    [House Hearing, 110 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

      BRIGHT LIGHTS IN THE CITIES: PATHWAYS TO AN ENERGY-EFFICIENT FUTURE

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   before the
                              SELECT COMMITTEE ON
                              ENERGY INDEPENDENCE
                               AND GLOBAL WARMING
                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                                NOVEMBER 2, 2007

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 110-17

                 Printed for the use of the Select Committee on
                     Energy Independence and Global Warming

                            globalwarming.house.gov

                                   ----------
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                    SELECT COMMITTEE ON ENERGY INDEPENDENCE
                               AND GLOBAL WARMING

                   EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts, Chairman
    EARL BLUMENAUER, Oregon              F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, Jr.,
    JAY INSLEE, Washington                   Wisconsin, Ranking Member
    JOHN B. LARSON, Connecticut          JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona
    HILDA L. SOLIS, California           GREG WALDEN, Oregon
    STEPHANIE HERSETH SANDLIN,           CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan
      South Dakota                       JOHN SULLIVAN, Oklahoma
    EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri            MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee
    JOHN J. HALL, New York
    JERRY McNERNEY, California
                                     ------

                               Professional Staff

                         David Moulton, Staff Director
                           Aliya Brodsky, Chief Clerk
                     Thomas Weimer, Minority Staff Director

                                C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page
    Hon. Jay Inslee, a Representative in Congress from the State of
      Washington, opening statement..................................     1
    Hon. Edward J. Markey, a Representative in Congress from the
      Commonwealth of Massachusetts, prepared statement..............     2
    Hon. F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., a Representative in Congress
      from the State of Wisconsin, opening statement.................     5
    Hon. Greg Walden, a Representative in Congress from the State of
      Oregon, opening statement......................................     6
    Hon. Norman Dicks, a Representative in Congress from the State of
      Washington, opening statement..................................     7
    Hon. Jim McDermott, a Representative in Congress from the State
      of Washington, opening statement...............................     8

                                   Witnesses

    Hon. Michael Bloomberg, Mayor, New York City.....................     9
        Written Testimony............................................    12
        Answers to submitted questions...............................    67
    Hon. Douglas Palmer, Mayor of Trenton, New Jersey................    15
        Written Testimony............................................    17
    Hon. Manuel Diaz, Mayor of Miami, Florida........................    22
        Written Testimony............................................    24
    Hon. Greg Nickels, Mayor of Seattle, Washington..................    29
        Written Testimony............................................    31
        Answers to submitted questions...............................    80

                               Submitted Material

    Written Testimony of Antonio R. Villaraigosa, Mayor of the City
      of Los Angeles.................................................    87

      BRIGHT LIGHTS IN THE CITIES: PATHWAYS TO AN ENERGY-EFFICIENT FUTURE

                                  ----------

                            FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 2007

                      House of Representatives,
                Select Committee on Energy Independence
                                            and Global Warming,
                                                       Washington, D.C.
        The committee met, pursuant to call, at 2:30 p.m., in the
    Olympic Room, Edgewater Hotel, Seattle, Washington, the Hon.
    Jay Inslee [member of the committee] presiding.
        Members Present: Representatives Inslee, Sensenbrenner, and
    Walden.
        Also Present: Representatives Dicks and McDermott.
        Mr. Inslee. Committee will come to order.
        Welcome to sunny Seattle. We hope you're all enjoying this
    glorious day and will enjoy what I think will be a very
    interesting hearing.
        Before I make an opening statement, I have a couple
    procedural matters I need unanimous consent on so we can have
    our fearless Chairman Ed Markey's statement entered into the
    record and all other select committees'.
        Ed was good enough to get this committee out here.
    Unfortunately, he tore his Achilles heel doing a 360 dunk in
    Boston, so he couldn't quite make it. So I would ask for
    unanimous consent for that.
        [The statement of Mr. Markey follows:]

        [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Mr. Inslee. And without objection, so ordered.
        I would also like to ask consent to allow our local
    talents, Norm Dicks and Jim McDermott, to join us and acquire
    the same privileges as other members of the committee.
        And without objection, so ordered.
        I'll yield myself 5 minutes for an opening statement.
        First, I want to welcome you all to our hearing today.
        I think that it is the right place, it is the right time,
    and it is the right group of people to have a hearing like
    this.
        It's the right place because we are in Seattle, Washington,
    which is the hub of technological creativity and a group of
    people who know that we need some creative thoughts and
    creative technology on how to solve this global warming
    problem.
        It is the right time because the United States Congress
    finally, after years and years of passivity and neglect, is now
    ready to move on legislation to help communities across the
    nation deal with global warming and truly revolutionize our
    economy to one based on clean energy.
        It's certainly the right people because we have four people
    representing scores of mayors across the country who have been
    such visionaries and have lead their local communities--I'm
    starting right here with our local mayor, Greg Nickels.
        I'd also like to thank Jim Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin and
    Greg Walden who traveled to this, and they have been very
    active members of this committee, which has been a great
    committee, in my estimation, and Norm Dicks who was
    instrumental in providing $90 million in a recent
    appropriations to deal with global warming, and Jim McDermott
    who has been a leader in an effort to try to switch some
    priorities by removing subsidies and tax breaks for oil
    companies and move them into clean energy research.
        So before we hear from our witnesses, I wanted to note
    something about Seattle, Washington, which has been a hub of
    research based both on the science of global warming but on
    efforts to deal with it.
        I want to applaud Mayor Nickels for his leadership in this
    national effort to engage the mayoral talent across the country
    and its success, and you just heard that under Mayor Nickels'
    leadership, Washington has meet Kyoto targets. We want that to
    be something that will be replicated.
        He is not the only one. We have a leader in our area.
    County Executive Ron Sims and he have teamed up to be involved
    in some very progressive land use and transportation measures,
    and I appreciate their leadership in this regard.
        You know, Seattle City Light, they serve 380,000 residents,
    but their energy efficiency initiatives have reduced the
    release of CO2 in the atmosphere by more than
    584,000 metric tons because they have taken some common sense
    measures, and we want to make that a national policy and
    believe we can do that.
        Their savings are the equivalent of removing more than
    131,000 cars from the roads. That is a signal achievement.
        Now, I wanted to share some good news with you. We have
    been waiting sort of perched in the capitol for years in great
    frustration.
        It's been both an inspiration and frustration watching
    these mayors at work.
        It's been an inspiration to see what they've been able to
    achieve with relatively little resources and some shoe levering
    great ideas and the urgency of the moment, but it's been a
    frustration because we haven't been able to move in Washington,
    D.C.
        The bad news is the ice is melting in the Arctic. The good
    news is the ice of resistance is melting in Washington, D.C.,
    and we are ready to get going on climate change legislation.
        In August, the House of Representatives passed a bill that
    has the most aggressive energy efficiency standards for
    lighting ever, the most aggressive energy efficiency standards
    for heating and cooling appliances ever, the first ever federal
    directions for energy efficiency in building codes, the first
    ever federal legislation that will decouple utilities so that
    they can start selling conservation rather than just electrons,
    and importantly, a renewable portfolio standard that follows
    Washington state's adoption of a 15 percent RPS, the first one
    in the nation's history.
        We now are working with the Senate to try to reach a
    consensus, and I'm pleased to report that the fire, the clean
    fire, that these mayors have started is now reaching
    Washington, D.C., and I'm going to be very happy to report to
    them when their ideas reach fruition as a national policy
    because we know we cannot solve this just on a city by city
    wide basis. The scope of this challenge is too great.
        We have to have a new Apollo project in clean energy.
    That's why I named my bill The New Apollo Energy Project and
    even wrote a book about it, about that subject.
        We have great work for the mayors but are very excited to
    hear from them, but we know we need a national policy as well.
        With that, I'd like to yield to Mr. Sensenbrenner from the
    great state of Wisconsin.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        First of all, I'd like to note that the only Members of
    Congress who don't represent Washington state who come to this
    hearing are Republicans, and maybe that's why the weather is so
    good today.
        This is the second time the select committee has invited
    mayors from across the nation to testify about their efforts to
    reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases that cause global
    warming.
        In June I told the mayors that testified before the select
    committee that their experience shows how difficult it is to
    meet the climate change goals in the Kyoto Treaty.
        From the moment that treaty was drafted, it was clear that
    it would have heavy impacts on the economy.
        I chaired the congressional delegation that went to Kyoto,
    and after the agreement was reached, I opposed it because it
    was apparent that it would take economic sacrifices that
    weren't justified then or now.
        I was particularly bothered about the fact that major
    emerging economies, like China and India, were exempt from any
    reductions in the growth rate of greenhouse gases whatsoever.
        The result would surely have been a flight of manufacturing
    from America to those exempt countries that is far greater than
    we're seeing today, and that's saying something.
        It's been almost a decade since the treaty was adopted, and
    the results from Europe aren't good.
        It appears that several European nations are far from
    meeting their Kyoto goals, and those that are are doing so
    because of factors other than reducing greenhouse gases that
    weren't going to be reduced anyhow.
        This week the Seattle Times published an article about the
    difficulty many cities here in Washington state are having with
    meeting Kyoto goals, and I'm not surprised that cities which
    have pledged to meet Kyoto-like goals are having troubles,
    although I honestly don't believe it's due to a lack of any
    effort on their part.
        States and localities are often referred to as laboratories
    of democracy, but in this case cities can be seen as
    laboratories of global warming policy.
        I am pleased that nearly 700 cities have pledged to work to
    meet Kyoto's goal, and I hope that those cities will make their
    best effort to fund those global warming initiatives
    themselves.
        One of the biggest problems with implementing global
    warming policy is the cost.
        When city politicians try to mask those costs by using
    federal funds, then we're no closer to understanding what
    sacrifices voters are willing to make in order to try to
    address global warming, and that's very important information
    for Members of Congress.
        Republicans on this select committee and in Congress aren't
    out to oppose every global warming policy. However, I believe
    that Congress should be guided by some principles when
    considering global warming legislation.
        Any global warming policy should, first, result in tangible
    and measurable improvements to the environment; second, support
    technological advances; third, protect jobs in the economy; and
    fourth, include global participation, including China and
    India.
        I'm confident that Congress can find ways to address global
    warming while meeting these goals, and in doing so I'm sure
    Congress will look to see what works in the cities and states
    that have made their own emission reductions.
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Inslee. With that, I would like to yield to our good
    friend Greg Walden, who has been a leader on issues in forestry
    issues from the great state of Oregon.
        Mr. Walden. Thank you very much, Mayors. Welcome.
        Thank you for letting us join you today and thank you for
    joining us today. We appreciate that.
        I like to be in Seattle, and while I would not necessarily
    disagree with my colleague from Wisconsin that bringing good
    weather is a Republican thing, I think it just happened to
    follow me from eastern Oregon earlier today because we know
    that's where the good weather really resides.
        In fact, that's where wind energy and geothermal energy
    reside as well. It is home to 70,000 square miles of enormous
    potential for wind, solar, and geothermal energy.
        I've had scientists tell me that there's enough potential
    in Oregon in geothermal to replace two-thirds of the electrical
    generation used.
        We know in the Northwest that we have done a good job on
    conservation. We have been a leader, I believe.
        According to Northwest Power Conservation Council, from
    1978 to 2005, the Northwest produced more than 3,100 megawatts
    of energy conservation, which equates to 40 percent of the load
    growth during this time period.
        The state energy efficiency scorecard of June 2007 produced
    by the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy ranks
    Oregon and Washington among the nine most energy-efficient
    states in the nation.
        Public Power Council notes the Northwest has nearly 2,000
    megawatts of installed wind capacity and another 4,500
    megawatts under development, 638 kilowatts of solar facilities,
    336 megawatts of geothermal, and will soon have some of the
    first ocean-powered projects in the nation, even though one of
    those initial buoys sunk the other day.
        We are learning from it though.
        We also have America's great national forests, and we'll
    talk later in this hearing, as I see my time seems to be
    running out rapidly, about the need to do better management of
    our forests.
        We see these incredible fires. We know the emissions that
    are being released. We can do a better job of managing our
    forests and reduce the emissions that come from fires.
        I will leave it at that, Mr. Chairman. I see my time has
    expired.
        Mr. Inslee. We'll yield to--Mr. Dicks is doing great work
    for Puget Sound and understands the impacts of global warming
    on our Puget Sound.
        Mr. Dicks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank our
    Republican colleagues for coming all the way out here. I'm glad
    we had a beautiful day in the Northwest.
        This year I became chairman of the Interior and Environment
    Appropriations Subcommittee, and one of the things I tried to
    do on our committee is to increase the funding for climate
    change activities.
        We increased it by $96 million above the administration's
    request, $200 million in EPA's budget and $67 million for
    interior department agencies for climate change activities, $46
    million for the climate change science programs of the U.S.
    Geological Survey, EPA, and the Forest Service.
        We also are very interested in what the effects on wildlife
    will be and on our federal lands, and we have a hearing in
    which we brought in officials from the Forest Service, the BLM,
    Fish and Wildlife Service, and they told us, unanimously, that
    we already are seeing the consequences of a warming climate on
    our national lands, more drought, more bug infestation, very
    serious problems, and the rising of the sea, which has occurred
    more rapidly than at any other time in our history.
        I want to say to the mayor: Mayor Nickels, we are very
    proud of you and your leadership and all of you mayors.
        I read every one of your statements on the way out. I flew
    out this morning from Washington, and you all have done
    fantastic work, and you've got an action agenda, which is what
    we like to see, and I'm very confident that we're going to get
    an energy bill passed with your block grant in it, and I think
    that money is going to be necessary to help some of the
    communities.
        The larger ones are going to be able to do this, a lot of
    the work themselves, but some of the smaller communities are
    going to need some assistance, and I think the block grant,
    which is the mayor's top priority, is a good idea.
        Also, I just want to end on this: For the first time our
    bill requires EPA to propose and publish a regulation for
    reducing greenhouse gases.
        The bill includes $2 million for the development of the
    regulations, following the recent Supreme Court ruling that the
    EPA has the authority to regulate greenhouse gases from local
    sources, so it's time for action, and EPA needs to start
    getting the regulation in place.
        Mr. Inslee. Thanks, Norm, and we'll yield to Jim McDermott,
    a great member of the Ways and Means Committee.
        Mr. McDermott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Welcome to Seattle.
        Norm, Greg Nickels is my mayor, and we are proud to have
    the leadership in this city that isn't coming from Washington.
    We have to wait for 440 days until we're going to start to get
    some leadership from the White House.
        America is importing supertankers loaded with oil, and
    we're exporting tankers loaded with America's cash, and it has
    made the United States dangerously vulnerable on economic,
    ecological, and national security, and our addiction to oil
    endangers the future of the planet.
        Our current strategy for energy independence is not
    working.
        The President has attempted to conquer oil fields in the
    Middle East to meet our energy needs.
        Seven long years into this administration, the price for a
    barrel of oil has gone from $30 a barrel to nearly $100, and he
    still doesn't get it.
        The President wants to conquer it by drilling in the Arctic
    National Wildlife Refuge. That won't work either.
        The solution will come from the national resources all
    around us, wave, solar, biofuels and from policies that
    emphasize and reward conservation and efficiency.
        We put a bill out of the Ways and Means Committee that's
    siting in the Senate, and we need your help to lobby the
    senators to get that bill out of there.
        Drilling for oil is not going to save the planet, but
    ending our addiction to oil will.
        Our work here is not merely about energy independence.
        In a few short years we've gone from an inconvenient truth
    about global warming to a clarion call for action.
        The Ways and Means Committee had a hearing in which all the
    witnesses said there was global warming and we ought to do it,
    called by both Republicans and Democrats.
        This is not a partisan issue. It is an issue of
    understanding what's going on in the world.
        We believe there's a chance, if we stop pretending and
    start defending our planet.
        We need new technologies, new policies, and political
    leaders like the four distinguished mayors before us here
    today.
        I not only want to hear what they're doing but what we need
    to do in Congress.
        We want to listen to you today.
        Thank you.
        Mr. Inslee. Thank you.
        It's my honor to introduce these great optimistic leaders
    because I know they're optimists because they're here, and
    they're realists as well, and I appreciate that.
        First--for a moment, first among equals, Mayor Greg Nickels
    of Seattle who has really spark-plugged this effort, and when
    the book is written about how we succeeded in this grant,
    you'll be in the first chapter, and thanks for your work.
        I want to point to your green collar job successes that
    you've had, and I appreciate it.
        By the way, you are my mayor too. Don't let McDermott steal
    the whole city.
        Mayor Manuel Diaz of Miami has done great work and just
    recently announced 11 sustainable principles, sustainability
    principles, that Miami is going to enjoy, and my roommate's got
    clients from Florida who sings your praises, so great work.
        Mayor Palmer from Trenton who I am very pleased to say is
    really the fellow known about brown fields leadership, and we
    hear about this in the East Coast all the time.
        When I was writing this book, I heard about your efforts,
    and we appreciate that.
        Of course, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, great city of New York,
    who has a tremendous idea about replacing taxi cabs and putting
    in hybrids.
        I am to report, Mr. Mayor, I was in your great city Monday
    morning talking to Wall Street folks about how to create a
    carbon trading system, and both cab drivers said they love your
    proposals, so you have two constituents working for you.
        Mayor Bloomberg. That's a start.
        Mr. Inslee. That's a start.
        With that, I yield 5 minutes to Mayor Bloomberg.

