[Senate Hearing 117-261]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]






                                                        S. Hrg. 117-261
 
  PROMOTING AMERICAN ENERGY SECURITY BY FACILITATING INVESTMENTS AND 
                    INNOVATION IN CLIMATE SOLUTIONS

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

                                HEARING

                               before the

                              COMMITTEE ON
                      ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS
                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                             MARCH 23, 2022

                               __________

  Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works
  
  
  
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
 

        Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
        
        
        
                        ______
 
              U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
 47-617PDF          WASHINGTON : 2023      
        
        
        
               COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                  THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware, Chairman
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland         SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West 
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont                 Virginia 
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island         Ranking Member
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon                 JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma
EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts      KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota
TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois            CYNTHIA M. LUMMIS, Wyoming
DEBBIE STABENOW, Michigan            RICHARD SHELBY, Alabama
MARK KELLY, Arizona                  JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
ALEX PADILLA, California             ROGER WICKER, Mississippi
                                     DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska
                                     JONI ERNST, Iowa
                                     LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina

             Mary Frances Repko, Democratic Staff Director
               Adam Tomlinson, Republican Staff Director
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

                             MARCH 23, 2022
                           OPENING STATEMENTS

Carper, Hon. Thomas R., U.S. Senator from the State of Delaware..     1
Capito, Hon. Shelley Moore, U.S. Senator from the State of 
  Virginia.......................................................     5

                               WITNESSES

Mabus, Hon. Raymond E., Former Secretary of the Navy.............     8
    Prepared statement...........................................    10
Responses to Additional Questions from Senators:
    Carper.......................................................    17
    Inhofe.......................................................    20
    Graham.......................................................    21
Stainken, Katherine, Vice President of Policy, Electrification 
  Coalition......................................................    22
    Prepared statement...........................................    25
Responses to Additional Questions from Senators:
    Carper.......................................................    37
    Capito.......................................................    46
Matheson, Hon. Jim, Chief Executive Officer, National Rural 
  Electric Cooperative Association...............................    50
    Prepared statement...........................................    53
Responses to Additional Questions from Senator Capito............    59
Sgamma, Kathleen, President, Western Energy Alliance Promoting 
  American Energy Security by Facilitating Investments and 
  Innovation in Climate Solutions................................    61
    Prepared statement...........................................    63
Responses to Additional Questions from Senators:
    Carper.......................................................    68
    Capito.......................................................    68

                          ADDITIONAL MATERIAL

Written Statement from Citizens' Climate Lobby...................   105
EDF Needless Waste of American Energy Resources..................   116
Resources for the Future Study that Shows Consumers will not be 
  Harmed by the Methane Emissions Reduction Program..............   120
IPCC Report Climate Change 2022 Impacts, Adaptation and 
  Vulnerability..................................................   121
Letter of 118 undersigned law professors to Chairman Bishop, 
  Ranking Member Grijalva, and Committee Members.................   132
Boston Globe Editorial Board Article; Our Russian `pipeline,' and 
  its ugly toll..................................................   147
Letter to President Biden from; Associated Builders and 
  Contractors of West Virginia, API Appalachia, Consumer Energy 
  Alliance, Midwest Gas and Oil Association of West Virginia West 
  Virginia Manufacturers Association.............................   153
Letter to President Biden from; Western Energy Alliance, Permian 
  Basin Petroleum Association, U.S. Oil and Gas Association, 
  Independent Petroleum Association of America, National Stripper 
  Well Association, Mid Continent Oil and Gas Association, New 
  Mexico Oil and Gas Association, North Dakota Petroleum 
  Council,Illinois Oil and Gas Association, Energy Workforce & 
  Technology Council.............................................   158
WJS Editorial Board Articles:
    A Nickel for Your Ukraine Thoughts...........................   160
    Biden's U.S. Oil Embargo.....................................   162
    Biden's Not-So-Clean Energy Transition.......................   165
    Russia Can Hold Nickel Hostage...............................   169
    The Electric-Vehicle Push Empowers China.....................   172
    GAO: Report to Congressional Requesters, National 
      Enviornmental Policy.......................................   174
    EIA expexts annual U.S. crude oil production to surpass pre-
      pandemic levels in 2023....................................   216
Due to size constraints the following ducuments are not included 
  in this Hearing record but are available on the Web:
 Critical Minerals: Current Challenges and Future 
  Strategies: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Vikas-Agrawal-
  3/publication/351954645--Critical--Minerals--Current--
  Challenges--and--Future--Strategies/links/
  60b1ba77299bf1f6d580439c/Critical-Minerals-Current-Challenges-
  and-Future-Strategies.pdf
 How a few geothermal plants could solve America's 
  lithium supply crunch and boost the EV battery industry: 
  https://theconversation.com/how-a-few-geothermal-plants-could-
  solve-americas-lithium-supply-crunch-and-boost-the-ev-battery-
  industry-179465
 IEA; Report extract Sustainable and responsible 
  development of minerals: https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-
  of-critical-minerals-in-clean-energy-transitions/sustainable-
  and-responsible-development-of-minerals
 Economy Statement by Benjamin Harris, Assistant 
  Secretary forEconomy Policy, for the Treasury Borrowing 
  AdvisoryCommittee January 31, 2022: https://home.treasury.gov/
  news/press-releases/jy0574
 One Year of Biden-Harris The White House: https://
  www.whitehouse.gov/oneyear/
 Republicans Wrongly Blame Biden for Rising Gas Prices: 
  https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/09/us/politics/fact-check-
  republicans-biden-gas.html
 Why Are U.S. Gas Prices Soaring When America Barley Uses 
  Russian Oil?: https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/12/energy/us-gas-
  prices-russia-oil/index.html
 Majority of New Renewables Undercut Cheapest Fossil Fuel 
  on Cost: https://www.irena.org/newsroom/pressreleases/2021/Jun/
  Majority-of-New-Renewables-Undercut-Cheapest-Fossil-Fuel-on-
  Cost
 Comptroller Texas Government Economy Fiscal Notes 
  Published October 2021: https://comptroller.texas.gov/economy/
  fiscal-notes/2021/oct/winter-storm-impact.php
 GAO @ 100 Electricity Grid Resilience: https://
  www.gao.gov/products/gao-21-423t.
 George Mason University; One way to combat Russia? Move 
  faster on clean energy: https://www.latimes.com/business/story/
  2022-02-26/one-way-to-combat-russia-move-faster-on-clean-energy
 Fact Sheet: Securing a Made in America Supply Chain for 
  Critical Minerals: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/
  statements-releases/2022/02/22/fact-sheet-securing-a-made-in-
  america-supply-chain-for-critical-minerals/
 DOE Releases First-Ever Comprehensive Strategy to Secure 
  America's Clean Energy Supply Chain: https://www.energy.gov/
  articles/doe-releases-first-ever-comprehensive-strategy-secure-
  americas-clean-energy-supply-chain
 White House BBB Plan: https://www.whitehouse.gov/
  briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/10/28/president-biden-
  announces-the-build-back-better-framework/
 FACT SHEET: President Biden to Highlight Clean Energy 
  Manufacturing and Deployment Investments that Cut Consumer 
  Costs, Strengthen U.S. Energy Sector, andCreate Good-Paying 
  Jobs: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-
  releases/2022/02/28/fact-sheet-president-biden-to-highlight-
  clean-energy-manufacturing-and-deployment-investments-that-cut-
  consumer-costs-strengthen-u-s-energy-sector-and-create-good-
  paying-jobs/
 World Resources Institute; How the Clean Energy for 
  America Improves Tax Credits: https://www.wri.org/insights/how-
  clean-energy-america-act-improves-tax-credits
 Resources for the Future; Methane Fees' Effects on 
  Natural Gas Prices and Methane Leakage: https://media.rff.org/
  documents/IB--21-12.pdf)
 Energy Innovation; Benefits of the Build Back Better 
  Act's Methane Fee; Jeffrey Rissman, October 2021: https://
  energyinnovation.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Benefits-of-
  the-Build-Back-Better-Act-Methane-Fee.pdf
 Energy Innovation; Energy Security Benefits of 
  Congressional Climate and Clean Energy Policy: https://
  energyinnovation.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Congressional-
  Proposals-and-U.S.-Energy-Security-EPS-Modeling.pdf


  PROMOTING AMERICAN ENERGY SECURITY BY FACILITATING INVESTMENTS AND 
                    INNOVATION IN CLIMATE SOLUTIONS

                              ----------                              


                       WEDNESDAY, MARCH 23, 2022

                                       U.S. Senate,
                 Committee on Environment and Public Works,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The committee, met, pursuant to notice, at 10:00 a.m. at 
Bethany Beach Town Hall, Hon. Thomas R. Carper (chairman of the 
committee) presiding.
    Present: Senators Carper, Capito, Cardin, Whitehouse, 
Markey, Duckworth, Stabenow, Kelly, Inhofe, Cramer, Lummis, 
Boozman, Sullivan, Ernst.
    The committee, met, pursuant to notice, at 10:02 a.m. in 
room 406, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Thomas R. Carper 
(chairman of the committee) presiding.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. THOMAS R. CARPER, 
            U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF DELAWARE

