, and clearly Senators Shaheen and Portman. It was bipartisan from the beginning. The Senator from New Hampshire got together with the Senator from Ohio to lead its development.

I can remember the conversation years ago when he said: I am working on this. It was long before there was any draft. It was working through in the kind of good old-fashioned, roll up your sleeves, let's work on doing good things in energy policy when it comes to efficiency. I give him full credit.

The committee held a hearing on this bill. We had testimony from the Department of Energy and other experts. We moved through to a markup. This could be considered regular order. We improved the bill in the markup. We reported it favorably by a vote of 19 to 3. Possible amendments have been worked on by members and staff alike over these past several months. I think there are many good amendments we all assume will easily win passage.

At the same time the bill's sponsors have continued to work to refine and improve the legislation leading to the product we have before us today. On scope and substance, on cost and on process, this bill has been a good example. This has been an example of regular order, working as usual, showing how the Senate can work, showing the Senate at its best. The only trouble we have encountered is securing the floor time necessary to try to secure its passage.

It is my hope with the efforts of the sponsors of this bill, with the efforts of the chairman of the Energy Committee continuing to push to build good things--rather than trying to blow up things--we will have an opportunity to see this measure enacted into law.

As I mentioned, we don't have an opportunity here on the floor of the Senate to debate energy often or as often as I would wish. By the looks of what we have pending in front of us, we recognize there may be interruptions. It is my hope we can move quickly and take up many of these bipartisan amendments Chairman Wyden has mentioned.

Let us make the most of the opportunity we have before us now. Let us weigh the Federal Government's proper role in efficiency. Let us make sure this bill reflects all of that. Let us start working through the amendments that have been filed and move forward with a process that will yield good policy for this country.

Again, I thank the sponsors for their yeoman's work in getting us to this point, and I look forward to the discussion and the debate we will have in the days ahead. I know Senator Shaheen, with all the work she has put into this, is anxious to finally discuss her bill in the Chamber.

I yield the floor.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source