     STATEMENT OF THE HON. MICHAEL BLOOMBERG, MAYOR, NEW YORK CITY

        Mayor Bloomberg. Thank you, Acting Chair and Ranking
    Members Sensenbrenner and Congressmen Walden, Dicks, and
    McDermott.
        I bring greetings to you from your chairman Ed Markey. I
    was with him last night at a conservation international dinner,
    and I'm happy to report he really does have an injured Achilles
    tendon, he really is on crutches, and his wife really would
    have rather had him come out here.
        Anyway, as you know, many of us just came from an event,
    the U.S. Conference of Mayors, run by Doug Palmer, which
    highlighted how much local leadership can do in climate changes
    across our city.
        Let me just try to summarize what I told that conference
    today. I'll try to be succinct.
        We think we need Congress to start taking the kinds of bold
    actions that cities and states are taking, and let me note that
    I'm talking about mayors and governors, Republicans, Democrats,
    and Independents from east, west, north, south. We all feel the
    same way. We need federal action because putting the brakes on
    global warming is not only an environmental imperative, it is
    also a national security imperative and an economic security
    imperative.
        The fact is that green energy is going to be the oil gusher
    of the 21st Century, creating good jobs across America: Farm
    jobs, factory jobs, sales jobs, management jobs. There's going
    to be a huge industry here, and we don't want our companies to
    move overseas where the employees will feel they can breathe
    cleaner air.
        We are the world's superpower, and we have to be pioneers,
    and I'm afraid that we keep losing that opportunity.
        Fighting global warming really is a national security
    imperative because it allows us to reduce our dependence on
    foreign oil, and that has really entangled our interests with
    tyrants and increased our exposure to terrorism.
        Any serious long-term strategy for strengthening our
    national security really does have to include the strategy for
    breaking what President Bush said is our addiction to oil, and
    usually breaking an addiction involves a 12-step program, but I
    really think that in four steps we can do it.
        Let's have a quick discussion on each of them.
        First, we need to increase investment in energy R&D,
    including support for demonstration projects such as the waste
    energy plan we want to build in New York City.
        Right now the U.S. is spending only one-third of what we
    were spending in the 1970s on R&D. It really is a disgrace. We
    talk about technology, and then we'll unwilling to fund it.
        Second, we have to stop setting tariffs and subsidies based
    on pork barrel politics.
        Why are we taxing sugar-based ethanol at $0.50 and
    subsidizing corn-based ethanol at $0.50 a gallon.
        It may be good agricultural policy, and if it is, fine, do
    it, but call it what it is. It's not giving us better energy
    independence. It's special interest politics, plain and simple.
        Third, we have to get serious about energy efficiency for
    both our buildings and our vehicles.
        In New York City we are converting cabs to hybrids, but the
    federal government has to do what you guys did so well between
    '75 and '85. You forced Detroit and the other companies to
    raise average miles per gallon from something like 12 to 24,
    25, and then we've done nothing since '85, and it was done to
    protect Detroit, and in fact you have destroyed the jobs in
    Detroit, you've destroyed the companies in Detroit.
        It's gone exactly the wrong way. We have got to be serious
    about mileage standards.
        Fourth and finally, we have to stop ignoring the laws of
    economics.
        As long as greenhouse gas pollution is free, it will be
    abundant.
        Capitalism really works. If you want to reduce it, there
    has to be a cost for producing it, which means putting a price
    on carbon, indirectly through a cap and trade system or
    directly through a charge on all carbon use.
        What I want to talk about today is I think that the primary
    flaw of cap and trade is economic, it's uncertain. People don't
    invest when the prices go up and down because they don't know
    whether their investments will pay off.
        The problem with the direct--what you could call a fee or a
    price or some people might disingenuously call a tax, is that
    it's politically unpopular, and it's time, I think, for
    Congress, because we can't do it, to stand up and tell the
    public that we have got to do something.
        Forget about waiting for India, forget about waiting for
    China, forget about global warming. The air we are breathing
    today is what you've got to focus on, and you can do something
    about it by making it in everybody's interest to invest in R&D,
    invest in new technology, and cut the emissions that they're
    using, but whichever ways you go, you have to do something, and
    you have to make it something that's understandable by the
    public so that they don't think there is a special interest
    taking advantage of them. You have to make them think that it's
    being done efficiently. You have to make sure that it's going
    to have the desired effects, and thank you very much for
    considering it.
        You guys really can make an enormous difference.
        While we at mayor level criticize Congress, we shouldn't.
        [The statement of Mayor Bloomberg follows:]