    Senator Carper. Good morning, everyone. I am pleased to 
call this hearing to order.
    Welcome to each of our witnesses, three in person and one 
remote. We are delighted to see you all.
    At a time when America's energy costs are tied to the whims 
of dictators like Vladimir Putin, our hearing today will 
explore how our Nation can promote American energy security by 
facilitating investments and innovation in among other things, 
climate solutions.
    To help inform our conversation today we will be hearing 
from a panel of expert witnesses that are joining us in person 
and remotely. We welcome you, and we thank you for your 
willingness to participate in what we believe is an important 
conversation and, frankly, a very timely conversation.
    I believe it was Winston Churchill who said, ``The further 
back we look, the further forward we can see.'' Think about 
that. The further back we look, the further forward we can see. 
When we look to find solutions for rising fossil fuel prices 
here and around the world, it is helpful, I think, to look back 
at history for some help on those answers.
    Since the Arab oil embargo of 1973, many in Washington have 
argued that if we just drill for more oil, we could be free of 
the price whiplash caused by international disruptions in the 
global oil market. That wasn't true during the Arab oil 
embargo, and it isn't true today. This narrative clings to a 
hope, I think a false hope, that the oil market in the United 
States is somehow separate from the global oil market. Some of 
us on this committee know better than me, that is not true. 
They are not separate.
    So, let's lay out some facts. One of those is that the oil 
and gas industry has been slow to ramp up production on the 
more than 9,000 unused approved permits that they hold to drill 
onshore. Is it onshore and offshore? Just onshore. I didn't 
realize that, 9,000 unused approved permits to drill onshore. I 
had my staff double check that, and apparently that is actually 
true.
    Now, after experiencing falling revenues during the 
pandemic, many in the industry are more interested in paying 
back their shareholders, it seems, than taking action to lower 
gas prices. High gas prices are not a result of this 
Administration's policies.
    Still, the U.S., as I am told, is a net exporter of oil 
products and is drilling more today than we were a year ago. 
Our Nation is on track to surpass our historic, pre-pandemic 
levels of oil production in the next year.
    Despite this increased oil production, American energy 
prices continue to be directly tied to global events, such as 
Vladimir Putin's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and the 
pandemic. In fact, prices at the pump have spiked nearly a 
dollar since Putin moved his forces into Ukraine.
    As long as our economy runs mostly on fossil fuels, energy 
prices will continue to be vulnerable to forces outside the 
United States. That is not energy security. For many families, 
it means energy insecurity.
    Let me just say, right here at the outset, we are not going 
to switch to electric vehicles overnight, or in a year, or two, 
or 5 years, or a decade. As much as I believe in using hydrogen 
to help provide the propulsion for our vehicles in the future, 
we are going to be driving vehicles that use liquid fuels for a 
long time. I would acknowledge that. That is the reality that 
we live with.
    But having said that, our overreliance on fossil fuels is 
also driving another existential threat, and that is climate 
change. Just last month, a study by the National Oceanic and 
Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, highlighted the alarming 
rates of sea level rise due to climate change.
    For people who live on the inland in the U.S. and in the 
heartland of our Country, they don't have to worry about this 
as much. Those of us who live on the coast, I think about half 
of the people in the United States live within 50 miles of one 
of our coasts, for us, this is real and a matter of ongoing 
concern.
    Anyway, NOAA estimated in the report last month that our 
oceans will rise as much as a foot in the next 30 years without 
action. That is more than they have raised in the last hundred 
years. The trend is going to continue, and if we don't do 
something about it, it is only going to make it worse. If you 
happen to live near a coast, that is a matter of real concern 
for us and our families.
    Increased sea level rise is just one challenge of many that 
Americans will face, and already are facing, because of climate 
change. The climate economic costs are starting to add up. 
According to GAO, the Government Accountability Office, the 
economic impacts that Americans are experiencing from the 
Russian invasion of Ukraine pale in comparison to the economic 
devastation we can look forward to if we fail to properly 
address the climate crisis.
    So instead of doubling down on an antiquated energy 
playbook that doesn't work well anymore, we need policies that 
help our economy smoothly transition toward cleaner, American-
made energy.
    In a scenario that is not always good news, here is some 
good news. We can adopt these policies that I am talking about 
while also giving consumers more choices to fuel their lives. 
By giving Americans a choice about how to heat their homes and 
fuel their vehicles, we can reduce price volatility and energy 
costs for all Americans. Fortunately, Congress and President 
Biden have already taken steps to relieve the pressure that 
high energy prices are putting on families and small 
businesses.
    Thanks in large part to our successful passage of the 
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, I would just say to our 
witnesses today, this is the committee that provided the 
foundation on which the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law was 
built, and we are very proud of our colleagues, but the Biden 
Administration is able to make many significant investments 
across the Country, from sea to shining sea, in expanding 
domestic clean energy and infrastructure for zero-emitting 
vehicles.
    These investments include $5 billion for a national network 
of electric vehicle chargers. They also include over $3 billion 
in the domestic battery supply chain and battery recycling, so 
U.S. electric vehicle manufacturing does not depend on critical 
minerals from China or countries in Africa.
    While these investments represent real progress, we can and 
must do more if we are going to meet our energy security and 
our climate goals. This is the challenge of our time.
    Most of us on this committee are married, I think maybe all 
of us, and our spouses say things to us over and over again, 
and we do the same with them. One thing my wife tells me is I 
am too much of an optimist. She says I need to be more of a 
realist like her. I always say, honey, I love you, but I don't 
want to be just like you. I want to be an optimist. She rolls 
her eyes and says, ``Oh, well.'' Why did she marry me, for 
better or for worse? There you go.
    While fossil fuels will continue to power more of the U.S. 
economy for years to come, many American businesses are already 
making investments toward a cleaner, more secure energy future. 
I think they need our encouragement and support to go not 
slower, but to go faster. With that, there are three things we 
can do to accelerate our transition to clean energy.
    First, we should help ensure that Americans have the choice 
to fuel their vehicles with electricity from renewable and 
nuclear energy, from biofuels from our farmers, or clean 
hydrogen produced by our refineries rather than oil from 
foreign countries. We can do this through direct investments in 
clean vehicles and their refueling infrastructure.
    Second, we must ensure that all Americans benefit from our 
investments in clean energy and energy efficiency. More often 
than not, lower-income families use a large portion of their 
household income on energy costs. We need to ensure that low-
income communities have access to clean technologies and that 
no community is left behind in the transition of clean energy.
    The Marines have a saying, ``Leave no Marine behind.'' 
Leave no Marin behind. I think we have a moral obligation to 
leave no community behind in our energy transition.
    As my colleagues know on this committee, I was born in West 
Virginia. Our neighbors were, for the most part, all coal 
miners. Those jobs are gone. We have a moral obligation, when 
people lose their livelihood, to help them transition to 
something new so they can support themselves and their 
families, and leave no family behind.
    Finally, we must redouble our efforts to improve energy 
efficiency and reduce waste. For example, the oil and gas 
industry should no longer be able to allow large amounts of our 
Nation's supply of natural gas to escape into the air as 
methane, harming our lungs and climate, just because it is 
inconvenient to capture methane. Encouraging greater energy 
efficiency in our homes, our Federal buildings, and our 
manufacturing facilities lowers costs and saves energy. That is 
a win-win situation, where I come from.
    If we make these investments, I firmly believe we can break 
our addiction to foreign oil, we need to. Also to reduce 
harmful climate emissions, and lower consumer costs. That is a 
hat trick, where I come from. That is a hat trick. At the same 
time, we can strengthen our national security and create good-
paying jobs across our Country. That is the promise of a clean 
energy future.
    In closing, as one of the strongest supporters of electric 
vehicles in the Senate, I know it is important to remember that 
we are not yet in a post-liquid fuel world. I sold, last year 
for $1, my 2001 Chrysler town and country minivan that had 
600,000 miles on it. Not many people get 600,000 miles out of 
their minivan, but I did, but there are a lot of people that 
have vehicles on the road that maybe have 50,000 miles or 
100,000, and they are going to be driving them. They are going 
to be driving those vehicles like I did for a long time. That 
is just the reality of what we face.
    We must retain our domestic capabilities to produce and 
refine the motor vehicle fuels that help power our lives and 
will continue to for some time to come. However, we must also 
ensure these fuels are as clean as possible, while investing in 
zero-emitting vehicles.
    Investments in clean energy and energy efficiency are the 
greatest long-term solutions for energy security, domestically 
and internationally. The United States is at our best when we 
lead. Now is our opportunity to do so by passing legislation 
that unleashes the potential of American clean energy, provides 
a lot of jobs going forward, and benefits all Americans.
    That said, we look forward to hearing from all of you. Now, 
to hear from our Ranking Member, Senator Capito, for her 
opening statement. I think we are going to start voting. Have 
we started?
    Senator Capito. I don't believe so.
    Senator Carper. I think we are going to start voting at 
10:30. So we will be going off to the floor and coming back, so 
just bear with us, if you will. We will try not to have too 
much disruption. We are thrilled that you are here, delighted 
that you are here. We are looking forward to hearing from you.
    Senator Capito.

        STATEMENT OF HON. SENATOR SHELLY MOORE CAPITO, 
          U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA

    Senator Capito. I want to thank Chairman Carper, and I want 
to thank the witnesses for coming here today. It is nice to see 
my former colleague, Jim Matheson. I think we came into the 
Congress together in 2000. It is nice to see you. Welcome to 
the committee.
    Senator Carper. Senator, Jim Matheson is a gift that keeps 
on giving. My chief of staff used to work for him. It is a 
small world. Sorry to interrupt.
    Senator Capito. No, that is fine.
    Now, as much as ever, promoting America's energy security 
is of utmost importance. National security is energy security. 
Not only can the U.S. lead the way on energy development, we 
can do it responsibly with lower emissions.
    U.S. greenhouse gas emissions have steadily decreased, 
thanks primarily to the shale revolution and America's 
ingenuity. But to pave the way for another American energy 
revolution, we need to take concrete steps to look at this 
Administration's policies that are holding American energy 
producers back here at home to the benefit of hostile regimes 
with appalling environmental track records.
    More specifically, facilitating additional American energy 
production will allow us to better assist our allies as they 
move away from Russian energy sources.
    Action to reverse the Biden Administration's regulatory 
policies will help us combat rising energy prices, ensuring 
Americans can fill up their gas tanks and keep their homes warm 
now and in the future.
    Over the last year, we have seen an unfortunate pattern 
from this Administration. The Administration's policies have 
strained supplies, increased prices for hardworking families, 
limited and delayed projects, chilled investments that could 
yield more production, and are threatening the affordability, 
reliability, and new capacity of our Nation's energy supply.
    As a candidate, President Biden promised to drop all 
drilling on Federal lands, and on day one in office, the 
Administration stopped all new oil and gas leasing on Federal 
lands and killed the Keystone XL Pipeline. They have also 
backed many challenges to energy projects in court.
    On top of these actions, activist judges have halted 
construction of necessary energy projects across this Country, 
like the Mountain Valley Pipeline in the region of West 
Virginia.
    As a result, the regular gas price in the United States has 
climbed to more than $4 per gallon, diesel is over $5 per 
gallon, and in some parts of the Country, I think I saw in 
California, it is well over $5, up to $6 per gallon. These are 
the highest recorded average gas prices our Country has ever 
seen, topping even the run-up in 2008.
    Now, the Administration is trying to claim, and I think I 
heard a little bit of this in your statement, that rising 
gasoline, oil, and natural gas prices is caused by Russia's 
invasion of Ukraine, but prices were skyrocketing well before 
this. For example, the week that President Biden took office, 
the average price of gas was $2.38 per gallon. It rose to $3.53 
per gallon, an increase of $1.15 per gallon by February 21, 
2022, the date of the last report before Putin invaded Ukraine. 
The most recent report recorded prices at $4.24 per gallon, up 
an additional 71 cents.
    So, the majority of the price increase took place before 
the invasion. Similarly, natural gas and other commodity prices 
have skyrocketed. The price of natural gas in New England 
averaged more than $20 per million BTU in January, spiking to 
almost $30 for several days due to a lack of pipelines in the 
region, or the equivalent of $180 per barrel of oil. At the 
same time, natural gas in my region was about $5 per million 
BTU.
    In 2021, home electricity bills rose at their fastest rate 
since 2008. Yet, EPA is working toward a menu of new 
regulations targeting power plants that will make the problem 
worse.
    This is on top of the record inflation that is impacting 
West Virginia families who are now paying higher grocery bills, 
higher gas prices, and facing higher costs to heat and cool 
their homes, leaving hardworking Americans struggling to 
balance higher costs in all areas of their lives. This is what 
we hear when we go home every day.
    So, President Biden's attacks on the industry are having an 
intended effect. He just doesn't like the way it materially 
impacts voters and taxpayers.
    If we are serious about domestic energy security, along 
with reducing emissions, we need to get back to policies that 
encourage and utilize American production and innovation. We 
need to reduce unnecessary roadblocks to vital energy projects 
and infrastructure. We need an all-of-the-above energy strategy 
that does include electric vehicles, renewables, and an all-of-
the-above hydrogen development, which we see.
    It is hard to deliver on American energy security if 
permitting complexities continue to pose an insurmountable 
challenge. Regulatory and permitting certainty is essential for 
building infrastructure to achieve our goals of energy 
security, whether that is a natural gas pipeline, transmission 
capacity for solar or wind, or lithium mining.
    For too long, States and project sponsors have been stuck 
in a regulatory purgatory, seeking endless approvals from up to 
13 Federal agencies. Additionally, dozens of State and local 
approvals are typically required before construction.
    I don't know how we get to energy security and build out 
clean energy if a labyrinthine permitting process chills 
investment in potential new projects.
    While we are focused on Russia, Congress can do more to 
support energy security domestically by expanding our 
production of our own resources here. We need to support 
American energy solutions, including coal, nuclear, and oil and 
gas, as well as critical minerals essential to making those EVs 
that we wish in our future and other products. These are 
important to our energy security and are critically important 
to energy affordability.
    So, some of the ways we can accomplish this is providing 
regulatory certainty by codifying actions that the Trump 
Administration took to provide certainty under the Clean Water 
Act. We can expedite permitting and review processes by 
codifying One Federal Decision, which is in the bipartisan 
infrastructure package for transportation, providing litigation 
certainty and allowing Federal agencies to use one another's 
categorical exclusions, and limit red tape for gasoline and 
other types of fuels by preventing regulations and new fees 
that will increase the price of our energy. If the 
Administration won't take action, the Congress needs to.
    I look forward to hearing what the witnesses have to say to 
bolster our energy security and encourage American investment 
while moving forward on the environmental issues that we know 
are so very important.
    Thank you very much.
    Senator Carper. Senator Capito, thank you very, very much.
    Senator Inhofe. Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Carper. Yes, sir, please.
    Senator Inhofe. Before going to the witnesses, let me 
apologize to the witnesses because I am going to go ahead and 
vote at the top of the votes so we can operate more smoothly 
here. I think I have already read the information that you have 
submitted. Thank you so much.
    Senator Carper. Thank you, Senator Inhofe. Senator Inhofe 
is the former chairman of this committee, and also chairman of 
the Armed Services Committee. His is a distinguished career.
    I had breakfast with him, we have a prayer breakfast that 
is a weekly event. You think Democrats and Republicans don't 
have much to agree on, but we actually, on a weekly basis, get 
together, read the scripture, pray, and we sang, what was the 
hymn we sang? There Is A Balm In Gilead, I don't know if you 
guys have ever heard that hymn. It is a great hymn. We don't 
agree on all the issues, but we love each other and try to find 
ways to work together, especially on this committee. We are 
pretty good at finding the middle.
    Senator Capito, thanks very much for your comments. I know 
you are going to be slipping out of here in a minute, slip-
sliding away?
    Senator Capito. Yes, I will slip out first.
    Senator Carper. Good enough.
    Our first witness today is joining us remotely. He is a 
former Secretary of the Navy. I first met him when he was 
Governor of Mississippi. I am the former Governor of Delaware. 
There is a huge bond between former Governors. I have started 
more sentences here in the Senate like, when I was Governor, 
and our colleagues get tired of hearing that, as you might 
imagine.
    Ray Mabus, longtime public servant, Governor of 
Mississippi, Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Secretary of the 
United States Navy, he was the 75th Secretary of the United 
States Navy from 2009 to 2017. It seems like a long time, and 
it is. He had the longest tenure as the leader of the Navy and 
Marine Corps since World War I. How about that?
    During this time, he officially named one of the Nation's 
newest naval fast attack nuclear submarines, Virginia class, 
the U.S.S. Delaware, which was christened a year ago this 
April, and is going to be making an important call to the Port 
of Wilmington in about 2 weeks. We are very excited about that. 
If that were not enough, he has also been a CEO at least once, 
maybe a couple times, and currently serves on a number of 
boards of nonprofits and businesses. He is joining us remotely 
today.
    I still call him Governor, so Governor, you are on. 
Welcome, and thank you for all of your service.

