Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act of 2013

Floor Speech

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Mr. HOEVEN. Madam President, I wish to thank the esteemed Senator from South Dakota for being here and for his comments on this very important issue and also for being a cosponsor of this amendment, both now and in previous amendments that I have submitted in support of the Keystone XL Pipeline project.

I believe some of the other sponsors of this amendment will be joining us. I will ask that they are able to say a few words as well as they appear. I wish to thank the Senator from South Dakota for his leadership on this issue. The pipeline will actually go through part of South Dakota, I should mention.

It was not too long ago I was back home in North Dakota, and down in the southwest corner of our State there are hundreds of miles of pipeline stacked, just waiting to be used, to be put in the ground.

A lot of that pipeline will go through the State of South Dakota, through the western part of your State. Of course, this is all about building vital infrastructure for our Nation. What it is truly about is getting our Nation to energy independence, working with Canada to have North American energy independence, so we no longer depend on oil from the Middle East. That is something all Americans very much want.

As the Senator from South Dakota said, this is a joint resolution, a concurrent resolution of the Senate, and then of course it would go to the House. So it would be putting both the Senate and the House on record together stating specifically and clearly that the Keystone XL Pipeline is in the national interest. It is in the national interest.

Why is that important? Because, quite simply, that is the decision our President needs to make. He has been reviewing this project for 5 years. TransCanada submitted an application to build this pipeline in September of 2008. Now it is September of 2013. For 5 years this has been under review and under study.

So what is the decision for the President of the United States? The decision for the President of the United States is he needs to determine is this pipeline in the national interest? Why is that important? Because it crosses an international boundary. The pipeline starts in Hardisty, which is in Alberta, Canada, and it travels down to the Canadian border and then across our country to our refineries, to a variety of refineries across the country.

It will provide 830,000 barrels of oil a day. But that is not just Canadian oil, that is also oil from the great State of North Dakota and Montana, more than 100,000 barrels a day of the lightest, sweetest crude oil produced anywhere in the country, really in the world. It takes it to our refineries so our consumers can use that refined fuel from Canada and from the United States rather than what? Rather than oil from the Middle East.

How fitting is it that we are here today where we are talking about the Middle East and Syria and today now talking about an energy efficiency bill. I will submit to you, it is a lot more efficient to move oil in a pipeline than it is by trains and trucks. So it is certainly appropriate that this amendment be part of the energy efficiency bill.

Americans do not want to get their oil from the Middle East anymore. That is a no-brainer. They do not want to get oil from the Middle East. They want it produced here. They want to work with our closest friend and neighbor, Canada. That is what this project is all about. So we figure if Congress can go on the record together, the Senate and the House together, just go on the record stating clearly, simply, and straightforwardly, after more than 5 years of study, exhaustive environmental impact statements, we are stating this pipeline is in the national interest.

It is in the national interest because we want the jobs. It is in the national interest because we want the energy. It is in the national interest because it will create tremendous economic activity, tax revenue without raising taxes for our country, for the States. It is in the national interest because of our national security.

We do not want to have to go to Venezuela or to the Middle East for our oil. We can produce it here and we can work with Canada to produce that oil. So by clearly stating in a joint resolution, in a concurrent resolution from the Senate and the House, this is in the national interest, we believe we can get the President to say, after 5 years of study, after environmental impact statement after environmental impact statement that shows no significant environmental impact, that he will make a decision.

The decision is to approve the project.

Mr. THUNE. Will the Senator from North Dakota yield for a question?

Mr. HOEVEN. I yield to my distinguished colleague from South Dakota.

Mr. THUNE. I would ask the Senator from North Dakota, who has been a great leader on all of these energy issues as we debate energy policy in the Senate, to confirm this but my understanding is that, according to President Obama's State Department, the pipeline will support 42,000 jobs across the country.

There have been some discussions and debate but the President, not too long ago, made a comment in front of an editorial board in one of the country's major newspapers that this is only going to create a couple of thousand jobs and that this was a very minimalist thing.

We have an unemployment rate that continues to hover in the 7.5-percent range and we have the lowest labor participation rate in our country today that we have had literally in 35 years, going back to the Carter administration. The real unemployment rate in other words those who are not only unemployed but those who would like to be working full time or those being forced to work part time or those who have quit looking, is actually much higher. About 14 percent--22 million Americans--fall into that category. We should be interested in anything that would create shovel-ready jobs.

We have heard from this administration, particularly when we were debating the stimulus, that we need shovel-ready jobs. We need jobs that can get people back to work immediately. This perfectly fits that description.

I would ask the Senator from North Dakota if it is his understanding, as well, that it is actually thousands of jobs that would be created as a result of building a pipeline. Wouldn't that be something we would add to the argument? There are many arguments, but this certainly is one, when we are talking about a sluggish economy where growth continues to hover in that 1- to 2-percent range, to get the economy growing and expanding again.

This is not only to get the immediate construction jobs but, when we are producing energy in this country and lowering the cost of energy because we are actually having more of it produced here as opposed to importing it from somewhere else around the world, it gives us a competitive advantage. It is good for economic growth and good for job creation.

Would the Senator from North Dakota speak to the issue of jobs and what his understanding is in terms of jobs that would be created if, in fact, we did move forward with the pipeline?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.

Mr. HOEVEN. Absolutely. This is a project, a $7.9 billion construction project. The administration's State Department has been working with a variety of agencies and has developed a number of environmental impact statements. In their own analysis, they indicate more than 40,000 jobs. We are talking of a project that costs billions to build and will create more than 40,000 jobs by their own admission. In the construction process alone, it will generate hundreds of millions in tax revenue at the local, State, and Federal level. It has a huge economic impact at a time when we need to get people working and when we need to get our economy growing.

At this time, I wish to acknowledge this is very much a bipartisan approach. Look, to get anything done, we have to be bipartisan. When we show a concurrent resolution from the Senate and the House, both Houses of Congress together, with Republicans and Democrats coming together and saying this is in the national interest, that is a powerful statement. It is one I certainly hope the President will acknowledge and make the same decision that this project truly is in the national interest.

On that note, I see Senator Mary Landrieu, my esteemed colleague from Louisiana, who is also a prime sponsor of this resolution. Also, I see Senator Begich from the great State of Alaska and Senator Heitkamp from my State of North Dakota. They are here as well. I wish to acknowledge them and acknowledge their cosponsorship of this legislation.

I will read the sponsors we have onboard already. There will be more. Then I will turn to the esteemed Senator from Louisiana, who was so instrumental in crafting this resolution.

I wish to mention all of our sponsors in addition to the Senator from Louisiana, Ms. Landrieu, Senator Thune of South Dakota, Senator McConnell of Kentucky, Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming, Senator Begich of Alaska, Senator Cornyn of Texas, Senator Blunt of Missouri, Senator Risch of Idaho, Senator Mark Pryor of Arkansas, and there will be others.

I mention these Senators both to thank them and to make the point this is very much a bipartisan effort because we are serious about getting something done. This is not about making a statement. This is about getting something done in a bipartisan way from the people's representatives across this great Nation.

I yield to Senator Landrieu, the coauthor of this resolution, and thank her for all of her great work on this project.

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