        [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

      STATEMENT OF THE HON. DOUGLAS PALMER, MAYOR OF TRENTON, NEW
                                 JERSEY

        Mayor Palmer. Thank you again, Mr. Chairman and members of
    the committee.
        I'm Douglas Palmer, Mayor of Trenton, New Jersey, President
    of the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
        I am proud to be joined by my colleagues to share our views
    on federal actions you can take to support the broad and
    growing grass roots movement among mayors to address this
    critical challenge before the nation and our planet.
        Mr. Chairman, please thank Chairman Markey for bringing
    this important field hearing to Seattle.
        Undeniably, mayors are the nation's leaders on climate
    protection. We are the first responders, and we are in a
    position to engage the public as we look at a range of
    solutions and the actions that are needed to curb our
    greenhouse gas emissions.
        For mayors, we're very anxious to have the federal
    government engaged as a better partner as we seek those
    environmentally friendly and sustainable climate protection
    policies and programs for our communities.
        For America, we believe this partnership is necessary to
    help us be competitive in the worldwide race to develop the new
    generation of green technologies and practices, and these are
    jobs that we can't outsource.
        As government leaders, we all know that each level has to
    do their part.
        For mayors, we believe that in the short term the best way
    to organize is through grass roots, community-led initiatives,
    and that is what the mayor's climate protection agreement is
    all about.
        I'll skip some of our history here to be brief, but we
    have, through the leadership of Greg Nickels, as was mentioned,
    we have now signed today 728 mayors to the climate protection
    agreement, which is more than one-quarter of the United States'
    population that now lives in cities where mayors have made a
    commitment to reduce carbon emissions by seven percent below
    the 1990 levels by 2012.
        Last June we adopted a new conference policy that outlines
    federal actions you should pursue in reducing greenhouse gases.
        As President of the Conference of Mayors, I have made an
    enactment of an energy block grant modelled after the
    successful CDBG program.
        This is one of our top priorities. This proposal is the
    leading recommendation of the conference's ten-point plan:
    Strong cities, strong families for strong America.
        We are very pleased that the House and Senate energy bills,
    which are pending now before you, include our energy block
    grant programs.
        When enacted, this block grant will dramatically accelerate
    and expand local energy efficiency programs and help us make
    gains in protecting the climate.
        In addition to the block grant, we want to call your
    attention to our key initiatives in the pending energy
    legislation: Green job initiatives, added support for public
    transit, expanded tax incentives for alternative energy
    sources, new energy efficient standards for appliances, light
    bulbs, and buildings, and tax credit bonds to support large
    capital improvement by cities.
        Today we call on Congress to finish work on this energy
    legislation and send agreement to the President this year.
        The current energy legislation is not an end point but
    rather it is a beginning of a new generation of federal
    commitments to combating our excessive energy use, foreign
    energy dependence, and climate change.
        Next up will probably be legislation to establish a cap and
    trade system. We need to make sure that these locally based
    initiatives that we are discussing here today are a key element
    of any cap and trade legislation.
        In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I want to again express my
    thanks to you and members of the committee for holding this
    hearing today and your continuing efforts to address climate
    change initiatives.
        The mayors of this nation believe that the time has come
    for Congressional action on climate change, and we certainly
    appreciate the opportunity to talk to you about this.
        What you see here today is an unprecedented group of over
    100 mayors that have come together in cities from Seattle all
    the way to Meridian, Mississippi, from Trenton, New Jersey,
    from all over our country, and we all are good Americans, but
    we want our country to be safe and secure.
        Getting off of foreign oil and our dependence on it,
    creating green collar jobs--which is essential in my city of
    Trenton, New Jersey, to create a whole new market and a source
    of jobs, help our middle class stretch our economy and produce
    sustainable jobs.
        This is about America, and America will lead the way in
    this initiative.
        I'm quite sure that when we show what we can do and make
    money from being green, that China and India and the rest will
    follow our lead as these countries follow this great American
    experiment called the United States of America.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Mayor Palmer follows:]

        [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Mr. Inslee. We think we understand why the mayors have been
    so successful. This is very uncongressional. Our first two
    speakers didn't use all their time.

       STATEMENT OF THE HON. MANUEL DIAZ, MAYOR OF MIAMI, FLORIDA

        Mayor Diaz. Mr. Chairman, Members, thank you for the
    opportunity to testify before you today.
        I'm afraid I'm going to have to join that weather bragging
    that was going on earlier. I think it was the Florida mayors
    who brought the sunshine with us to Seattle.
        Although the issue of climate change represents a global
    challenge, it has prompted a local response. This is what
    America's mayors have done.
        You will now hear from our Pied Piper mayor, Mayor Nickels,
    who through his leadership has brought together over 700
    mayors, including, I would add, 70 from Florida who have signed
    the Mayors Climate Protection Agreement.
        In Miami we are particularly susceptible to the effects of
    climate change causing more and stronger hurricanes, rising sea
    levels, a threat in water supply, and a threat to one of the
    most fragile ecosystems in the world, the Florida Everglades.
        Miami is responding with a climate action plan, our
    blueprint towards sustainability.
        Through this plan, municipal government is placing
    environmental consciousness into every decision we make.
        For the first time ever we have created an office of
    sustainable initiatives. We are creating our green fleets,
    converting our entire fleet to hybrids or other fuel-efficient
    vehicles by the year 2012.
        Last year I traded my City SUV for a hybrid. I have doubled
    my fuel economy, cut my gas consumption in half, cut greenhouse
    gas emissions by 40 tons, and saved the taxpayers twice the
    amount of fuel costs in just one year.
        Because buildings emit 48 percent of greenhouse gas
    emissions and consume 68 percent of electricity in the U.S.,
    our green building program has laid credit to the first LEED
    precertified green building in the state of Florida.
        Our new zoning ordinance will require all buildings over
    50,000 square feet to be built silver certified, LEED certified
    green buildings.
        We are training our City staff to be LEED certified and on
    providing expedited building permits for green buildings.
        Apparently there's over $2 billion worth of green
    buildings--construction taking place in the city of Miami. We
    have gone from zero buildings in less than a year to over 20
    buildings that have now registered in Miami. They are either
    going to build green or you're not going to build at all.
        We have instituted green procurement and water conservation
    measures, public transit initiatives, such as dedicated bus
    lines and light rail.
        In a city where hurricanes have depleted our tree canopy
    cover, our canopy replacement is a priority.
        We have now adopted our first-ever tree master plans to
    increase our tree canopy by 30 percent in ten years.
        I am proud that for the first time ever, Miami was named a
    tree city U.S.A.
        We have also taken the ultimate step towards sustainability
    by increasing the density of our city because bringing people
    back to the urban corridor is the ultimate antidote for
    suburban sprawl.
        Given the worldwide move towards urbanization, the single
    most critical action we can take to help save our planet is to
    embrace smart growth by designing cities that make sense.
        In Miami, we decided to embrace smart growth on a scale
    never before seen in a major U.S. city, and this is the
    cornerstone of our Miami 21 project.
        For too long cities have been planned around cars and not
    people. Miami 21 will change that by bringing sustainability
    through design.
        It is rooted in the belief of the power of traditional
    neighborhoods to restore the functions of sustainable cities.
        The idea is to make the city pedestrian friendly, building
    and designing around people, offering them great shared spaces
    of civic pride so they may work, live, and play all within
    walking distance.
        Finally, we recognize that while individuals want to take
    the initiative in reducing their carbon footprint, they often
    do not know how. This is why we started an awareness campaign,
    something we call: One person, ten steps, ten tons, ten simple
    things a person can do to reduce their carbon footprint by ten
    tons.
        As you can see, local government is acting, but local
    government cannot act alone.
        If we are to ameliorate the impact of climate change, there
    needs to be a multifaceted approach involving all levels of
    government.
        This is especially true when local governments are facing
    increasing budgetary constraints.
        The Conference of Mayors has called on Congress to partner
    with us by providing additional resources to develop and
    implement comprehensive energy efficiency plans.
        Both versions of the energy bill contain an energy
    efficient block grant whose passage is the top priority of the
    United States Conference of Mayors.
        The CDBG would provide local governments with needed
    additional resources to continue developing and implementing
    comprehensive energy strategies for our community.
        I would strongly urge that you adopt this important piece
    of legislation, and let me leave you with an ancient Native
    American saying, ``We do not inherit the earth from our
    ancestors. We borrow it from our children.''
        Thank you for joining America's mayors today. Thank you for
    the opportunity to testify before you.
        [The statement of Mayor Diaz follows:]

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        Mr. Inslee. Thank you, and it is a fine day for the Pied
    Piper.