  STATEMENT OF HON. RAYMOND E. MABUS, FORMER SECRETARY OF THE 
                              NAVY

    Mr. Mabus. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member. To 
the Ranking Member, Senator, that is the Shenandoah River 
behind me. I am one of your constituents now.
    Senator Capito. I had better be nice to you, right?
    Mr. Mabus. I am a voter.
    [Laughter.]
    Mr. Mabus. To the members of this committee, thank you for 
your efforts to strengthen American energy security.
    Today, as for several weeks, Americans in the world are 
intently watching as the brave people of Ukraine fight for 
their nation, their families, and their freedom against a 
brutal tyrant. The total motivations behind Vladimir Putin's 
illegal invasion of Ukraine remain unclear, but nothing could 
be clearer than his power over Europe because of its dependence 
on his oil and gas. Europe needs fossil fuels piped in from 
Russia, so Putin has the leverage and the money to undermine 
the security and economic independence of our allies.
    Putin believed that, because of its reliance on Russia's 
fossil fuels, Europe would not take any strong, united actions 
against his unprovoked invasion of a democratic nation. The 
fact that this was a gross miscalculation by Putin doesn't 
negate that it was a calculation that helped start an horrific 
war.
    The way to fight Putin, in the long run, is to shift the 
world economy away from the oil and gas that keeps him 
affluent, armed, and arrogant. Whatever we do in the days ahead 
to support our European allies, and we should do everything we 
can, we must also move swiftly to end the World's addiction to 
fossil fuels, and we need to start here at home.
    Three issues that we are facing. First, depriving Putin of 
the power and money that the world's dependence on fossil fuels 
brings him; second, aggressively attacking climate change that 
is a huge national security issue; and third, becoming truly 
energy independent and not subject to big price spikes, are 
inextricably intertwined. Moving urgently to renewables is the 
answer to all three.
    The price of oil and gas is set worldwide, and even if we 
imported no fossil fuels, we in America would still be 
incredibly vulnerable to price spikes. The one thing that 
drives up the price of oil is instability, the kind that is 
caused by an irrational war in Europe waged by an unstable 
leader. Instability can also be driven by climate refugees, 
hurricanes, famine, and drought, the kind that will be ever 
more common in a hotter, stormier world caused by climate 
change.
    Climate change is an enormous national security issue. As 
Secretary of the Navy from 2009 to 2017, I was in a unique 
position to see this. Climate change affects national security 
in numerous and profound ways. The storms that are more 
frequent and powerful, catastrophically damaging our bases, the 
instability and chaos arriving from storms, droughts, and fires 
that put our troops at risk when they respond to disasters. The 
enormous increase in migrations, people flee climate disasters, 
and the melting of the Arctic and the greatly increased risk of 
conflict and emergencies there.
    I was certainly not alone in this. Every Administration 
since George W. Bush has called out climate change as a 
national security risk. That is why, first as a war-fighting 
measure, then as an effort to fight climate change, I began to 
move the Navy and Marines off fossil fuels. Today, two-thirds 
of the energy on our bases come from renewables, and when I 
left in 2017, nearly 40 percent.
    The economics of renewables are compelling. Today, 
renewables are considerably cheaper than fossil fuels, even 
natural gas. We saved taxpayers $400 million by moving our 
bases to renewables. If we as a Nation move very fast to clean 
energy, millions of new, goodpaying jobs would be created. As 
businesses are finding out every day, doing what is right for 
the planet and the future and doing what is right for the 
bottom line are exactly the same.
    Much of the world's fossil fuels are produced and 
controlled by countries run by dictators. By continuing to use 
so much oil, we leave our economy and the pocketbooks of 
American families subject to the whims of these dictators. Only 
by pushing our economy to renewable sources like wind, solar, 
and agricultural biomass, which are controlled locally and 
essentially bulletproofed from foreign manipulation, can we 
regain our economic sovereignty.
    Europe has begun to move in this direction. Many nations 
there are getting between a quarter and a third of their energy 
from renewables. But this change has to be speeded up, since as 
the invasion of Ukraine showed, we are all still far too 
vulnerable to dramatic swings in the price of fossil fuels.
    Two quotes sum it up. President Zelenskyy, in a recent 
address to German citizens: ``We have warned your politicians 
that it is dangerous when Moscow decides whether you have gas 
and how much it costs.'' James Murray of Business Green: 
``Clean technologies are peacekeeping and patriotic. Putin 
hates them. As such, they need to be deployed at a pace and a 
scale that is completely unprecedented in the entire sweep of 
human history. Our climate security, our energy security, and 
our national security depend on it.''
    America will not become truly energy independent until we 
end our dependence on fossil fuels.
    Thank you very much.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Mabus follows:]
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    Senator Carper. Secretary Mabus, thank you for opening up 
our witnesses' testimony. Great to see you. Welcome.
    Our next witness who will speak is Katherine Stainken, Vice 
President of Policy of Electrification Coalition. The 
Electrification Coalition is a nonprofit focused on 
transportation electrification. It is also the sister 
organization of SAFE, a nonpartisan organization focused on the 
nexus of climate change and national security.
    You are recognized to speak. Thank you again, so much, for 
joining us.

  STATEMENT OF KATHERINE STAINKEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF POLICY, 
                   ELECTRIFICATION COALITION

    Ms. Stainken. Great, thank you. Transportation 
electrification, that is a mouthful, and so I need to speak 
fast, so I will just apologize in advance for that.
    Chairman Carper, Ranking Member Capito, and distinguished 
members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to 
testify this morning. My name is Katherine Stainken.
    Senator Carper. You can slow down just a little bit.
    Ms. Stainken. I am the Vice President of Policy at the 
Electrification Coalition, a nonprofit, bipartisan group that 
is working to accelerate the adoption of EVs in order to reduce 
the economic and national security threats caused by our 
dependence on oil.
    Our sister organization is SAFE, who leads a broader 
approach focused on the supply side with the same core mission. 
The EC has direct experience working at the local level.
    Senator Carper. I am going to ask you, seriously, just slow 
down just a little bit.
    Ms. Stainken. The EC has direct experience working at the 
local, State, and Federal levels that includes acting as the 
lead implementer for transportation for the USDOT's Smart City 
Challenge, working with 25 leadership cities through the 
American Cities Climate Challenge, and working with companies 
like Pepsi to pilot freight electrification projects. We work 
also directly with States and provide direct technical and 
policy support.
    I live in a more rural part of Arizona that is 100 miles 
outside of Phoenix. I mention this to say that I am aware of 
the struggles facing many Americans and businesses today. I am 
aware of the gas prices and the implications for that for 
families and businesses. But I see that even in my community, a 
place where you wouldn't expect to see many electric vehicles, 
that they are still growing in number, and we are seeing them 
on the roads today.
    The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law laid critical 
foundational policies and investments to our transportation 
electrification future. We applaud this committee, under your 
leadership, and Congress, for the work done is passing that 
legislation.
    However, we need to recognize the scale of what is at stake 
in terms of our national security, our economic prosperity, 
American leadership, and global competitiveness. In short, we 
need to recognize that our electric transportation future is a 
matter of national strategic importance. Without aggressive 
action, the U.S. risks significant job loss by ceding on 
advanced technology and auto manufacturing to other countries 
like China, who are moving quickly forward to their own 
electric transportation futures.
    We need a suite of policies adopted today aimed at electric 
vehicles across all modes of transportation that loosen oil's 
grip on our national security and our long-term economic 
prosperity, while simultaneously reducing carbon emissions.
    The policies we need can be divided into four pillars. 
First, vehicle purchase incentives. For example, we need 
substantial funding for electrification of the medium and 
heavy-duty sector, including through programs like the Clean 
Heavy Duty Vehicles Program and the Diesel Emissions Reduction 
Act and other EPA grant opportunities, policies which have long 
been supported by members of this committee.
    Second, we need additional support for EV charging 
infrastructure. We support the policies proposed under the 
jurisdiction of this committee, such as the grant program under 
EPA that will reduce air pollution at ports through adopting EV 
technologies and the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund Grant 
Program that will deploy EV charging stations.
    Third, we need funding to electrify the U.S. Federal fleet, 
and fourth, we need incentives for U.S. manufacturing and the 
supply chain. My written testimony goes into more of those 
details.
    These policies, combined with activity at the State and 
city levels, will enable a new era of American mobility powered 
by electricity generated from domestic sources that are readily 
available, cleaner, and stably priced. EVs bring a myriad of 
benefits beyond just these stable prices. They provide fuel and 
maintenance savings for consumers and businesses, improved air 
quality and public health, new jobs in the tech and innovation 
sectors, reduced carbon emissions, and investment in local 
economies as the fuel source is generated locally.
    The mass adoption of EVs also provides the opportunity to 
address the supply chain issues that we are currently 
experiencing and highlighted even more by the COVID-19 
pandemic, particularly those for critical minerals that are 
used in the multiple products that drive our economy, not just 
the batteries used to power EVs.
    States and cities are already working to adopt smart and 
bold policies to accelerate adoption of EVs, whether it be 
Delaware, West Virginia, South Carolina, or North Dakota, 
States are moving forward and forming partnerships and working 
with stakeholders to prepare for this coming funding to buildup 
the charging along highway corridors.
    The EC, my organization, is actively working to assist 
States to utilize this Federal funding so that we achieve an 
effective, efficient, equitable, and urgent deployment of EV 
charging infrastructure. In fact, this week, we are launching a 
series of initiatives to assist States and cities with the 
coming Federal funding, starting with Charging Infrastructure 
Week.
    In closing, while oil has facilitated the rise of the 
modern era, our overreliance on it creates tremendous energy 
security vulnerabilities because the price of this critical 
commodity is subject to manipulations by OPEC and global events 
that are beyond our control, such as those we are experiencing 
by the crisis in Ukraine today.
    Regardless of your political or technological view on 
electric vehicles, other nations, especially China, have 
continued to demonstrate a growing commitment to transportation 
electrification. The U.S. Government has long supported nascent 
industries when their success was aligned with a national 
interest. We urgently need bipartisan support to implement the 
policies that I have outlined here today and that are further 
elaborated on in my written testimony to accelerate this 
future.
    Thank you for your leadership and hosting this hearing 
today, and for the opportunity to provide testimony. I look 
forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Stainken follows:]
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    Senator Carper. Thank you for coming all the way from 
Arizona to be with us to testify.
    Next, we are going to hear from a former colleague in the 
U.S. House of Representatives from Utah, someone who served 
with our Ranking Member and probably others that serve on this 
committee. It is great to see you. Thank you for all your 
service.
    Jim Matheson today serves as the Chief Executive Officer of 
the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. He is also 
a longtime public servant and has the rare distinction of being 
elected as a U.S. Representative from two different districts 
within his State, the Second District and the Fourth District. 
In Delaware, we only have one district, so I can't match what 
you have done.
    Jim, great to see you. Thank you so much for coming, and we 
are anxious to hear your testimony. Thank you.

  STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES MATHESON, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, 
        NATIONAL RURAL ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE ASSOCIATION

    Mr. Matheson. Thank you, Chairman Carper and Ranking Member 
Capito. It is good to see you, and I appreciate the opportunity 
to participate in the hearing today.
    As CEO of the National Rural Electric Cooperative 
Association, I am here on behalf of the 900 not-for-profit 
electric cooperatives in 48 States.
    I think at the outset, the point I would like to make is a 
resilient and reliable electric grid that affordably keeps the 
lights on really is a cornerstone of American energy security 
and our economy. American electric cooperatives, we actually 
provide electricity to about one in eight Americans. While we 
cover that many Americans, we also cover 56 percent of all the 
landmass in this Country, so we have a lot of territory that we 
serve.
    More importantly, we serve folks that are often in the 
hardestto-serve, most expensive places to receive electricity. 
Electric coops, of course, are owned by the people they serve. 
They operate atcost, and return any excess revenue to their 
members. It was about one and a half billion in 2020 alone.
    Every action that is taken that has a financial impact on 
an electric cooperative, it goes straight to the consumer's 
bill. We have no shareholders. In short, electric co-ops are 
motivated by people, not by profits.
    Electric co-ops are thoughtfully exploring all ideas and 
potential partnerships as they work to meet the evolving needs 
of the communities they serve. As I engage with co-ops across 
the Country, I have to say one thing is clear, and that is that 
the ongoing energy transition must recognize the need for time, 
technology development, and be inclusive of all energy sources 
to maintain reliability and affordability.
    Achieving 100 percent carbon-free electricity generation by 
2035 is simply an overly ambitious goal. American consumers 
expect the lights to stay on, and they expect it to be at a 
price they can afford. A diverse energy mix is essential to 
meeting those expectations day in and day out. To do that, 
America's electric cooperatives depend on an evolving suite of 
resources.
    Natural gas is playing an increasingly important role in 
co-op reliability and emissions reductions, often replacing 
coal generation. But even as coal capacity declines, it remains 
a critical source for reliable, affordable power to co-ops in 
many regions of the Country.
    Co-ops also share ownership in nuclear power plants, and 
they are exploring the potential of advanced reactor 
technology. Electric coops are leaders in community solar and 
small-scale wind, and we also are major consumers of Federal 
hydropower. Due in part to the expanse of renewable assets, 
electric co-ops substantially lowered their carbon emissions by 
23 percent between 2005 and 2020. So, we have a diverse mix 
across our membership.
    However, intermittent resources like wind and solar must be 
supported by always-available resources with an assured fuel 
supply. A recent long-term reliability assessment by the North 
American Electric Reliability Corporation sounded the alarm on 
risks to reliability of too much baseload generation is retired 
prematurely without replacement capacity that can balance the 
grid by meeting short-term disruptions in supply and demand. To 
avoid these risks and undue economic impacts, policymakers 
should oppose efforts to mandate energy transformations over 
unreasonable or unrealistic timelines.
    Instead, we can work constructively to achieve 
environmental objectives while maintaining exceptional 
reliability and affordability. If we are going to electrify 
other sectors in the economy to achieve lower economy-wide 
carbon output, reliability and affordability of the electric 
sector will be all the more important.
    Several programs in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law 
provide significant opportunities to electric co-ops and the 
communities they serve. We certainly appreciate the leadership 
of this committee in supporting the deployment and permitting 
of carbon capture technologies as an important element of power 
sector decarbonization. We appreciate the support for electric 
vehicle charging infrastructure and grid resiliency programs, 
which will also support electric co-ops and rural America.
    But additional actions are needed. As not-for-profit 
businesses, electric co-ops cannot access energy tax credits 
that are readily available to the rest of the electric sector. 
Allowing electric coops to access direct pay tax credits would 
enhance electric co-op energy innovation investment 
opportunities.
    I want to thank you, Chairman Carper, for your leadership 
on providing a direct pay option, and also to Ranking Member 
Capito, for your work on the 45Q tax credit.
    Maximizing infrastructure investments also requires 
coordinated, consistent, and timely agency permitting decisions 
in a manner that strengthens our economy and enhances 
environmental stewardship. The electric sector can play a major 
role in reducing emissions in other sectors of the economy 
through increased electrification. However, as a recent 
National Academy of Sciences report noted, making this 
transition will require a threefold expansion, threefold 
expansion, of transmission infrastructure in this Country, and 
a 170 percent more electricity generation supply by the year 
2050.
    Meeting those two objectives will require tremendous 
planning, investment, and collaboration among all stakeholders. 
Reliability, affordability, and flexibility should be the 
pillars on which any energy transition is built. NRECA and 
America's electric cooperatives look forward to working with 
this committee in pursuit of this mission.
    I want to thank you. I look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Matheson follows:]
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    Senator Carper. We thank you so much for taking time to 
join us. There used to be a former Congressman, I want to say, 
from Oklahoma, who sat in your seat and filled your shoes.
    Mr. Matheson. That is right, Glenn English.
    Senator Carper. Glenn. Do you ever talk to him?
    Mr. Matheson. I do, yes.
    Senator Carper. Give him our best. He was a great colleague 
and I very much enjoyed the time that we served together.
    Mr. Matheson. I will do that. I am happy to do that.
    Senator Carper. Last but not least is the woman whose name 
has been mispronounced more times than she can count, and her 
name is spelled S-G-A-M-M-A. So we are going to try to get it 
right, so bear with us.
    President, you are the President, I can tell my wife I 
talked to the President today, President of the Western Energy 
Alliance, and you are a former public servant, serving 3 years 
as a military intelligence officer in the United States Army.
    I was a Naval flight officer for many years. During one of 
those tours, I was also the air intelligence officer in my 
squadron. They said that it abused the word intelligence to 
have my name associated with it. I don't understand how I ended 
up with that job, but we are delighted with your service.
    In this case, Navy salutes Army. Welcome today. Thanks so 
much for joining us.

