Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Chairman, my amendment forbids defense dollars from being spent to fund two executive orders and several other provisions of law that require the military to squander billions of dollars on so-called green energy.

For example, according to the GAO, the Navy has spent as much as $150 per gallon for jet fuel. In 2012, the Navy purchased 450,000 gallons of biofuel for its so-called green fleet at the cost of $26.60 per gallon, at a time when conventional petroleum fuel cost just $2.50.

What taxpayer in his right mind would pay $26.60 per gallon to fill up his car when, next door, they are selling it for $2.50? Yet that is precisely what our Armed Forces are ordered to do--except they are not just filling up their cars, they are filling up entire ships and aircraft, and this all comes out of our precious defense dollars.

The Air Force paid $59 per gallon for 11,000 gallons of biofuel in 2012--10 times more than regular jet fuel.

It is not just biofuels. The Pentagon expects to purchase 1,500 Chevy Volts at a subsidized price of $40,000 apiece and a production price of $90,000 apiece, paid for by other subsidies. As Senator Coburn's office points out:

Each one of these $40,000 Chevy Volts represents the choice not to provide an entire infantry platoon with all new rifles or 50,000 rounds of ammunition that cannot be used for realistic training.

Under these green energy mandates, the Army and Navy have been required to install solar arrays at various facilities. At Naval Station Norfolk, the Navy spent $21 million to install a 10-acre solar array, which will supply a grand total of 2 percent of the base's electricity.

According to the inspector general's office, this project will save enough money to pay for itself in only 447 years. Of course, solar panels only last about 25 years.

In Alaska, the Pentagon was ordered to convert three radar stations from diesel fuel to wind turbine energy. The Air Force claimed it will take 15 years to pay for itself, but auditors found that the generators produce only ``sporadic, unusable power,'' and the inspector general charged that the Air Force claim was completely unsubstantiated.

As of 2013, the Defense Department had at least 680 such projects, including 357 solar, 29 wind, and 289 thermal energy projects.

There are several arguments that we hear for this mandate. One of them is it is going to save us money, but as you can see, these orders are running up huge costs. We don't know exactly how much because, as the GAO said:

There is currently no comprehensive inventory of which Federal agencies are implementing renewable energy-related initiatives and the types of initiatives they are implementing.

Outside estimates are as much as $7 billion for the Department of Defense for this year, a figure that will only grow each year.

We are told it is to move our Armed Forces toward energy independence from hostile foreign sources. This is from an administration that has obstructed every effort to develop America's vast oil shale reserves that would make Saudi Arabia look like a petroleum pauper. The XL Keystone pipeline, by itself, would bring a half-million barrels of Canadian crude a day into this country.

Finally, we are told this is all a grand strategy to protect us from climate change, which the Secretary of State has called as big a threat as terrorism. Even if it were possible to wage an environmentally-sensitive war--which I doubt--I think there is a good chance that climate will continue to change, as it has that past 4 billion years, whether or not we waste our defense dollars to pay for this quixotic venture.

This explanation does reveal the real reason for this folly. This is an ideological crusade imposed on our military that will pointlessly consume billions of defense dollars, mainly to keep money flowing to politically well-connected green energy companies that can't get anybody else to buy their products.

These green activists are willing to squander the resources of our military to do so. This is a travesty that we can end here and now with this amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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