         STATEMENT OF THE HON. GREG NICKELS, MAYOR OF SEATTLE,
                               WASHINGTON

        Mayor Nickels. Chairman Inslee, Ranking Member
    Sensenbrenner, Mr. Walden, Mr. Dicks, Mr. McDermott, welcome to
    Seattle. I am very proud to have you here today. Particularly
    Mr. Sensenbrenner, Mr. Walden, thank you for making the trip
    out here, and hopefully you'll spend lots of money while you're
    here and enjoy our sunshine.
        You're coming at a very exciting time for us. In the last
    two days, as you heard, over 100 mayors gathered here to talk
    about this issue of local leadership on greenhouse gas
    emissions and how we can accelerate that local leadership into
    action.
        I've submitted significant comments in writing to you. I'm
    not going to read that to you, but I'd like to make some brief
    comments to you orally.
        Seattle's very excited about this issue and in sharing our
    experience with you on how we have increased energy efficiency,
    how we use renewable energy, and how we have reduced our
    greenhouse gas emissions in the city.
        We've heard in the last couple of days from former
    President Bill Clinton who talked about the work of the Clinton
    Climate Initiative and who announced a purchase consortium that
    cities will be able to join to buy energy-efficient products at
    low prices, very similar to the work that the Clinton
    Foundation did on HIV AIDS.
        We heard messages of optimism and hope around the green
    revolution from former Vice President and now Nobel Prize
    winner Al Gore, from noted Canadian journalist and scientist
    David Suzuki, and Jerome Ringo of the Apollo Alliance.
        I think most importantly we learned from one another what
    our cities are doing, the results we're having, and how we can
    inspire our communities to do even more.
        It's important that cities are involved in this effort, and
    that's because for the first time in human history more people
    live within cities than do not, and as the engines of our
    national economies, we consume about three-quarters of the
    energy that is consumed on this planet, and obviously it's the
    burning of fossil fuels that is causing the greenhouse gas
    pollution that is threatening our planet.
        There are people who would look at cities and say, ``You're
    the problem.'' I would suggest that you look at the cities and
    see us as the solution to this problem.
        In February of 2005, after a period of time that we called
    snowless in Seattle, when the snow pack in the Cascade
    Mountains was at 1.1 percent of normal, which meant no ski
    season, which Mr. Walden knows is a tragedy in the Northwest,
    but more than that, for Seattle, we rely on 100-year-old
    systems to capture that snow as it melts and use it for water
    and use it for power, and we were doing such drastic things as
    urging people to shower together.
        On February 16th of 2005, I challenged the people of
    Seattle to meet or beat the reductions called for in the Kyoto
    protocol, but recognizing that if it were only Seattle, it's
    purely symbolic, and it's hard to ask people to take tough
    action for purely symbolic reasons.
        I challenged my fellow mayors to join with me.
        For the United States, that reduction would mean a seven
    percent reduction from 1990 levels by 2012.
        Today, more than two years later, I'm pleased to say, as
    was mentioned, that 728 mayors have taken this up, and they
    have agreed to take local action to try and achieve those same
    reductions.
        They represent one in four people who live in the United
    States of America.
        In Seattle, we decided to try and lead by example. The City
    government has reduced its emissions by 60 percent from 1990
    levels. We have measured our community-wide emissions, and
    we've reduced our community-wide emissions by eight percent
    from 1990 levels, so we have, in fact, met the targets set out
    in the Kyoto Treaty.
        Now, if we do nothing more, we will not maintain that
    because growth in population and growth in the emissions of our
    transportation system mean that we would begin to creep back
    up, but we are committed to continuing to take action to reduce
    our emissions.
        It's a remarkable milestone, but it is a first step, and
    obviously we need to go far beyond what Kyoto calls for.
        You've all said--we've all said it's not a perfect treaty,
    and in fact it's only a first step, and we can lead at the
    local level, we can achieve this reduction we believe is called
    for in Kyoto, but it's going to take national leadership. It's
    going to take a national will to move forward for us to reach
    the levels we have to to protect the climate for our children
    and our children's children, and that's why we think that the
    energy block grant is important. That's why we think that
    whether it's a cap and trade system or a carbon tax, it is
    important that our federal government stand up and help lead
    this effort, this global effort.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Mayor Nickels follows:]

