Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act of 2013

Floor Speech

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here on what we are calling the Shaheen-Portman bill, the energy efficiency bill, and I note that the lead sponsor of the bill, Senator Shaheen of New Hampshire, as well as the ranking member of the energy committee, Senator Murkowski, are both here. I have been cleared by them to take a minute on the floor right now and talk about an amendment I would like to have offered and voted on and added to this bill. We call it the pay for success amendment. It is amendment No. 1852.

What this amendment would do is something that is quite simple and bombproof for taxpayers. Ultimately, it would save money and save energy; that is, for the properties managed by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, if they do not have the capital to go back into that property and do retrofits and install efficiency measures that will bring down their cost of electricity, this amendment would allow them to contract with the private sector to bring in private capital to achieve those energy savings.

There are significant restrictions in here that will protect taxpayers. Any money that goes back to these investors comes out of energy savings and only out of energy savings. If something goes wrong and the energy savings don't materialize, the investors lose. The taxpayers and the government are held harmless.

Thanks to an amendment by Senator Coburn of Oklahoma, as we were drafting the amendment, we have even specifically exempted the administrative costs of HUD in administering the legislation. Those have to be paid before the investors take their profits. But once the investors are paid back, there is now a more efficient building and savings for taxpayers over the long haul.

In addition, the result is a reduction of our energy footprint, increases our energy independence, and reduces the contribution of ill effects, such as pollution and climate change, by HUD buildings.

Now is not the time to call it up--we are at too early a stage in the proceedings--but I did want to take a moment to urge my colleagues to support this amendment. We discussed it at length with Senator Collins of Maine when we were trying to add it to the Transportation and HUD appropriations bill, and I believe we have worked through issues presented by her office and issues presented by Senator Coburn. If anybody else has any concerns, we look forward to hearing from them, but I think this is a bombproof piece of legislation, from the taxpayers' point of view. It opens up a niche for private capital to come in and earn a return on their investment by capitalizing on the opportunity we have for energy savings in these buildings.

With that, I yield the floor and look forward to a future opportunity to discuss the amendment further and, with any luck, call it up for a positive vote. I thank Senator Shaheen and yield the floor.

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