    STATEMENT OF KATHLEEN SGAMMA, PRESIDENT, WESTERN ENERGY 
                            ALLIANCE

    Ms. Sgamma. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Capito, 
and members of the committee. I really appreciate the 
opportunity to be here. I have answered from my name 
mispronounced many times; that is not a problem.
    I am really happy to followup Mr. Matheson, because that 
realistic timeframe and that realism, I think, is what is 
called for. When we look at what Europe is facing because of 
this Russian invasion, it is time to get real about energy.
    I have heard today that we need to get off of our addiction 
of oil and fossil fuels, and that is kind of like an addiction 
to food or other necessities of life. The reason oil and 
natural gas are so heavily used is because that deliver such 
huge value to humanity. So realistic timeframes for some type 
of transition requires a transition to something that is 24/7 
reliable and affordable. So as it has been recognized, oil and 
natural gas will be part of our energy mix through 2050 and 
much beyond that because of the huge value they deliver to 
humanity.
    We have also heard about doubling down on certain policies 
like mass transition to renewables. If that were the answer, 
then Germany would not be in the situation that it is in, 
because Germany has spent over $800 billion since 2000 in its 
Energiewende, its energy transition, and it is now more 
vulnerable to Russia than it was before. We in America, in the 
oil and natural gas industry, and I represent producers in the 
Rocky Mountain West, we in the oil and natural gas industry 
provide a specific solution today to making Europe and the 
United States less vulnerable to Russian oil, and that is 
implementing policies that don't require taxpayer subsidies. 
They just require the government to stop the hostile policies 
against our industry, and that would enable us to put in 
private investment and to increase production.
    We have been stymied since the beginning of this 
Administration. It has been policies of overregulation, the 
leasing ban, which, by the way, continues today, because not a 
single onshore lease has been offered for sale since the 
Administration started, despite a judge's order overturning 
that leasing ban, policies that are meant to deny us of 
capital. We cannot develop new oil and gas production without 
investment, without credit. That has been a policy that is 
holding us back.
    We can also deliver the same greenhouse gas reductions that 
natural gas has delivered in the electricity sector, as Mr. 
Matheson pointed out. We are the primary reason the United 
States has reduced more greenhouse gas emissions than any other 
country. So we provide actual, tangible solutions to reducing 
greenhouse gas emissions, and we have done that since 2005. We 
have delivered more reduction than wind and solar combined.
    We can help our allies around the world in Asia and in 
Europe deliver the same types of reduction in greenhouse gas 
emissions while increasing their energy security if we produce 
more oil and natural gas here at home. We were very pleased to 
see the announcement last week from the Administration of 
approving two new liquefied natural gas export permits. That is 
very hopeful. I am hoping that is a recognition of the reality 
of delivering that climate change benefit around the world that 
LNG provides. We hope that they will continue to move forward 
with LNG exports as well.
    But it is really imperative to have pipelines in order to 
deliver the natural gas to those LNG export facilities. 
Policies to move forward with permitting pipelines and other 
infrastructure are necessary.
    Also, we urge the FERC to overturn its policies on natural 
gas certification and greenhouse gas analysis on pipelines. 
Those policies are meant to get to an answer of no on 
infrastructure. We need infrastructure so that we can export 
our natural gas and deliver the same greenhouse gas reductions 
that we have enjoyed here at home while making our allies in 
Europe and Asia more secure.
    Thank you very much; I appreciate it.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Sgamma follows:]
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    Senator Carper. Ms. Sgamma, thank you for joining us. 
Thanks for your testimony again, and for the time you spent in 
uniform.
    My first question is going to pick on a guy who is a long 
way away from us today, and it is Secretary Mabus. In Ms. 
Sgamma's written testimony, she essentially says that without 
oil and natural gas, ``modern life is not possible.''
    Too many times to count, I have heard witnesses tell me, 
and tell us, that the deployment of clean energy was 
impossible, and transition would result in major disruptions in 
our energy system. Every time, those predictions have turned 
out not to be the case.
    History has shown us that we should never bet against U.S. 
innovation and ingenuity. U.S. businesses, and with the support 
of the U.S. Government, taxpayers, have always figured out how 
to build it faster, cleaner, and more reliable than before.
    As someone who has led clean energy and transition in the 
Navy and in the private sector, Mr. Secretary, would you 
respond to Ms. Sgamma's testimony? Do you believe that we can 
grow our economy while reducing our dependence on oil and 
natural gas?
    Mr. Mabus. Mr. Chairman, I absolutely believe that. I agree 
that these predictions are always wrong. Just look at Naval 
energy. The Navy has led the Nation in energy transformation 
since its founding. We moved from sail to coal in the middle of 
the 19th century. We moved from coal to oil at the beginning of 
the 20th century. We pioneered the use of nuclear for 
propulsion in the middle of the 20th century.
    Every single time, every single time, there were naysayers 
that said, this can't be done, you are taking too big a risk, 
you are betting on a new technology, like oil, and that you can 
never make an atomic reactor small enough or safe enough to put 
inside a submarine.
    The ways we can do this, No. 1, renewables today are 
cheaper. It is better for the bottom line. It makes our 
economy, it makes our businesses much more competitive 
globally.
    Two, it insulates us from these price spikes that 
basically, today, the American economy, and more importantly, 
American families are being held hostage by dictators around 
the world.
    Three, if we don't do this, as has been pointed out, other 
countries will, particularly China. If we lose the leadership 
here, we are going to lose all the benefits that come from it, 
particularly jobs. As we move toward more electrification, as 
we move toward more renewables, just from the things that have 
already been done, we are going to need a million more 
electricians just in the next few years. Those are solid, good-
paying jobs.
    We are going to lose the manufacturing ability, we are 
going to lose the ability to do the research and development 
that we need to do to lead in alternative energy. If we ignore 
climate change and the effects that climate change is having 
due to human activity, and a lot of that is due to the burning 
of fossil fuels, and the huge impact it has on our economy, 
storms and fires and natural disasters that are increasing in 
severity and increasing in frequency.
    Last, I will quote a former Saudi oil minister from the 
country I was the Ambassador to. He said the Stone Age didn't 
end because we ran out of stones; it ended because we invented 
something better. We invented something better here, and it is 
time to move to it.
    Senator Carper. Thank you for that. I have a quick followup 
question. Before I do that, I ask unanimous consent to place in 
the record materials demonstrating the effects of global 
instability from Russian invasion of Ukraine on energy prices 
in the United States. Without objection, so ordered.
    [The referenced information follows:]
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    Senator Carper. A quick followup question, Mr. Secretary, 
and then I will yield to others on the committee.
    Ms. Sgamma's written testimony also includes concerns about 
the reliability of clean energy. One of your first acts 
following your confirmation as Secretary of the Navy in 2009 
was the announcement of an ambitious plan to transform the 
energy use of the United States and move away from reliance on 
fossil-based energy to cleaner sources.
    Question. During or after the transition to clean energy, 
did the Navy experience any reliability concerns? What 
underlying factors motivated you to endeavor in this 
generational transformation of the Navy's energy use from 
fossil sources to cleaner fuels? I will ask you to be fairly 
brief in responding, I would appreciate it. Thank you.
    Mr. Mabus. We experienced no reliability issues at all. 
First, I would never, ever, ever do anything to lower the 
combat readiness or the reliability of the United States 
military. I did this to give us an edge. I did this as a war-
fighting measure. My first 2 years as Secretary, I had to find 
$2 billion in unanticipated price spikes from oil and gas. Even 
in the Pentagon, finding $2 billion that you hadn't budgeted 
for is not an easy thing. And so we had to steam less, we had 
to fly less, we had to train less, which is simply not 
acceptable.
    Very personally, we were losing a Marine, killed or 
wounded, for every 50 convoys of fuel we brought into 
Afghanistan. We began to equip Marines with rollable solar 
panels to put in their packs with portable solar, so that 
Marines now make much of their energy where they are and where 
they fight, and they don't have to be resupplied.
    Last, when I was there, we had SEAL teams in the field that 
were net zero in terms of energy and water. I asked a SEAL 
commander, what change did he notice. He said, well, we had 
been using generators, and when you turn off the generators, 
you can hear when the bad guys are trying to sneak up on you, 
and second, you take a target off your back. That made him and 
his team far more combat effective.
    Senator Carper. Thank you very much for those insights. We 
have been rejoined by Senator Capito, and I am going to run and 
vote. I will be back. Thank you all. Senator?
    Senator Capito. Thank you.
    Mr. Matheson, one issue I have talked about time and time 
again is the need to be able to buildup our Nation's 
infrastructure. You talked about this in your statement. What 
issues are rural co-ops facing with regard to permitting and 
infrastructure buildout? If we are going to go to all electric 
vehicles, we have to have capacity. Are these permitting 
hurdles, are they applied equally to no matter what the 
generation is, whether it is renewables, or whether it is 
fossil fuels? What are those challenges?
    Mr. Matheson. It is a great question. As I said in my oral 
testimony, if we are going to pursue any type of transition, we 
have to be thoughtful about how we can do this and have 
appropriate time. Sadly, when it comes to permitting, time is a 
problem. You have heard, I am sure, story after story about the 
length of time it takes to have, whether it is a generation 
project or if it is electric transmission line permitted. There 
have been efforts and talk about streamlining in Congress for 
years about this, but we don't seem to be solving the problem.
    I will mention a particular transmission project we are 
involved in in the Wisconsin area, the Cardinal-Hickory Creek 
Transmission Line, where it is over a 103 miles of high voltage 
transmission line. One point three miles crosses Federal land, 
and between the State and between the rural utility service, 
the Federal level, and between the regional transmission 
operator, myself, it has taken years and years and years to get 
this transmission project built.
    And this is one that everyone thinks is a good idea. 
Everybody, wherever they are in their politics or whatever they 
think about different types of generation, they all agree this 
transmission line ought to get built.
    You would like to think we could have a matter-of-fact 
conversation about the tradeoffs of siting this facility and 
what the risks are and how to mitigate those risks in a timely 
way. But that is not the way the process works anymore. There 
is a lack of coordination across agencies; there is a lack of 
timeliness in terms of how we get things done, and there are 
too many opportunities for people to throw a wrench in the 
gears and stop it.
    I know you have looked at opportunities to try to 
streamline. I really appreciate that. But I can tell you from 
representing a group of 900 co-ops that are actually in the 
field trying to make things happen that the frustration is 
palpable and it is real. Wherever we go with our energy future 
in this Country, this question of siting facilities is going to 
be part of the answer, right?
    Senator Capito. Right.
    Mr. Matheson. So, I do think we have to stop just pointing 
out examples like I have just done and come up with solutions 
where we can have a credible, reasonable, thoughtful approach 
to getting facilities sited in a timely way.
    Senator Capito. I think the One Federal Decision you were 
talking about, if we can get that running smoothly, it is 
certainly projected to be able to save time, energy, and at 
least get an answer. I have always said, if the answer is going 
to be no at the end, tell me no in the beginning so I can make 
the adjustments that I need to make, rather than drag it out, 
cost a lot of money and cost a lot of time.
    Let me ask you, quickly, on global supply chains, domestic 
and international. How is this affecting your co-ops? What are 
you seeing? Obviously, the price of building and building out, 
but what are you all seeing throughout your rural co-ops in 
terms of supply chain issues?
    Mr. Matheson. Great question, and it is a big problem, and 
it is for basic materials. It is across the board. It could be 
for transformers, it could be on our broadband site for fiber 
optic cable, conductors, just basic stuff to keep the utility 
running on a daily basis. We are seeing great extensions of 
lead time to get these types of materials, let alone cost 
increases.
    Our concern is that as inventories drop, we may be one 
major storm event away from where we don't have the supplies to 
bring the system back online in a timely way. I get that supply 
chain concerns are on all sectors of the economy right now. But 
the electric sector, which is so vital for the day-to-day 
actions in our economy, we are feeling the pinch in a big way.
    I can tell you, quickly, on co-ops. Some co-ops already had 
supplies that were primarily domestically sourced. They haven't 
faced the same challenges as some who had foreign source 
supply. We are working within the co-op world. We have supply 
chain co-ops that band together to try to find supplies.
    But I can tell you, this is a significant challenge. It is 