        [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Mr. Inslee. Thank you.
        The Chair will recognize himself for 5 minutes.
        I wanted to ask Mayor Bloomberg about the position you
    espouse that we need some cost on carbon, that that's pivotal
    to this solution, and I agree with you in that regard. The more
    I've looked at this, the more that's absolutely pivotal to
    drive investment in these new technologies because we need new
    technologies to skin this cat.
        I was asked--I was just on a radio show just a few minutes
    before we started here, and a fellow asked if this was a tax,
    and I suggested it really was not, that it was a charge for the
    use of a scarce resource, that the atmosphere is a scarce
    resource that we hold in common, and we allow polluting
    industries and ourselves now to put CO2 in the
    atmosphere at no charge.
        Now, you had some experience in the capitalist system, and
    my view is without charging for the right to put CO2
    into the atmosphere, it's a little like allowing a company to
    come up to a city park and dump their garbage in the city park
    or over your fence at no charge.
        To me it's a rational thing, economically, to have
    limitations on CO2 and to have an auction for
    permits in the most certain way we can to get as much certainty
    in the market as we can. You addressed that as well.
        I just wondered if that's a fair assessment, and give me
    your thoughts, maybe in a little more depth, why we need a
    price on carbon.
        Mayor Bloomberg. People are not going to stop doing
    something that is in their interest as long as it's in their
    interest, and if you were to have a fee, it is less in their
    interest, and presumably they would divert their resources
    elsewhere.
        What I would suggest is you charge--you can call it a tax
    if you want. I know that's a word that--everybody runs away
    from the word ``tax,'' but Americans aren't stupid. They
    understand that they are going to have to pay one way or
    another if they want progress, and I think if somebody looks
    them in the eye, they are not going to go and shoot you for
    saying, ``I'm supporting this particular charge.''
        What I would do with the moneys, however, is I would divert
    a little bit to expand the R&D, and I would use the rest of it
    to reduce payroll taxes, so that the net tax effect on the
    public is less, but you would take it away from those handful
    of companies that pollute a lot. You would help everybody.
        After all, more jobs are good, more pollution is bad, so
    charge people that are polluting and give the money to the
    people that are doing something good.
        Let me give you another thought about cap and trade and
    other ways to describe it.
        If you want to reduce, let's say, something bad, stolen
    automobiles in this country, what you have to do is--and you
    also covet your neighbor's automobile. Pay somebody who's a
    professional guy at stealing cars and ripping them up at the
    shop, pay him some money to not steal two cars and then go
    steal your neighbor's car.
        Will you have reduced the number of cars stolen in America?
        That's what cap and trade is. It's saying, ``I'll still go
    and pollute, but I'll just pay somebody else to not pollute.''
        I think we should stop the pollution. You are not going to
    make any progress here.
        Mr. Inslee. I think your point is really important to fence
    in this idea of offsets.
        I think you are referring to the offset model, and it is
    clear that if a cap and trade system is going to work, you are
    going to have to put limitations at least----
        Mayor Bloomberg. Experience in Europe and in Australia and
    other places has been terrible.
        It did work here in this country to reduce sulfur
    emissions, but that was a very small thing.
        Overseas, it's cost companies billions of dollars that they
    didn't expect because they made investments, and it turned out
    that the price of carbon varied so much that their investments
    were poorly constructed, poorly made----
        Mr. Inslee. We found multiple errors in the European system
    that we intend not to replicate----
        Mayor Bloomberg. I think most economists will tell you that
    rather than take one right--take three left turns, take one
    right turn.
        You are going to find businesses coalescing around this
    idea because everybody understands the implementation of it
    would be so unfair, would have so much fighting about who gets
    special interest, and would not accomplish what everybody wants
    to get done here.
        Mr. Inslee. Gotcha.
        I want to ask the other three mayors: Could you share
    surprises, learning experiences, both positives and negatives,
    things you thought were going to be hard that turned out
    relatively easy and the opposite?
        Tell me about your learning experience that we should share
    on a federal level. What worked best? What did not work that
    you thought was going to work?
        Mayor Nickels. Mr. Chairman, I'll kick off with that.
        First of all, when we embarked on the U.S. Mayors' climate
    protection agreement, we hoped against hope that we would sign
    up 141 cities, one for every country that had signed onto
    Kyoto.
        The fact that we have 728, and they represent, literally,
    one in four Americans, to me is remarkable.
        It means that this issue is well understood throughout the
    country and that the message that we need to take action at the
    local level, in the absence of federal leadership, is widely
    held.
        All 50 states are represented in this agreement, and to me
    that was surprising.
        I knew it would do well in Seattle, would do well in some
    other places, but it really has been something that people have
    been perceiving, and the fact that this is a different issue
    and different effort in different parts of the country I think
    is something that has become clear.
        In Seattle, our electric utility, which we own, has zero
    net greenhouse gas emissions, none. We sold a coal plant, we
    have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in conservation,
    and we now emit zero out of our electrical system, so we can
    turn the lights on in Seattle, and you are not toasting the
    planet.
        That's a harder issue with other parts of the country that
    rely on coal and other fossil fuels, and we're going to have to
    find other ways of providing help in those places.
        That's why the flexibility of the block grant is so
    important. Different answers are going to work in different
    parts of the country.
        Mayor Palmer. I also think it's very important--as Mayor
    Nickels says, different cities are at different places than
    others.
        Of course here in Seattle--Seattle has really been a mover,
    and through his leadership we've seen what's happened.
        I'm from New Jersey. Governor Corzine has just implemented
    his reduction strategy, but quite frankly, we have to look at
    changing human behavior.
        Each mayor in this room and across the country has the
    ability to make those changes because people look to us for
    leadership. We just don't have the luxury of picking and
    choosing what issues we want to deal with. We have to deal with
    all of them. We are the first responders.
        This is a critically important issue to us, but we do
    recognize, you have to let everybody understand what's their
    piece of the pie, ``What's it going to do for me?''
        In neighborhoods where there are low-income people that are
    really paying high exorbitant costs for where they live for
    heating and fuel and those kinds of things, they may say,
    ``Look, I'm worried about getting a job, I'm worried about my
    prescription drugs, and how does this help me?''
        Well, that's why the energy block grant can help as well to
    give us resources. That's why mayors are not waiting and are
    doing those things that say, ``This is how we can create green-
    collar careers,'' by looking at solar panels and putting solar
    panels on roofs, looking at ways in which we can install the
    compact florescent light bulbs by our senior citizens, creating
    jobs out of that.
        One of the biggest challenges we're going to have, quite
    frankly, is telling all of our citizens, whether it's the
    business community, how you can really make money by going
    green, talking to people in low-income neighborhoods about how
    you can get jobs, so that's what we're doing.
        That's one of the biggest challenges, and I think it's
    important that we show strong leadership not just by the
    mayors--we can't do it alone--but by what you're doing, the
    actions you are taking, being here, having these hearings.
        We recognize you are coming here because we were here, and
    we appreciate that.
        Moving forward on the energy environment block grant and
    strong leadership from the White House and from the next
    President is important so that all of our citizens can
    recognize this is something that's in the best interest of our
    national security and all of us.
        I want to put into the record, and this can tell you--this
    is our climate protection strategy and practice guide that we'd
    like to have put into the record. It shows success stories that
    continue to happen each and every day from mayors in a real
    way.
        Mr. Inslee. Thank you.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        I think one of the reasons why the Kyoto Treaty was not
    ratified--as a matter of fact, President Clinton, even though
    he signed it, did not send it to the Senate for ratification
    because it was an unfair treaty, and the economic costs of
    compliance with Kyoto were not sustainable or politically
    acceptable.
        Whether we're talking about a carbon tax directly or an
    indirect tax through buying carbon offset credits, we are
    talking about higher energy costs, and how do we prevent the
    outsourcing of jobs if we have significantly higher energy
    costs and countries like China and India don't?
        Mayor Bloomberg, you said, ``Forget about China and
    India.'' I really can't, because of that.
        Can you respond to that?
        Mayor Bloomberg. I think China and India come along not
    because of any pressure, other than the same thing that brought
    down the Iron Curtain. They will see on television, they will
    see from the Internet that other countries, hopefully America
    and Western Europe, can breathe clean air, and they will want
    it, and they will demand it from their own government.
        No government exists without the will and the majority of
    the people. You are not going to force them to do it. They are
    going to demand it.
        You'll see China start doing this with the Olympics, and
    all of a sudden the air is going to be an awful lot cleaner,
    and they are going to say, ``I don't want to go back to what we
    had before.''
        Let me just say about the jobs, some things are energy
    dependent and some are not.
        I just looked on my BlackBerry. Oil today closed at $96 a
    barrel. A few years ago it was $30 a barrel, and yet people
    really aren't driving less.
        Some things they are going to spend the money on anyway,
    but if you could force people to choose between natural gas and
    coal, and if you could make natural gas cheaper than coal or
    coal more expensive than natural gas, power plants would change
    instantly because they are very price sensitive.
        What we found in our society in the last five years is we
    are nowhere near as dependent on the cost of oil as we used to
    be.
        If I told you five years ago oil was going to go from $30 a
    barrel to $90 a barrel and the stock market would be at record
    high, and we would have reasonably low unemployment and
    prospects----
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. I'd sell my Bloomberg stock if you said
    that----
        Mayor Bloomberg. You would have sold everything, and the
    truth of the matter is our society uses a lot less oil.
        The problem we have here is not the jobs, it is the impact
    on our environment, and while Kyoto was flawed--I'll tell you,
    Kyoto was worse than what you think because a lot of the
    countries that signed up never did anything, but I still don't
    know how to look, Congressman, the people of New York City in
    the eye and say, ``We are going to go ahead and continue to
    pollute the air your kids breathe because on the other side of
    the world they're not willing''--it just doesn't make any
    sense.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. Mayor, a year after Kyoto, the head of
    the energy information agency who was a direct appointee of
    President Clinton testified before the science committee that
    compliance with Kyoto would result in a 60 to 80 percent
    increase in the cost of energy, and he specifically referenced
    electricity, natural gas, and fueling.
        Now, how do we sustain our economy with those kinds of
    increases, particularly with countries that are exempt like
    China and India?
        I have less faith than you that the communist government in
    China is going to respond to the people and do all of these
    things.
        Mayor Bloomberg. I just have enormous faith in America's
    competitiveness.
        We are losing jobs and business overseas not because they
    are more attractive. It's because we are becoming less
    attractive.
        China is building automobile manufacturing plants in
    Eastern Europe not because it's cheaper but because they have
    to have a better workforce and close to their market.
        They don't have enough engineers, don't have enough trained
    people.
        We have the great America machine. We are just holding it
    back.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. But isn't the secret to dealing with
    this question advances in technology, because America is the
    most innovative country in the world, and we educate people who
    innovate, and this community is probably the best one in the--
    --
        Mayor Bloomberg. Congress, I am 100 percent with you, but
    we should have told you we cut the amount of R&D by two-thirds.
        If you believe that, then let's get Congress to give us
    some money to do the inventions.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. The R&D tax credit expires on December
    31st. The House of Representatives has yet to act on a bill
    that extends the R&D tax credit.
        That tax credit is the private sector incentive for R&D,
    not government handout but a private sector incentive.
        Can we get you guys on board to do that because that's
    something we can do in the next eight weeks?
        Mayor Bloomberg. I promise you our office will talk to your
    office on Monday and see what we can do to help get more R&D in
    this country.
        I can just tell you R&D is leaving this country. Scientists
    don't want to work here, education is moving overseas, and
    three-quarters of IBM's employment is overseas today.
        Just think about that.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. Mayor, with all due respect, I'll be
    happy to talk to your office on Monday, but why don't you just
    go uptown and talk to Ways and Means Committee Chair Rangel
    because he's got the future of the R&D tax credit in his hand,
    and now----
        Mayor Bloomberg. I talk to him every day. Thank you. I need
    you to come and work with me.
        I'm on your side on a lot of these things.
        Charlie is a good guy, but I don't agree with him on
    everything.
        Mr. Inslee. This is certainly worth the price of admission.
        Thank you.
        Mr. Walden.
        Mr. Walden. Thank you, Mr. Inslee.
        Mr. Mayor, I want to follow up on a comment you just made
    about converting energy production from natural gas to coal
    because I think most of us recognize the cost of capture,
    compression, sequestration is very high, and the science is not
    proven yet, and I fully concur with the notion we need to
    invest more in scientific research, but shifting to natural gas
    still produces carbon emissions, about a third what coal does,
    but somehow we look at natural gas sometimes as not producing
    carbon tonnage at all when, in fact, it does for electricity
    production.
        I'm a little concerned about shifting to another one that
    produces two-thirds less but still produces, but the big issue
    is: Where do you get the natural gas?
        Mayor Bloomberg. Well, the supply of natural gas worldwide
    is great, supply of wind is great.
        There are a lot of different things you can do, but the
    issue is not to let the perfect get away--in the way of the
    good.
        If you can go from coal to natural gas, that would make a
    very big difference. If you go to wind, that would make another
    big difference.
        Plus, to solve all the electrical problems in this country,
    go to nuclear. That's what France has done, and more and more
    environmentalists are starting to come out in favor of nuclear
    power.
        Mr. Walden. I appreciate you saying that because a lot of
    our colleagues in Congress are on the opposite side of that
    issue, as they are on the opposite side of LNG, compressed
    natural gas being brought in.
        The energy bill we passed in 2005, we tried to expedite
    that process, so at least on the margin we can get natural gas
    in here, even though Alan Greenspan said, ``You'll never bring
    in enough LNG to make a huge difference and replace natural
    gas.''
        We need to access that which is readily available here but
    often found in areas that we're not allowed to go into.
        Do you think we ought to be able to go into those areas, in
    federal land, and gotten into in an environmentally sensitive
    way and get the natural gas out so we can then make the shift
    off of coal or do you think we----
        Mayor Bloomberg. We have to make a decision: Do we want to
    import or do we want to generate it here?
        If you generate it or dig it up or pump it here, it is
    going to be in places where some people don't think we should.
        Can you do it and be environmentally responsible is the $64
    question. People are skeptical that you can, but we have to
    make the choice. Do you want to import the oil or do you want
    to pump it here?
        Mr. Walden. I'm talking about natural gas.
        Mayor Bloomberg. Same thing with natural gas.
        I am not opposed to opening up lands here.
        I would require, if it were up to me, which it's not, that
    we had some real enforceable safeguards to protect the
    environment, but you can't have it both ways. You can't say,
    ``I don't want to import gas or oil'' and say, ``I'm not going
    to do it here.''
        We are not about to turn off the lights. We can use less
    electricity for the lights, but we are still going to have an
    industrial society.
        Mr. Walden. I appreciate that. I think you and I agree on
    that point.
        Mayor Nickels, I bring you greetings from the receivers of
    your garbage. I mean that nicely. My district is--I have people
    at my district that contract or receive the solid waste from
    this area.
        We actually appreciate that because it means jobs in a very
    remote area of my district, so I'm not being sarcastic even
    though some might have interpreted it that way.
        I appreciate what you've done here in Seattle as well in
    this effort.
        I do share concerns similar to those outlined by my
    colleague from Wisconsin though. As much as I'm an advocate for
    renewable energy, and my district is home to much of that,
    wind, geothermal, solar--we are working on an EERE system down
    in Lake County right now in an old Air Force installation.
        I think it holds great potential, but what do we do--as I
    watch some of the testimony--I watched the ships go out of here
    and back over probably to China, and I think about the jobs
    that we have lost offshore, and part of the issue is energy
    costs, and so I'm hesitant about that, and I know that years
    ago--we're lucky in this region with hydro, but years ago the
    City of Seattle passed a resolution calling for the removal or
    breaching of Lower Snake River Dams which produces as much
    energy as we've conserved in the Northwest between 1978 and
    2005.
        Does the City of Seattle still support breaching the Lower
    Snake River Dams?
        Mayor Nickels. Congressman, that resolution was passed by
    the City Council before I became mayor, and you have not seen a
    repeat of that during my time as mayor.
        We have worked hard in conservation, as you know. We have
    invested some $340 million in conservation, and we've seen a
    significant savings in our usage of electricity and as a result
    in our electric bills, and we're proud of that, but we do
    support hydroelectric power.
        We own and operate dams on the Skagit River and on the Pend
    Oreille River, and it's basically solar power. It is the sun
    warming the ocean and taking the water over to the Cascade
    Mountains, putting it in beautiful snow that we can ski on, and
    then later we can put through the turbines. That energy is more
    susceptible to global warming than any other source.
        When that snow pack goes away, so does that source of
    clean, green power.
        We think it's important for us to be able to maintain that
    sustainable system we've had for 100 years and be able to
    conserve so that we don't have to have some of the other more
    polluting measures, and then in the meantime we work on
    technologies, solar--solar will create jobs in my city. It
    takes people to actually put them on buildings. That can't be
    outsourced.
        The R&D that Mayor Bloomberg was talking about, that will
    create jobs at the university here and ultimately in businesses
    that take that research and put it into application.
        We think there are great opportunities to create jobs in
    green industries, in green energy, and we think it's an
    exciting thing for the future of our country.
        Mr. Walden. I know my time is about to expire, but I have
    one final question, and that is that--and it's a serious
    question. How do you measure carbon output in a city?
        I understand how you can do it in a power plant where we've
    kept records. How do you do it overall though when we're all
    walking carbon emitters, we drive different vehicles, so how do
    we really get our hands around the measurement----
        Mayor Nickels. That's a great question, and I actually
    think there's a role for the federal government in that because
    there are a lot of different ways you can do it, and they add
    up to apples and oranges, so we don't necessarily have a
    consistent method that is, today, available.
        There are numerous organizations that have created tools
    that you can use.
        What we did is we took what we thought were the best
    models, and we built upon those.
        For instance, there are judgment calls. Seatac airport, not
    in the city, not run by the city, but clearly air travel is
    something people in Seattle engage in, so we took 30 percent of
    the emissions of the airport and called that our own.
        We think that the Congress and the federal government could
    establish a system that would be uniform, would allow us to
    compare apples to apples, and obviously that would be necessary
    if you were to have a cap and trade system, if you were to have
    a carbon--whether you call it a carbon tax and use the ``T''
    word or carbon fee and use the ``fee'' word, that would give
    us, I think, a lot more common--ability to talk about that.
        Mr. Walden. I appreciate that. Your help as mayors would be
    helpful as we work on those policies.
        Thank you very much and thanks for your testimony and the
    work you are doing in your cities.
        Mr. Inslee. Thank you.
        Mr. Dicks.
        Mr. Dicks. Many of you have done good work on buildings and
    retrofitting buildings. I think that's an important part of the
    solution here because building construction is a major issue.
        Also, one of the things--I was reading one of the
    editorials in the paper today talking about the consequences--I
    worry a lot as chairman of the interior subcommittee about the
    consequences to wildlife, but if we do have really significant
    warming, there's going to be consequences to human beings.
        I would like each of you to maybe just take some time and
    discuss those two issues.
        Mayor Nickels. Mr. Dicks, one of the members of the U.S.
    Mayor's climate protection agreement is Bob Cluck who is the
    mayor of Arlington, Texas. He's a Republican and he's a medical
    doctor, and he said that for a number of reasons he had signed
    on, but the main reason was the effect that he is seeing on
    human health; in particular, asthma and other chronic illnesses
    that he is seeing in greater and greater numbers in his city
    that concern him.
        The air quality--the greenhouse gas emission that also
    causes climate change is something that he sees as a health
    problem as well.
        Mr. Dicks. What about LEED standards in your buildings?
        Mayor Nickels. Well, we are very proud. We are in sort of a
    nip and tuck race with the City of Portland to have the largest
    portfolio of LEED buildings.
        Last week they were ahead 32 to 31 or something. This week
    we think we are ahead with Starbucks announcing that the old
    Sears store that is now Starbucks center is both the oldest and
    largest building to achieve a LEED gold certification. We are
    really proud of that.
        We think we are ahead of Portland today, but check back
    next week.
        Mr. Walden. How are the Huskies doing against the Ducks?
        Mayor Nickels. I'm not much of a basketball fan.
        The thing that is interesting is that the original LEED
    buildings were government buildings, our City Hall, our
    libraries. We are building a fire station--and now the market
    is demanding that private buildings be LEED certified.
        We are having a lot of new residential buildings built in
    our downtown, so we are seeing architectural firms, engineering
    firms, we are seeing companies that install and create the
    technology that allows you to achieve that certification being
    created here.
        We see the future for Seattle as being the green building
    capital of America. We see a lot of jobs in that.
        Mr. Dicks. Mayor Diaz, you have done a lot in Miami about
    this.
        Mayor Diaz. Sure. Actually, I believe it's something you
    asked earlier about the surprises--what are the best surprises
    we've had. One of the best surprises I think we've had is
    precisely how our business community has stepped up.
        This is a business issue, and in our case, at least, we've
    had the private sector be an active partner of everything that
    we've done in Miami, and with respect to LEED buildings, when
    we got past that little resistance in terms of knowledge, the
    response has been overwhelming.
        As I said in my statement earlier, we are looking at having
    gone from zero to over 20 buildings in one year--in a year, and
    as Mayor Nickels said, the market is now demanding it.
        Not only are the owners of the buildings, developers of
    those buildings saving a lot of money in energy costs but also
    just a quality of life for those people that are working in the
    building.
        It's been documented that it reduces absenteeism, people
    get sick less often, and it's just a wonderful experience for
    people to work in those buildings, so the market is demanding
    it.
        Now it's kind of like--you know, you guys here have a
    Starbucks in every corner, so if the developer over there is
    building a green building and I'm about to start one over
    there, I better make sure that I am at that same standard or
    else people are going to run over there to lease over there.
        The economic incentive is there for the business community
    and for developers to be a part of this effort.
        Mayor Palmer. I would like to talk about the housing aspect
    of this as well.
        In our city of Trenton, we are rehabilitating thousands of
    homes for working families, and what you don't want to see--
    because a lot of them are older brownstones, and of course the
    energy costs could be more than a mortgage once you make it
    affordable for working families.
        We have seen, working with our contractors, even our
    architects, that we build green so that you can reduce those
    costs, whether it's doubling up windows, whether it's even
    putting gardens on top of roofs.
        I mean, you know how hot it will get on tar roofs and the
    cost of your air conditioning at that time.
        If you put a garden on top of a roof, it will reduce your
    energy costs dramatically, which will make you able to live in
    a house that you buy, and I think this is very important.
        Not only is it reducing the energy costs of the homeowner,
    making it affordable and sustainable, but it's also helping
    create jobs in a market that didn't exist.
        Those are the kinds of things that can be and will be done
    as we move forward on this issue.
        Mr. Dicks. What about health issues?
        Mayor Palmer. I'm so glad you brought that up.
        I mean, if we do nothing--I know we talked about--and the
    economy is important and we continue to grow it, but what about
    our health? What about the--our health?
        We are in areas especially--and there are a lot of low-
    income areas, that this issue is also an environmental justice
    issue. Look at all the young people that have asthma, that have
    their inhalers walking around because they are around air that
    is polluted.
        We need to clean up our air and our environment, and
    especially as it relates to some of the people that live in
    some of the low income areas that are breathing this.
        We need to make sure that we have schools that are
    surrounding our inner cities that when buses are idling, that
    you have--that you retrofit those buses so you're not emitting
    all the CO2 in the air that our families and people
    are breathing.
        Look at the cost that you fight and deal with every day on
    health care?
        All of this is related. Every bit of it is related.
        You can't just look at climate change in a vacuum.
    Everything is tied to one another as relates to our environment
    and the way we are going to do business.
        All these are very important issues that some you can
    quantify, others you may not be able to quantify, but certainly
    we can't be in disagreement if we want a healthier and cleaner
    planet.
        Mr. McDermott. The alternative production of energy is
    always the sexy issue, the wind and the solar and all the rest,
    but it's my belief that the conservation issue is really the
    quickest and fastest way to really get some change going in the
    society.
        We put a lot of bonds in our bill from the House, and
    you're talking about a bond fund for the country's cities.
        One of the arguments that we listened to constantly on the
    Ways and Means Committee was ``Well, the mayors will just waste
    the money. If we give them $50 million or $100 million worth of
    bonds, they'll just waste it. Look at CDBG. What did they do
    with all that money?''
        I'd like to hear what you'd do with 100 million bucks if it
    was available on the 1st of March and you could begin planning
    in your cities for where you would put that money.
        Any one of you. Give me some ammunition.
        Mayor Nickels. Well, Congressman, we actually have taken
    the time to write a plan.
        We always do that in Seattle, and then we debate the plan
    for a long time before we adopt it.
        Mr. Dicks. And then you tear it up.
        Mayor Nickels. We brought together business leaders,
    environmental leaders, and civil leaders and looked at what we
    could do to reduce our carbon footprint, increase our
    efficiency, and improve the environment, and so we've already
    got it laid out.
        We would----
        Mr. McDermott. Do specifics.
        Mayor Nickels. We would work on the transportation system.