not unique to co-ops, I know. In the investor-owned utility and 
municipal utility, I talke to the heads of those associations. 
They are feeling the same squeeze.
    Senator Capito. Right. It is up and down, whatever business 
you are in. We just had a school that had an estimate of what 
it was going to cost to rebuild from a 2016 flood. I just read 
they have to redo all their plans, because they can't afford 
what the new cost figures came in.
    Ms. Sgamma, thank you for coming. I did read your 
testimony; I am sorry I wasn't here for it. Let's talk a little 
bit about what are the top issues that small oil and gas 
producers are facing right now, and how can we remove some of 
those barriers. The Chairman talked about methane. I would like 
to give you a chance to talk about what your industry is doing 
in terms of capturing methane emissions and how the 
improvements have been moving along.
    Ms. Sgamma. Sure. We have taken voluntary measures, as well 
as complied with regulations that require leak detection and 
fixing of any methane leaks. We have significantly reduced 
flaring of natural gas. Flaring is really necessary when you 
don't have the infrastructure in place to capture the natural 
gas off your oil well. So lack of pipeline capacity and a 
purposeful policies and opposition from environmental groups to 
natural gas pipelines are meant to ensure that we can't move 
forward with oil and gas development here. If we can't capture 
that methane, we can't even put that well in place. That is one 
of the things that is definitely holding us up, is lack of 
pipeline capacity.
    Senator Capito.
    [Presiding.] Senator Cardin.
    Senator Cardin. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me thank all 
four of our witnesses for your testimony and for your 
leadership in this area.
    I want to drill down a little bit, Secretary Mabus, on the 
comments you made on cost. Consumers today are struggling with 
increasing costs, increasing energy costs, particularly at the 
pump. We recognize that. I think one of the points that you 
raised that we should be looking at is the efficiency factor of 
clean energy, that it is more economical and less costly and 
less subject to change based upon global conditions, if we can 
handle the production here in the United States and not depend 
upon supplies from countries of autocratic leaders that can be 
disrupted for political reasons or, as we see today in the 
Russian invasion in Ukraine. That is not even to mention the 
fact that we provide about $35 billion a year in subsidies to 
the gas and oil community here.
    My question to you is, you were talking about the cost 
issues and your budget. We recognize that clean energy is 
vitally important for us to meet our goals in regard to the 
climate agenda. That is clearly a driving force. Could you talk 
a little bit more about the costs and efficiency factors of 
clean energy as we move forward in this debate?
    Mr. Mabus. Thank you, Senator. When we moved to alternative 
energy on our bases, our Navy and Marine Corps bases, where we 
now get two-thirds of all our energy from renewables, mainly 
solar and wind, we saved the taxpayers $400 million. If you 
look at businesses today, they are realizing that the same 
thing that does a good job for the planet does a good job for 
their bottom line, because the cost of renewables has come down 
so dramatically, and continue to decrease.
    Solar decreases about 10 percent a year, the cost does. All 
alternative energies are coming down and are now cheaper than 
traditional fossil fuel energies.
    It used to be that you would have to make a decision 
between doing what is right for the planet in terms of climate 
change or doing what is right for your bottom line. That is 
absolutely no longer the case. If you want stability in terms 
of pricing, to keep it from being dictated, because this is 
Putin's oil spike, there is no doubt about that. This is 
Putin's price spike. This is leaving the American consumer 
vulnerable to dictators around the world and vulnerable to 
these acts like an irrational war.
    If you want to have stable prices for energy, they have to 
be home-grown and they have to be alternative, because they are 
bulletproofed from the world events. Oil and gas in the last 40 
years, there has been very little correlation, frankly none, 
between American oil and gas production and the price. The 
price is driven globally. We don't have very much impact on it.
    Senator Cardin. I think that is a very important point 
about the pricing is not based upon the production here in the 
United States on oil and gas. Your points are so important.
    Jim Matheson, first of all, it is good to see you again, my 
former colleague. It is nice to have you here.
    I want to talk about the source of clean electricity. 
Fifty-five percent is generated through nuclear, of clean 
electricity. Twenty percent of our total production of 
electricity is through nuclear. We don't have a level playing 
field. Senator Carper and I both serve on the Senate Finance 
Committee, and we have clean energy provisions that we hope 
will get to the finish line that have production tax credit for 
nuclear to have somewhat of a level playing field. I already 
mentioned we spend $35 billion a year in regard to the oil and 
gas.
    So, what do we need to do in order to modernize our nuclear 
fleet to reserve what we have, but to modernize it? Because we 
know the next generation is so much more friendly in regards to 
nuclear waste materials and risk factors. What policies do we 
need in order to accomplish that?
    Mr. Matheson. It may be a little out of my wheelhouse, but 
I will say this: I do think you have to have always-available, 
fully dispatchable power as part of your grid in terms of 
reliability. Nuclear is a key part of that today. If you want 
to have a lower carbon footprint for the electricity sector in 
the future, nuclear has to be part of the mix then, as well.
    Representing the National Association of Rural Electric 
Cooperatives, we have a position in support of nuclear energy 
and understanding its value for reliability of the grid. I 
think that the challenge you have is the limited number of 
plants that get built in this Country. We do not have much 
practice of building them. As a result, the cost overruns, as 
you know, off the charts for the few that are being built here. 
We have electric co-op exposure in the plant that is being 
built in Georgia right now.
    I think some type of effort to come up with a plausible 
step to keep the cost of these resources from jumping and 
skyrocketing so much would be helpful. I think, on the 
permitting side that, in reference to what I said to Senator 
Capito earlier, the permitting of a nuclear facility is 
exceptionally complicated, drags out the process far longer 
than it takes in other parts of the world. I think there are 
steps we could take to try to make this a more efficient 
process.
    Senator Cardin. Thank you, and we have bipartisan support 
on these issues in this committee. Thank you. Thank you, Madam 
Chair.
    Mr. Matheson. Thank you.
    Senator Capito. Senator Inhofe.
    Senator Inhofe. Thank you.
    Ms. Sgamma, every American has been paying the price at the 
pump for this Administration's anti-American energy policies 
that they have, and keep in mind, and I think it was said very 
well by Senator Capito in her statement that when Biden first 
took office, the price of gas was $2.38. It is now at a record 
high. You hear record high all the time, but in this case, you 
can document that. The record high prior to today was $4.14, 
and now it is $4.25. So it is these policies that are 
responsible for this.
    This Administration has opposed policies that restrict 
domestic oil and gas production, including canceling the 
Keystone XL Pipeline, also putting the policies as he has on 
oil and gas leasing permits on Federal lands. That has been 
going on, and that is very intentional, and that is what we are 
talking about right now.
    Ms. Sgamma, do you believe that President Biden's energy 
agenda has contributed to the major reduction in the domestic 
oil and gas supply?
    Ms. Sgamma. I do. His policies, on a number of levels, have 
been meant to stymie the American oil and gas producer and to 
buttress up the oil dictators around the world, like in Russia. 
So if we talk about not wanting to be dependent on dictators, I 
think the President has a lot to do with that. He could back 
off some of the policies that make production difficult in the 
United States.
    I would like to answer that absolutely incorrect statement 
that American production has nothing to do with the price of 
oil globally, because when we were able to export oil after 
2015, the American producer met the increased demand globally, 
and we helped to keep the global price of oil down. We are the 
major oil producer in the world, so of course the statement 
that our production does not affect prices is completely 
incorrect.
    Senator Inhofe. Thank you. Thank you very much.
    Today, what could the President do? What could President 
Biden do today that would set in motion more domestic oil and 
gas production and bring relief to the American people at the 
pump? This is something that everyone is concerned about. You 
can't turn on a show without people complaining about this, and 
it is so obvious where it is coming from. Just today, what 
could we do?
    Ms. Sgamma. I think backing off on regulation, like the SEC 
Rules on Climate Change Disclosure, which are specifically 
meant to get to an answer of no on any new fossil fuel projects 
by elevating climate change concerns over real pocketbook 
issues, over real production in the United States. Because of 
course, when we don't produce it here, it doesn't mean we don't 
use it. It just means we import it from overseas.
    Senator Inhofe. We import it from overseas.
    Ms. Sgamma. Blocking pipelines, too, is a major problem.
    Senator Inhofe. Yes. Well, you expect the tax, then, on 
methane to lead to the increase in energy prices. You would 
expect that, wouldn't you?
    Ms. Sgamma. Right. The estimates are that about $9 billion 
of cost to the economy would result from the methane tax, 
because it is really basically a tax on natural gas. That could 
be as much as $85 to $240 per consumer. Taxing methane is meant 
to get less natural gas, and natural gas is used for 
electricity generation, to heat homes, natural gas backs up 
renewables, which are intermittent. The cost of renewables is 
higher because they have to have that backup when they can only 
operate 20 to 30 percent of the time.
    Senator Inhofe. That is right.
    Mr. Matheson, America is dependent on countries like China, 
not only for the list of critical minerals, but China controls 
the mining and processing for a variety of metals in the 
electricity sector and used in electric vehicles, whether on 
the critical list or not.
    Mandates to decarbonize the transportation and electricity 
sectors would increase our reliance on China. I think we all 
understand that.
    But as was pointed out by the Chairman in his opening 
remarks, I have chaired the Senate Armed Services Committee. I 
am concerned about national security in a more profound way 
than I ever have been before, because we know what China is 
doing.
    We know that back in the old days, we used to talk about 
how America has the best of everything, and we did, for a long 
period of time. That is not true anymore, and so that is a very 
serious thing. Mr. Matheson, how can the utility sector work to 
ensure domestic sourcing for American-mined minerals?
    Mr. Matheson. First of all, since I mentioned in my opening 
statement, since rural electric co-ops serve 56 percent of the 
landmass in this Country, we serve most of the areas where we 
would be trying to secure these materials by mining. So 
increased domestic production across the board for the various 
products you are talking about, electric co-ops are in those 
areas.
    We would be serving those mines with electric service, and 
it is an area that we would value, of course, because it is 
part of the economic opportunity for rural communities. Since 
we are owned by the communities we serve, we are always 
interested in those economic opportunities.
    But I don't want to diminish what you raised in terms of 
national security issues. Greater domestic supply gives us 
greater opportunity to control the situation. I mentioned 
earlier to Senator Capito, the supply chain challenges we are 
facing in the electric sector are much more pronounced for the 
electric utilities that are more reliant on foreign supply.
    A number of our co-ops have domestic supply manufacturing 
relationships, and they still face supply chain challenges, but 
they are not as severe. So there is no question that if we can 
find production of these minerals or anything else in the 
supply chain for electric cooperatives, a domestic source is 
preferable.
    Senator Inhofe. Well, you know, that is so obvious to most 
people.
    Senator Carper.
    [Presiding.] Senator Inhofe.
    Senator Inhofe. Sometimes I have a difficult time 
explaining why that is not the case. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Carper. You are welcome.
    I have two unanimous consent requests, one to place a 
Resources for the Future study that shows consumers will not be 
harmed by methane emissions reduction program. The second 
unanimous consent request is to place materials on the economic 
impact of wasted energy from methane leakage in the record, if 
there is no objection.
    [The referenced information was not submitted at the time 
of print.]
    Senator Carper. I just note for the record that we have 
been developing bipartisan-based, and some of you call it a 
methane emission reduction program, Before any oil and gas 
companies require to pay a fee, they would be offered 
assistance, up to three-quarters of a billion dollars of money 
would be set aside to help pay down the cost for actions taken 
by oil and gas companies to reduce emissions before any fees 
would kick in. So there you go.
    I think next is Senator Whitehouse. Senator Whitehouse, 
please.
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you to 
all the witnesses for being here. This is going to be a lively 
discussion, because we have dramatically differing views on 
this committee as to what is actually going on here.
    I feel, listening to much of what has been said, like those 
advertisements that you sometimes see on TV where some old band 
is selling its CD of its greatest hits, and all the old songs 
that you are supposed to love. They are selling you the CD 
package. A lot of what we are hearing today sounds like the CD 
package of the oil and gas industry's greatest hits. I think 
the fact of the matter is that sellers in a market economy, 
which is what we are, set price. The price that the sellers 