        We are about to open a new streetcar in Seattle connecting
    our downtown with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.
    That will take cars off of the street. It will move people from
    diesel buses to an electric nonpolluting vehicle, so we would
    look at improvements in our transportation system, like
    streetcars.
        Secondly, I think we would invest more in energy
    conservation and water conservation, probably in multifamily
    buildings and residential buildings.
        Mayor Palmer. I don't want to be redundant. We would do the
    same, but we would develop our plan.
        Just so you know, in real dollars and cents, if this were
    enacted, my city of Trenton would receive $633,566.54.
        Mr. McDermott. Not that you're waiting for it.
        Mayor Palmer. We would use it--we are putting together our
    plan for our carbon footprint but also looking at ways in which
    we can do education, job training, look at retrofitting of
    buildings, and those kinds of things that would help our
    economy.
        The other thing I want to say too--you know, as mayors, we
    hear this all the time, ``CDBG, what are you doing with the
    money? You are wasting the money.'' You know, I don't know what
    other cities are doing, but I can tell you the U.S. Conference
    of Mayors, we know what to do with the money. We help millions
    of Americans each and every day. They are almost like urban
    myths anymore.
        You know, you look at Iraq. You want to talk about where's
    the money going, nobody questions Halliburton with all of that,
    but they question the mayors that we each and every day fight
    for the citizens of our community and without a partner in
    federal government. You wouldn't have daycare centers, senior
    citizen buildings, and those kinds of things.
        What we're asking for is not a handout. We want a partner,
    and what we're also--we know there's accountability in this
    bill. We want to be held accountable for the results. We want
    to show what we are going to do, and it's in the bill that you
    have. ``Show us what you have done in order to reduce that.''
        I think that we spend a lot of time on demonizing. We need
    to say, ``Let's work together. Let's get the mayors who are
    doing this''--you know, if you want to talk about saving money,
    the mayors are already doing this.
        The governors, they are following our lead, as they usually
    do, but the mayors are actually doing this, so even if--look at
    the bottom line. If you are going to put money into something,
    who is doing it rather than who's talking about doing it?
        The mayors have shown--Mayor Diaz, Mayor Bloomberg, Mayor
    Daley, Mayor Diaz, and hundreds of other mayors, we're already
    doing it.
        Give us the opportunity to show you what will work, and
    it's the best, quite frankly, investment we could ever make for
    our country.
        Mayor Diaz. I would add to what they said, and that is, I
    think, the question that has come from the members, and
    particularly with the cities that are not as far advanced in
    this process, is creating measurements, going through an audit
    process, creating standards, something that we can measure,
    something that we can make sure that that money--you know,
    what's the problem, identify it on day one, and what strategies
    are you going to have to implement that and then be able to
    test against the problem on day one.
        I think that's--I think that's essential because that's how
    we all know we're spending the money wisely.
        Mr. McDermott. What would you do with new money?
        Mayor Diaz. What would I do with new money? I think I would
    work primarily in establishing a lot of these audits,
    particularly at the single family level, weatherization
    programs for some of our residents, particularly the low-income
    residents in our community who are really challenged.
        If I'm--as President Palmer said, if we are going to a lot
    of low-income residents, and we are saying, ``If you do these
    certain things, you will reduce your energy costs and therefore
    reduce your greenhouse gas emissions,'' et cetera, et cetera,
    ``It's all fine and dandy, but I can't afford it,'' and so I
    think that's a challenge that all of us have at the local level
    to really have an impact in--especially in neighborhoods that
    need it but at the same time in so many of our--in what is
    really a large part of the emissions that are being generated
    in some of our cities.
        Mr. McDermott. I can understand that. I did the energy
    audit on my house to put solar paneling on it, and it would
    cost me $24,000, and I would get my money back, at my present
    usage, in 21 years because I'm not using enough energy, so I
    understand the economics of it are very difficult and to help
    the lower income people.
        Mayor Nickels. One of the things that you ought to look at,
    and it's one of the things that President Clinton mentioned and
    also Mayor Tom Bates of Berkeley, California would be to create
    a financing mechanism so that instead of having to take out a
    consumer loan where you would have to pay the solar panels off
    in three years, you would take out a financing mechanism that
    would take the savings that you have and dedicate those savings
    to paying off a loan over a longer period of time.
        You wouldn't pay anything if you got no savings, but you
    would do that audit that would demonstrate what the savings are
    so that the lender would have a guarantee of a repayment.
        Mayor Bloomberg. Solar panels are one thing. Some parts of
    the country don't get a lot of sunlight where it really makes a
    lot of sense, but if you would just convert the light bulbs in
    your house to compact fluorescent light bulbs, the payback is
    within a year, and you'll save $100 per light bulb over the
    life of the bulb.
        I was talking to Lee Scott the other day who is the
    chairman of Wal-Mart. They have taken on the objective of
    selling hundreds of millions of these compact fluorescent
    bulbs.
        He said they've sold well over 100 million of them, and
    that reduces the need for one and a half coal-fired plants in
    this country. That's one thing, and that's most people still
    going nowhere near converting their houses, so there are lots
    of things that you can do in your house with a payback that's
    quick enough and the investment is small enough that all of us
    can do it.
        Mr. Inslee. I just want to note the Capitol dome is going
    to have efficient lighting, the top of the Capitol dome.
        We had a little contrary note about governors. I thought it
    was appropriate to defend Governor Schwarzenegger who is doing
    a great job on energy efficiency, Governor Christine Gregoire
    who has helped us in the state of Washington, Governor Ted
    Strickland in Ohio--we have some great governors too.
        We are going to have a lightening round, second round.
    Let's try to confine it to four minutes, and we'll start with
    Mr. Walden.
        Mr. Walden. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        I'm feeling really guilty right now looking up at no
    fluorescent light bulbs and all these lights on on a sunny day
    in Seattle, and I'm wondering if we could do our part and
    conserve by turning those down a little bit.
        I invested in a hybrid this year, bought a Prius, traded in
    my old Chrysler, doubled or more my gas mileage, but I was
    disturbed when I picked up a paper the other day, and they had
    a chart in there about your return on investment, and because
    Toyota has been so successful selling those, they no longer
    give the tax credit to the buyer, so now it takes 17.9 years to
    recover the difference between a Toyota Prius and another
    vehicle that's standard, but the Ford Escape, which I'm looking
    at for out here in Oregon, it's 3.1 years return on your
    investment, and would double the mileage I'm getting on my
    current four-wheel drive, which I need to get up to ski on
    Mount Hood, which is clearly the best skiing in the Northwest,
    and I encourage you all to come ski there.
        I wanted to get back to this issue of the international
    effect, and by no means are we saying we shouldn't do
    everything we can here--and I'm going through as the light
    bulbs go out and putting in the fluorescents, and I'm trying to
    do those things. I've supported efforts to go to the LED
    technology, when it's available, which will make fluorescents
    look like incandescents in contrast in terms of energy
    efficiency, so we need to encourage that.
        We need to do these things for our future and snow pack and
    the future of the planet, but what do we do to encourage
    foreign nations to get involved?
        I spent an hour with the lead negotiator for China in
    former Speaker Hastert's office, and it was pretty clear to me,
    they are moving ahead on a new coal fire plant, 4 or 500
    megawatts per week, every week this year, as well as other
    energy-producing sources.
        They are doing that because they are getting a lot of jobs
    over there, and they are using dirty coal.
        We had a group of members that was over there that toured a
    coal plant that when they talked to them, they said, on the
    scrubbers they have today, not for sequestration, just
    scrubbing out the sulfur dome, they only turn it on when they
    know the inspectors are coming because it reduces the
    efficiency of the plant.
        This is--if there was ever a global problem, this is it,
    and while we do our part--I struggle with this piece of
    potentially losing jobs here--not necessarily creating the
    green jobs. I think there is a wonderful opportunity to do
    that, don't get me wrong, but I also know manufacturing jobs
    are going to chase cheap power, cheap natural gas, cheap labor.
        The ships that come in and out of here, as we watch, are
    bringing a lot of goods this way and not many going that way,
    as many as we'd like, and so I struggle with this issue of
    letting China off the hook or letting India off the hook.
        What do you think we should do, not diminishing what we are
    doing in this country or what you are doing as mayors, but what
    do we do internationally to try to bring the big polluters in
    who never were going to be part of Kyoto and who have made it
    clear, in personal discussions, they have no intention of
    making major changes.
        In fact, basically we were told we polluted when we were
    industrializing, and it's their turn now and it's our turn to
    clean up. I don't think it's anybody's turn to pollute, by the
    way.
        Suggestions, Mayor?
        Mayor Bloomberg. Make--continuing to pollute, to teach them
    a lesson, just doesn't make any sense to me, and that's the
    strategy.
        Mr. Walden. You're missing my point. No, no, no.
        Mayor Bloomberg. It just doesn't make any sense to me.
        I don't know how to make them do it. You can only hope that
    they will look at America and say, ``America is so good. I want
    to be like them.''
        We are America, we shouldn't be walking away. We should
    invest in technology, clean our air, and hopefully they will
    follow. Short of that, I don't think there's any way. You are
    pushing on a string.
        The only way they are going to do it is if they see it is
    in their interest, and the only way they are going to see it's
    in their interest is if we show that we can do it.
        This is a country--think about what we came from, what we
    used to do. We used to roll up our sleeves and make it better,
    and now all we're doing is we're complaining, ``The other guy's
    not doing it, so we are not going to do it.''
        That doesn't make any sense to me at all.
        Mr. Walden. That's not what I said. You missed the point.
        Mr. Inslee. I want to take a crack at answering Mr.
    Walden's very important question about China.
        What some of us believe is a vision on China is that we
    will take Ramgen Corporation's technology being developed in
    Mayor Nickels' city, which allows the compression of
    CO2 so we might be able to burn coal cleanly, and
    sell it to China, use the Ausra solar thermal technology being
    installed in Florida with the first big contract for zero
    CO2 solar thermal in Florida for about 200
    megawatts, and sell it to China, use the technology being
    developed in New Jersey, not too far from Trenton, and sell it
    to China.
        I just think our role and our destiny as a country is to
    develop these technologies and make China our biggest market
    ever, and I believe--that's just one member of Congress.
        We've been kind of lobbing softballs. I want to ask a hard
    question to you, if I can.
        We have passed a bill in the House for the first time
    having a requirement federally to require local communities to
    have building codes that answer a need for energy efficiency,
    and it's a pretty aggressive requirement. It essentially
    requires local communities to adopt building codes that will
    meet federal--what we have now for federal codes for LEED
    standards in federal building for private construction,
    including in the community, including public construction.
        Now, that bill, that requirement, as currently written, has
    no sanction associated with it. It says the communities will do
    this and cities will do that, but it doesn't have any sanction
    associated with it.
        Now, some have argued that we have to have some minor way
    to enforce that requirement, and we think it's necessary
    because not all mayors are as enlightened as the four at this
    table, not in every single city in the United States, and it is
    important to have a federal building code energy efficiency
    requirement.
        I would just ask for your views on that, whether that's a
    good idea and whether or not some enforcement mechanism is
    appropriate.
        Mayor Nickels. First, the Conference of Mayors has adopted
    a framework for this issue, and that's attached to my
    testimony, and one of the things that we suggest is that the
    federal government lead by example, so to the extent that the
    federal government has taken this on and is showing how it can
    work, I think that's great. I think that's a great first step,
    but often it's the opposite, it's that the federal government
    exempts itself and then puts requirements on states and cities.
        I think that there is a role for the federal government to
    set some standards in this area and many others, just as
    there's a role for the federal government in showing how things
    ought to be measured and then figure out how it should be paid
    for, whether it's a carbon tax or cap and trade system or what
    have you, so I think that's fair.
        I think that to the extent that you're talking about
    smaller jurisdictions in particular, there should be some
    resources to help them do that because it's a fairly technical
    matter to develop those codes and to implement those codes, so
    I think there should be not an unfair mandate that doesn't have
    some resources with it, but setting the standards and then
    enforcing the standards I think is fair game.
        Mr. Inslee. Mayor.
        Mayor Diaz. I would tend to agree.
        In fact, as I mentioned earlier, we are adopting our own
    certification standards locally, but I also agree with what
    Mayor Nickels said about the fact that even today cities are at
    different levels in terms of their expertise and their
    knowledge in this area, so I would recommend that there be some
    phasing in to allow cities to sort of catch up, at least
    intellectually, with the kinds of things that are necessary,
    and I can think of no better way to do that, by the way, than
    through the CDBG program.
        Mr. Inslee. We'll work on that.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner.
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        Congressman Dicks and I have been in Congress longer than
    any of our colleagues up here, and I remember in my first year
    in Congress, President Carter rammed through a repeal of the
    revenue sharing program to states and municipalities, and that
    caused a considerable financial dislocation when the revenue
    sharing money ended.
        Let me ask each of you a question, which you probably can
    answer ``yes'' or ``no.''
        If the federal money in the block grant program were not
    available, would you continue doing what you are advocating in
    your testimony?
        Mayor Bloomberg. Yes.
        Mayor Palmer. You just want a ``yes'' or ``no''? It's yes.
        As mayors, we can't afford not to. It's important, but at
    what cost?
        You know, we have to do it, but then what gets cut? We cut
    out resources to a library, resources to a senior citizen
    center, and then you get to the bone and you cut police and
    fire because as a result of it, you have to do something.
        I mean, there's only so much----
        Mr. Sensenbrenner. We face the same thing with our PAYGO
    rules here. If we plug something up, we have to offset
    something elsewhere.
        Mayor Palmer. I don't know about PAYGO, but I know where we
    need to go, and that's----
        Mayor Diaz. The answer would be yes.
        Mayor Nickels. We would continue what we are doing. What
    the federal money would allow us to do is bring it up to a
    larger scale.
        Mr. Dicks. We are very proud of the fact that we have 728
    mayors signed up. Well, what about the rest?
        That means three-fourths of the mayors are not signed up.
        Why is that? What is the problem?
        Is it a lack of understanding or is it a lack of resources?
        In other words, is it the richer cities, the well-off
    cities that can do this?
        What's the reason for people not doing it?
        Mayor Nickels. It's a wide variety of cities that have
    signed on, and that's been a very interesting part of it is as
    different parts of the country have experienced extreme weather
    events and they kind of--the bulb goes off, they have that aha
    moment, we see cities begin to sign on.
        I wouldn't characterize cities as being the richer cities
    or the poor--they literally represent the gamut of cities in
    America.
        Politically, it's still a difficult issue in many parts of
    the country, and so I think that there's probably a political
    factor for some mayors not to sign on.
        I think for others, it's a question of ``What does it mean?
    How do I measure my emissions? What do I do in order to reduce
    them and how do I know when I've succeeded?''
        That's the question we get even from the mayors who have
    signed on and providing the technical help to them to be able
    to answer that and be accountable to their constituents when
    they make that promise is a big part of the effort that we're--
    --
        Mr. Dicks. You have reached out, obviously, to the whole
    country here, but what about in our own region? Is there an
    effort for Seattle and King County, which have been the leaders
    on this, to reach out to, let's say, Tacoma and Bremerton----
        Mayor Nickels. Yes, both Tacoma and Bremerton in the Sixth
    Congressional District have signed on, and Mayor Baarsma was an
    active participant in the summit that we had.
        Spokane, the largest city in eastern Washington has signed
    on, and, in fact, 30 cities in Washington state have signed on,
    and many of those mayors were here for the last two days to
    learn about ways to keep that promise.
        Mr. Dicks. But maybe--Mayor Palmer, you are the president
    of the organization. Is there an active effort to continue to
    try to get mayors to consider this and to join this effort?
        Mayor Palmer. Absolutely.
        If you think of where we were--first and foremost, when
    Mayor Nickels started, he said his goal was 141 from the amount
    of nations that signed on, and the more you talked about, the
    more people understood this. We are at 728. We just picked up
    18 today.
        I know in the city of--in the state of New Jersey what we
    are going to do is even be more active as it relates to this
    issue once you can explain it to the elected officials.
        I think what we are doing now as an organization is
    continuing to educate not only our public but the people,
    working with the business community because of course you have
    to look at the bottom line, but I believe that if we put our
    great minds together, we can find out that we can be energy
    efficient and be competitive as relates to our economy. We just
    have to figure out how to do it.
        Of course China and them are not going to do it until they
    can see how you make money with your technology and doing that,
    but we are going to continue.
        Next year at this time, we will probably have another 728
    and continue to grow.
        Mr. Dicks. Are the National Association of Manufacturers,
    companies like that, of that magnitude, are they involved? Do
    they help in this cause of yours?
        Mayor Palmer. Yes. As a matter of fact, this week we
    announced a partnership with members of our business council,
    our climate protection council made up of businesses that have
    started.
        TCP, Wal-Mart, DuPont and others are a part of it to come
    up with a strategy on how do we make this competitive and get
    the word out.
        We are going to continue to do this, but I can tell you
    that if this committee passes the energy environment block
    grant and we begin to see true success stories at work and what
    it's about, we'll have many more mayors involved.
        Some mayors say, ``My town is so small, does it matter to
    me,'' but it matters to all of us, and we are going to continue
    to push that message.
        Mayor Diaz. I would just add that I believe that the
    universe we are talking about in terms of membership cities is
    1,100, of cities over 30,000, so 728 out of 1,100 is a pretty
    good percentage.
        I would also argue that as far as I know, reading history,
    which I love to do, at no time in our history do I remember
    over 700 mayors coming together agreeing on anything, all
    parties, all cities, all areas.
        Mr. McDermott. I couldn't help as Mayor Bloomberg was
    talking at lunch today thinking about the ``Yes, but,'' ``Yes,
    but there's politics.''
        If you were going to be the energy secretary for the next
    President of the United States, what would you tell him or her
    to do? How would you overcome the power of coal in this country
    and the power of oil?
        We have huge deposits in this country, enough coal to
    provide energy for the next 600 years, if we don't consider the
    environment.
        So what would you say to the next President?
        Mayor Bloomberg. I think in the end the great challenge is
    to convince the public and companies that it is in their own
    interests to clean the air, to pollute less, to use less
    energy, and I don't think that there are a lot of companies
    that have sent their jobs overseas just because of the price of
    oil or the price of coal, the price of energy, but we have to--
    in the end--there's two things that matter to people: Jobs and
    housing, ``My job, my house.''
        If you can convince people that they can save money or that
    their kids will breathe better air or that their products will
    be more attractive or that they'll be able to get better
    employees by being energy efficient, then people will do it.
        In the end, government can only do so much.
        This is a capitalistic country, it's the greatest
    strength--the marketplace is the greatest strength of America,
    and you are seeing companies do things when it is in their
    interest or individuals doing it.
        In fact, I can tell you in New York City, building green
    has become fashionable because it lets you rent your space for
    more money and it lets you run your building cheaper not
    because I've beat them over the head and said, ``You should do
    this for saving the planet 50 years from now''----
        Mr. McDermott. If your belief is that it's a capitalist
    system and people will respond to incentives, what would you
    tell the President to send up to the Congress for changes in
    the tax code to make this thing work, besides the $10 or $20 a
    ton of uncarbon? Anything else?
        Mayor Bloomberg. Yeah. I would certainly not subsidize corn
    ethanol and tariff against sugar ethanol. It makes absolutely
    no sense or if I was going to do it, I wouldn't do it in the
    energy side. I would do it in the agricultural side where it
    may very well make good policy.
        I am not an expert on agriculture, but when it comes to
    energy, this is just not the most efficient way to do things.
        As a matter of fact, there are some studies that say that
    we pollute more by doing it.
        Mr. McDermott. Any other advice that you would give the
    President?
        Mayor Nickels. If the President asked my advice, I would
    tell her that the--I would quote the price of oil on her first
    day as President and suggest that it would be no lower on her
    last day of Presidency and, in fact, likely to be much higher
    and that we have the opportunity to create jobs and create a
    new economy in this country by finding a different way to power
    our buildings and our industries and to run our transportation
    and that that research and development effort and
    implementation effort would be the, I think, most important
    undertaking that the federal government would have made,
    certainly since we decided to send a person to the moon, and I
    think probably ever.
        Mr. McDermott. I would just say to my colleague from
    Wisconsin, the Ways and Means Committee did put out the R&D tax
    credit out of the committee on Thursday, so--on Wednesday, so
    it will be on its way to the floor shortly.
        Mr. Inslee. Before we close, I want to recognize Mayor
    Rosemary Ives from the great city of Redmond who has been a
    great leader in bicycle transportation and public
    transportation. Thank you for your work, Mayor. We really
    appreciate a great career in that.
        I wonder if we can ask our witnesses if they want to make a
    closing one-minute comment.
        What would you like us to take back to D.C.?
        Mayor Nickels. First, I would like to recognize the fact
    that there are a number of mayors in the audience, and maybe
    ask them if they would be willing to stand and be recognized
    just so you know there are other parts of the country
    represented.
        [Mayors stand.]
        Mayor Nickels. Thank you so much for holding this hearing.
        The fact that we are having honest and direct conversations
    around this issue is refreshing and I think very healthy.
        There are different ways to go about this issue, but the
    recognition that global warming is happening, that it is human
    caused, and that we have a moral responsibility to step up and
    provide leadership I think is the key thing.
        I would like you to take that back, and then we will be
    happy to work with you to find the specific policy directions
    that will best suit our country.
        Mayor Diaz. I will conclude by saying two things. Number
    one, I think there was a poll released in the last few days
    that showed that to 84 percent of Americans, this is a
    mainstream issue. It's not a tree-hugger issue anymore.
        Eighty-four percent of Americans are saying this should be
    a top priority issue for the next President of the United
    States of America.
        Number two, there was a lot of discussion here about cost.
        I think the greatest cost is the fact that we are draining
    the resources that we have accustomed ourselves to living under
    that our children maybe, our grandchildren, our great-children
    may not have, and we have an obligation to make sure that we
    don't continue to drain the earth's resources.
        There was a United Nations study that was just released
    over the last few days. 1,400 scientists came together saying
    that what we have done to the natural resources of this world
    over the last 20 years is ridiculous and what we are about to
    continue doing, if we don't stop, is going to make things even
    worse.
        With regard to the international, I would say that the--in
    Miami and in Florida, Governor Crist is also joining other
    governors in being a great leader of this movement.
        We have signed an agreement with the national government.
    It's just, unfortunately, not ours. It's the national
    governments of Germany and the United Kingdom, and they are
    making every effort to work with the state of Florida to create
    green jobs, to show us how they have done it in those countries
    and are doing it in Florida.
        We need to take the leadership. We can't--one thing for
    sure that I know--I don't know quite how to get there, but I
    know how we don't get there. There's no way we can ever
    convince China and India to be a part of this process if we are
    not a part of it, and that's what our partners from the UK and
    our partners from up in Germany tell us as well.
        Mayor Palmer. I would be redundant. I don't want to take
    any more of your time. I just want to thank you on behalf of
    the U.S. Conference of Mayors and Executive Director Tom
    Cochran and staff for coming and having this field hearing. It
    is very encouraging to all of us.
        I just want to say that we can do this. We can really do
    this.
        There is disagreement. We can work through those. Nothing
    is impossible.
        We have got the greatest nation in the world in innovation,
    a capitalistic system.
        We can do that. We just need to bring everybody to the
    table.
        How do you make money off this? How can we get a job? How
    can my kids breathe clean air? We can do this, but our citizens
    want to see us work together and show the leadership, and I
    think that we are doing it as mayors, and I really truly
    believe that you are doing this by coming here and putting
    forth part of your energy environment block grant as well, so I
    want to wish you all to have a great weekend and we really
    appreciate--it's a Friday, and I know how you have families,
    and I really appreciate you being here and all of my colleagues
    as well.
        Mayor Bloomberg. Invest in R&D, open the borders because we
    are driving our jobs to China. They aren't going because of
    energy. They are going because we are not letting the best
    scientists come here.
        You talked about science being used overseas. It's going to
    start being developed overseas. It is very scary what is
    happening to science, to education, to medicine.
        The rest of the world is going after the best and the
    brightest while we are trying to keep them out, and our energy
    policy should be set by what's best for America not by some
    misguided fear that somebody else may be polluting more. We
    have got to take care of ourselves first and lead by example.
        Thank you very much.
        Mr. Inslee. As a closing note, and on a personal note, I
    want to thank all the mayors here who are engaged in this
    effort.
        If you look out on the Sound, it is a pretty nice place to
    grow up, and I was born here. Your efforts in whatever town you
    are in is helping the Evergreen State stay evergreen.
        I want to personally thank you and tell you that I've been
    watching your efforts with great personal frustration to watch
    your achievements and the lack of achievements we have had in
    Congress, and I just want to report to you that the calvary is
    on the way, okay?
        We are about ready to arrive, and I will tell you one
    story.
        March 21st--25th, 1961, John Kennedy goes to the House, and
    he says, ``We are going to go to the moon in ten years and
    bring him back safely,'' and the NASA director James Webb
    turned to his assistant, Jim Gilruth, and he said, ``Jim, can
    we actually do this,'' and Gilruth said, ``Yes, absolutely. We
    have to,'' and I think that's the message today.
        Thank you very much for all your work.
        [Whereupon, at 4:33 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]

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