have set is a very high price.
    Ordinarily, the market intervenes to put downward pressure 
on prices. But the market for oil and gas is peculiar, because 
it is based on an international cartel that sets international 
prices and a bunch of international speculation, particularly 
driven by the conflict in Ukraine and the uncertainty in 
Russia.
    So there is an international price that is completely 
unhinged from cost. We have all seen this slide that the 
President used that shows what has happened, as the prices went 
up, up went the prices at the pump. Then, per barrel prices 
dropped dramatically, and yet, the industry kept its prices up.
    So, this whole red zone is basically excess profit. It is 
not related to a market economy. It is taking advantage of 
excess prices from an international cartel.
    We have another graphic here that shows the same thing: 
domestic oil production and the price of gasoline. There just 
isn't much of a, let me bring it down a little bit so the 
camera can see it there, there just isn't great correlation 
between the two. It is not very dynamically connected.
    So we have this kind of oil cartel and a very small group 
of very big oil companies that are setting prices and reaping 
unbelievable profits. What are they doing with those 
unbelievable profits? They are not turning them back to people 
at the pump.
    In fact, here is Darren Woods, President and CEO of 
ExxonMobil, which is the biggest of the lot, and he is saying 
exactly what he is going to do. He is going to pay back his 
lenders, he is going to raise the dividend to his shareholders, 
and he is going to buy back shares, which boost share price, 
and coincidentally, his compensation.
    So none of it is going back to consumers. They are not even 
mentioned in this statement. But the industry PR machine is out 
full blast, trying to blame this on people who don't have the 
power to set price.
    It is a little hard to accept that, which is why I have 
proposed that the companies at least split that excess profit 
with consumers and send that money back to consumers' pockets 
for them to spend. If they want to spend it on more gasoline, 
great, they will have money in their pockets to do that. If 
they want to spend it on food or pharmaceuticals or rent or 
whatever they want to spend it on.
    But share the windfall profits. Claw back some of the 
excess profit that reflects the disconnect between actual 
domestic production cost and these international cartel-driven, 
speculator-driven markets that the companies are riding along 
to pocket tens of billions of dollars. According to Exxon, they 
are spending $10 billion just on the share buyback part of this 
bonanza.
    So, there is definitely money there that could be used to 
reduce costs for consumers, and they are definitely not 
interested in doing that, and they are definitely not in a real 
market, because they are dealing with this international 
cartel, surfing on the cost, on the price that is set by an 
international cartel full of not-very-great people, Saudi 
Arabia, Iran, Russia, Venezuela. I am really thrilled that that 
is the group that is setting domestic prices off of which our 
oil companies run, and then that our oil companies, when they 
have that opportunity, don't dial it back to help consumers. 
They just pocket it. Good for shareholders, good for CEOs, good 
for stock price, not good for consumers.
    That is what we are dealing with. That is the short-run 
problem. The long-run problem is that here in Congress, we have 
been buffaloed by the oil and gas industry forever to create a 
completely unfair environment for renewable energy so we remain 
hooked on oil and gas.
    If we had solved this problem a decade ago, we wouldn't 
have this vulnerability. If we had solved it 20 years ago, we 
wouldn't have this vulnerability. If we had solved this 30 
years ago when Senator John Chafee of Rhode Island was holding 
hearings in this committee pointing out what was driving 
climate change and how difficult this was going to be, we 
wouldn't have this problem now.
    We are hostages to the oil and gas industry, which is now 
telling us that the solution for the hostages is to buy more 
oil and gas. What could be more expected?
    I yield back. Oh, I am sorry; I went over. I yield nothing 
back. My apologies to my colleagues.
    [Laughter.]
    Senator Carper. You are welcome, thank you for those 
comments, Sheldon.
    Next, Senator Cramer, and then my notes here indicate 
Senator Stabenow, you follow Senator Cramer. Senator Lummis, I 
think you are going to follow Senator Stabenow. Senator Cramer, 
you are recognized.
    Senator Cramer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for 
being here, witnesses.
    I do have to respond a little bit, because Senator 
Whitehouse I think is wrong. Actually, I think it is 
dynamically connected. It is not statically connected. When he 
talks about price, the producer gets paid for producing oil and 
the price at the pump. It is quite dynamic, but it is not 
static.
    In fact, in response to a question to you, Ms. Sgamma, you 
referenced the oil export ban being lifted. As I watch the 
markets today, and I see that WTI and Brent are roughly $3 
apart, I remember that before the ban, they were $30 apart. In 
other words, the United States has helped bring down the cost 
of oil globally. As opposed to being a price taker, we have 
become a price maker.
    That is good for the world. That has enhanced productivity, 
and it has brought prices down. Frankly, if we do a lot more of 
it, we could be the price maker yet again. We have this window 
of opportunity.
    Never in my wildest dreams, Congressman Matheson, when I 
would see my dad come home from climbing poles for Cascone 
Rural Electric Cooperative, did I imagine I would be meeting on 
an almost daily basis with European energy leaders pleading 
with us to help them meet a demand that they have and they have 
cut themselves off of in Russia. We have a moment to do it 
cleaner, greener, better by investing more in what we do 
really, really well.
    While I appreciate the illustration of turning albums into 
CDs into digital music and celebrating the oldies, quite 
honestly, I don't want to be the leader of a new world order. I 
want to be the leader of a free world order. That is what the 
oil and gas industry has provided us in this Country, and what 
we are able to provide the world today. If we stop--listen, I 
am all for long-term aspirational goals. We can have a 2050 
fantasy. I don't mind that, but it is being met by a 2022 
reality, and we ought to step up to that reality today and 
enhance the opportunity.
    So, Mr. Matheson, with regard to your testimony about rural 
cooperatives and co-ops not having the commercially available 
technologies to have baseload electricity generation and have 
it all be carbon-free, there are some opportunities, and 
Senator Cardin is right, and Senator Whitehouse is right, and 
Senator Carper is right. There is a lot of bipartisan support 
for some innovation and technological advancement incentives 
around here. We need to do more of that.
    So you know, Minnkota Electric in North Dakota is on the 
very forefront of a commercial opportunity for carbon capture 
utilization and storage technologies. But you also, I am sure, 
know that there are some challenges to that. Could you speak to 
that just a little bit and how we could maybe do more to 
provide opportunities to innovate?
    Mr. Matheson. Sure. I would be happy to do that, and I 
appreciate the question. Foundationally, you have to have 
alwaysavailable supply to maintain reliability 24/7, and I know 
I have said that a couple of times. I can't say it enough.
    Senator Cramer. I agree with you.
    Mr. Matheson. We need to be thoughtful about how we talk 
about this in terms of a portfolio approach to all the source 
of electricity generation in this Country. It is going to 
transition over time, but the portfolio has got to maintain 
reliability and affordability.
    You mentioned specifically the Minnkota Project. That is 
right, it is a commercial-sized carbon capture sequestration 
effort at a coal-fired power plant. It is an exciting 
opportunity. It represents a commitment by electric co-ops to 
try to be part of the solution.
    What can Congress do? Well, there is this issue of Congress 
often uses tax credits to incentivize these things. We are non-
forprofit electric cooperatives, so we do not benefit directly 
from those tax credits. I would suggest, whether it is 
renewables, whether it is carbon capture, or whatever type of 
tax credit Congress wants to offer, we and the municipal 
utilities are on the outside looking in, quite frankly.
    So if Congress wants to incent investments in these 
emerging new technologies, I would suggest you may want to 
create that incentive for everyone in the electric sector, and 
it is call direct pay, is the term we use. It is a very popular 
item. I know it went through the Senate Finance Committee in a 
marked-up bill late last year. So I think there is an 
opportunity to help incent that investment on the electric co-
op side as well.
    You asked a question about what you could specifically do; 
that would be my No. 1 ask.
    Senator Cramer. I am with you. Thank you.
    I have 5 seconds, so Ms. Sgamma, really quickly, what can 
we do to enjoy this incredible abundance of resources that we 
have in a way that is both clean but also recognizes America's 
leadership?
    Ms. Sgamma. We produce it here. We produce it here more 
cleanly than any other country. More greenhouse gas emissions 
if you import it from overseas, so just produce it here.
    Senator Cramer. I worry a lot about the signals being sent 
by the SEC this week, Federal Reserve nominees and others, we 
can get into that if we do another round. Thank you, Mr. 
Chairman.
    Senator Carper. You are welcome. Thank you very much.
    Next, Senator Stabenow,
    Senator Stabenow. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. This 
deserves a lot of debate. We have very, very different views on 
this.
    I just say, coming from Michigan, that in 1914, there were 
all kinds of articles about Henry Ford and Thomas Edison, who 
were creating the first vehicles, and they wanted to do a 
battery technology. They had to debate about range. But instead 
of them getting tax incentives to do that, 2 years later, the 
Congress of the United States embedded in the tax code, for 
over 100 years now, major tax credits for oil and gas with no 
connection to the pollution that it involved.
    So here we are today. We picked a winner over 100 years 
ago. They won. Now we are trying to level the playing field as 
we tackle the climate crisis because of carbon pollution.
    I also just want to indicate, we are the largest oil 
producing Country. In the last year, the top 25 largest oil 
companies made over $205 billion in profits in the United 
States, Mr. Chairman, and yet our prices are going up at the 
pump. Our prices are going up, and it is interesting because 
the last time a barrel of oil was $96, gas was $3.62 cents a 
gallon at the pump. Last week, it was $96 again. This time, it 
was $4.31 cents, not $3.62, $4.31. So this is about what the 
market will bear.
    It is really about, in my judgment, there is price gouging 
going on. We have 9,000 approved leases that we aren't using. 
So if in fact, supply production does relate to prices, let's 
use the leases. Let's produce more.
    But what I really want to talk about is where we do from 
here and how we can both support the biofuels that will get us 
to a cleaner future and electric vehicles, so you can drive by 
the pump and not worry about what the sign says.
    I first have to ask though, I know that in your testimony, 
Ms. Sgamma, you talked about the fact that electric vehicles 
won't work because we don't have the critical minerals, we 
don't have the capacity to do this. Certainly, this is a 
challenge we are aware of, but we have our companies that have 
weighed in, the iconic Ford Motor Company, General Motors, Mary 
Barra, who is now the chair of the Business Roundtable, saying 
by 2035 that they are only going to produce electric vehicles. 
That is what GM is saying. Ford is all in.
    Do you think they are uninformed?
    Ms. Sgamma. I don't think you have characterized what I 
said in my testimony correctly. I don't say they don't work, 
but I said that a realistic approach is to recognize that the 
increased use of natural gas in the electricity sector has 
already been the equivalent of 190 EVs on the road. So, we have 
delivered the same reduction as would 190 million electric 
vehicles. There are 11 million electric vehicles globally 
today, and projections that we could get to maybe 145 million 
by 2030.
    Senator Stabenow. So you are saying that natural gas is 
cleaner than zero emission electric vehicles?
    Ms. Sgamma. I am just saying that natural gas has already 
delivered the equivalent reduction since 2005 of 190 million 
EVs on the road.
    Senator Stabenow. I think it is important to, because I 
hear this all the time, opponents of electric vehicles saying 
that electrifying our vehicle fleet will result in us being 
dependent on China for batteries and rare earth materials. That 
certainly is something we need to focus on, which is why we 
need a whole range of tax credits and strategies to make sure 
we are bringing those jobs home and supporting people in the 
vehicle industry.
    They are pretty smart. They wouldn't bet the farm. They 
wouldn't bet the whole company if they didn't think that they 
would be able to get there.
    So I want to just ask, I could go through I am going to run 
out of time, and go through everything we have already 
invested, what we need to do. Ms. Stainken, do you agree that a 
suite of policies and incentives are needed for the U.S. to 
remain a leader in electric vehicles, and should we be doing 
that?
    Ms. Stainken. Yes, absolutely. I fully support our 
transition to electric vehicles, and the Bipartisan 
Infrastructure Law laid that perfect foundation for that. Now 
it is time to build on top of that for a whole-of-nation 
approach.
    Just to add on to the critical minerals piece here, 
geologically speaking, China does not have all of the resources 
or the reserves of critical minerals. In the U.S., we actually 
have a very robust share ourselves and our allies. So together 
with bold policy support, the United States and our allies, we 
can extract in an environmentally safe way, we can process the 
minerals and make the batteries to meet the demand.
    Senator Stabenow. I absolutely agree. We can do it in 
America, we just need to be bold and focused and invest in 
America.
    Just one other quick thing. Secretary Mabus, how would 
ceding the clean energy manufacturing sector to China harm U.S. 
economic and national security?
    Mr. Mabus. I think it harms it in so many ways. Our 
military is dependent on so many of these technologies. If we 
don't have the capacity to make them here at home, we don't 
have the capacity to do the research and development here at 
home, we are going to raise the risk to our national security 
pretty dramatically.
    As you pointed out, we have the ability to do this. We have 
the minerals. What we lack are the incentives, are the policies 
to make sure that we keep those manufacturing jobs, the 
manufacture of those batteries and the precursor materials here 
in the United States. I think it is incredibly important to our 
national security.
    Senator Stabenow. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Carper. Thank you, Senator Stabenow.
    Senator Lummis is next, and joining us right after Senator 
Lummis will be Senator Duckworth, who is going to join us by 
WebEx, then the Marine Colonel from Alaska will follow that. 
Senator Lummis, please.
    Senator Lummis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to say how 
nice it is to see my former colleague from the House, Jim 
Matheson. Great to see you.
    Thank you for holding this hearing today, and Ranking 
Member Capito, thank you for doing this, as well.
    One area that I hope to find agreement on this subject is 
unleashing nuclear energy in America. My first question is for 
Mr. Mabus. In your testimony, you advocate for prohibiting oil 
and gas imports from Russia as a means to cutoff Russian 
revenues. Isn't the same true, restricting Russian uranium, 
which also provides direct revenues to the Russian government?
    Mr. Mabus. I think cutting off all Russian energy revenues 
is incredibly important. Coming from the Navy, where we have 
used nuclear for propulsion from the mid-1950's until today, 
safely, with no accidents, I do think that nuclear, 
particularly some of the new technologies, the small, modular 
reactors need to be a part of the mix.
    Senator Lummis. Thank you. I would note, the last 
questioner mentioned how incentives were needed, tax 
incentives. I would argue that regulatory relief is the more 
important place to look, especially when it comes to rare earth 
minerals and uranium. These are the products that are held up 
and stymied in the United States, including in my home State of 
Wyoming, because it is the regulatory burden and the length of 
time and the cost to get through all those regulatory hurdles 
that snuffs out the financial capability and wherewithal for 
these companies to move forward and develop these rare earth 
minerals and uranium in the United States. So let's address the 
regulatory side of it as well.
    Ms. Sgamma, my colleague here from North Dakota and I both 
sit on the Banking Committee. We are aware that the Federal 
Reserve nominee that was rejected on a bipartisan basis was 
advocating limiting credit access to energy companies, and her 
writings were genuinely hostile to the energy industry.
    In light of the fact that this became an issue that 
ultimately caused her to not be accepted, do you think it is 
appropriate for the SEC to be issuing a climate proposal?
    Ms. Sgamma. SEC simply doesn't have the authority to 
regulate climate change. Congress hasn't even passed a law, why 
should an agency just assume that regulatory power?
    Senator Lummis. We will note that ESG, as BlackRock has 
asserted, because of its market power, its ESG portfolio 
demands are really driving the market in that direction anyway. 
Government doesn't need to do that. Again, Ms. Sgamma, could 
you expand on the greenhouse gas reduction efforts and outcomes 
by the oil and gas industry that you detail in testimony?
    Ms. Sgamma. I would like to highlight the fact that in the 
electricity sector, fuel switching to natural gas has reduced 
more greenhouse gas emissions than wind and solar combined. We 
have reduced about 3.5 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas 
emissions, compared to 2.1 billion by renewables. We did that 
without incentives; we did that without subsidies. We did that 
through market investment from the private sector investment 
and just increased use of production of natural gas.
    Senator Lummis. Natural gas, especially in this Country, is 
so incredibly clean that I am actually surprised that climate 
advocates don't highlight the benefits of natural gas in their 
agendas. Because climate change is climate-based, and globally 
based, I would argue that the cost and benefits associated with 
helping countries like India with their greenhouse gas 
emissions by helping them switch to natural gas or LNG would 
globally be enormous, so much bigger than what we could produce 
here in the United States in terms of greenhouse gas 
reductions. My gosh, helping India do the same thing with the 
same amount of money that takes us to get little tiny 
incremental benefits, if we would help them with that amount of 
money, we could have huge, huge incremental benefits for the 
global climate.
    Excuse me, my time has run out. I yield back.
    Senator Carper. You can't yield back; you have nothing to 
yield.
    [Laughter.]
    Senator Carper. My staff just handed me a note that says, 
natural gas fracking enjoyed a production tax credit for 20 
years from the 1980's to the early 2000's, just for the record.
    OK, let us see who is next.
    Senator Markey, somehow you slipped ahead of these folks. I 
am not sure how you did that, but you are next.
    Senator Markey. Thank you so much.
    Again, if the oil and gas and coal industry have a tax 
break for 100 years, all we are looking for is a little equal 
treatment. If we had the same kind of predictability for 100 
years, I think we would feel really good about our future in 
renewable industry, and if they call that for renewables, 
socialism, then that is what you call it. Give us whatever the 
oil, gas, and coal industries had for 100 years in terms of 
their protections, and we will be very happy with that in terms 
of the protections.
    If we are going to break our dependence upon Putin's dirty 
energy oil, the oil companies have had years to live up to 
their promises of affordability and security. But they weren't 
just selling oil. They were selling snake oil to American 
consumers. Take their argument, for example, that lifting the 
export ban would help American energy independence. In 2014, 
the year before Congress lifted the ban on exports, nine 
million barrels a day were imported from other countries. 
Today, believe it or not, the United States now exports 8.6 
million barrels of oil a day. We export it out of our own 
Country; 8.6 million barrels. That wasn't really what the 
promise was of the oil industry in 2015 when we lifted that 
ban. So, we can see increasingly that American consumers are 
exposed to the global price fluctuation caused by Putin and 
Chinese energy demands and other external forces.
    Secretary Mabus, first, I would like to thank you for your 
great service to our Country. As the U.S. remains attached to 
global oil markets and dependent on oil and natural gas as a 
result of big oil's business decisions, do you agree that we 
are running a constant risk of playing into petro-states and 
undermining our security and that of our allies, in addition to 
fuel instability from climate change?
    Mr. Mabus. Absolutely, on both counts, Senator. The fact 
that we allow these tyrants and dictators like Putin to 
basically hold our families and our economy hostage for their 
bad acts, and we are not addressing climate change nearly as 
strongly as we should in order to prevent some of the really 
terrible things that we are already beginning to see happen. So 
I think both the things you said are absolutely true.
    Senator Markey. Thank you. By the way, it is great to see 
my old friend, Jim Matheson, here. A great Congressman and a 
great friend.
    So, here is where we are: we have, right now, 6,000 leases 
that have been bid for by the oil industry on onshore public 
lands, so about two bucks a barrel. They are not drilling on 
those right now. There are 3,000 leases offshore at about two 
bucks an acre. They are not drilling on that as well.
    But let us just go even further. They have 6,000 leases 
that they are already drilling on that they have just stopped 
drilling on that are already about half drilled. They are not 
drilling on that either.
    So I just keep hearing drill, baby, drill, but the reality 
is that if we want to get real and move to our greatest 
strength in our Country, it has got to be plug in, baby, plug 
in. Because for every 16 million all-electric vehicles which we 
deploy in the United States, we back out all the oil that we 
import from Russia. That is just the reality. The next 16 
million all-electric vehicles would back out the Saudi oil, et 
cetera, et cetera.
    That is why the tax breaks for all-electric vehicles, the 
batteries, are so important. We can tell Russia we don't need 
their oil any more than we need their caviar. We can tell Saudi 
Arabia we don't need their oil any more than we need their 
sand. We can do it, but we have to unleash this incredible 
revolution. And that is all in the legislation that is still 
pending. We take this as our moment, our signal, to be able to 
move to the future.
    EV is electric vehicle, but it can also stand for evading 
violence, getting ourselves into wars around the world, funding 
despots, autocracies, where it is completely avoidable because 
we put 70 percent of the oil we consume into gasoline tanks. It 
is something that we can cure ourselves of, and also reduce 
greenhouse gases and also protect consumers from crazy price 
spikes, the way we see right now.
    The National Climate Bank that came out of this committee, 
that is part of the solution. So are so many of the other 
programs that we have been considering in this committee and 
are all ready to be passed.
    But if we are going to be serious, we have to do everything 
we can to pass those tax breaks, pass the Climate Bank, and 
send a message to these countries around the world, that 
finally, America as a technological giant is going to rise up, 
because right now, we have oil companies sitting on 15,000 
leases that they are not drilling on because they are saying 
they are not making enough money.
    That just can't be how we protect American security, the 
American economy, the environment of our Country, and 
ultimately our moral standing in the world. If we have a 
capacity to do this, we should unleash that revolution.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Carper. Senator Markey, thank you.
    Senator Sullivan, you are next, please.
    Senator Sullivan. Thanks, Mr. Chairman, and of course, it 
is always good to hear from our friend from Massachusetts.
    Senator Carper. We thought it would be nice to pair the two 
of you, side by side.
    Senator Sullivan. I don't agree with him on a lot of these 
issues. Just a reminder, the Administration put a moratorium on 
any oil and gas leasing, and by the way, any permits to drill, 
that is a more detailed requirement. They are still sitting on 
4,621 permit to drill applications that they have stopped, so 
we have a lot of difference on this.
    But here is an area where Senator Markey and I probably 
agree: he talked about a revolution. He talked about greenhouse 
gas emissions. Let's get that up there. I want to talk about 
this chart for quite some time, because it never gets the 
attention that it deserves. Right here, this shows that from 
2005 to 2020, the United States dropped its emissions of CO2 
emission by 970 million metric tons.
    Let's start with you, Ms. Sgamma, and Mr. Matheson. That is 
a pretty remarkable record, isn't it? Look at, relative to 
China, relative to India, relative to any major economy in the 
world since 2005, the United States has reduced greenhouse gas 
emissions by almost 15 percent, best in the world. Isn't that 
correct? For almost two decades, correct? Everybody agree with 
that? Those are the facts. How did that happen?
    Ms. Sgamma. Increased use of natural gas is the primary 
reason.
    Senator Sullivan. Correct. It was the revolution----
    Ms. Sgamma. The Shale Revolution, yes.
    Senator Sullivan [continuing]. in natural gas. Had every 
other country in the world had a record like this, where do you 
think we would be in global emissions? Again, panelists, you 
guys can all jump in. These are facts. Nobody ever talks about 
them, because they are inconvenient truths, as Al Gore said. I 
was thinking about someone else, but that is a whole other 
story.
    Mr. Matheson, do you want to comment on this?
    Mr. Matheson. I think from an electric cooperative 
perspective, yes, we have seen a reduction of emissions, I 
mentioned it in my testimony, primarily driven by increased use 
of natural gas. We also have had----
    Senator Sullivan. But I mean, this is astounding, isn't it? 
I mean, we are the leader in the world by far. Correct?
    Mr. Matheson. Yes, the chart says it.
    Senator Sullivan. Yes, and China, of course, and India are 
going through the roof, correct? So, my question always is to 
the Biden Administration, why would you stop that? Right now, 
just look at the FERC's latest ruling. They all seem to be 
focused on shutting down the production of oil and gas. If this 
is the record right now, do you think it makes sense, Ms. 
Sgamma, to shut down the production of natural gas in America, 
or make it harder to produce, like the FERC's latest rule just 
did?
    Ms. Sgamma. It does not. If we really wanted to provide 
meaningful solutions to climate change, we would look at 
increasing our exports of natural gas to the world so that they 
could deliver the same type of greenhouse gas reduction.
    Senator Sullivan. That is a great segue, thank you. Senator 
Lummis, Senator Cramer, and I, we put forward this plan several 
months ago. We worked on it for many months. It is our American 
Energy Jobs and Climate Plan, and it would do more than almost 
anything, because it focuses on that.
    Let me give you an estimate. We ran some numbers. If the 
United States significantly increased exports of a clean-
burning American natural gas globally to India, we already 
export to India, we already export to China, what do you think 
the global emission reductions would be? Do you have a ballpark 
figure? I can give it to you.
    Ms. Sgamma. I don't have a ballpark figure, but they would 
go down. But the problem is, we can't build pipelines so that 
we can supply our LNG export terminals.
    Senator Sullivan. The answer is about 9 percent, globally, 
9 percent, which is remarkable. That is modeling that we did as 
part of our plan, and it is based not on some pie-in-the-sky 
predictions that John Kerry and others make when they go around 
the world, telling countries not to buy American natural gas, 
can you believe that? That is what he does, which is, to me, 
remarkable, almost un-American.
    But how could we get to this? What are your recommendations 
where we can take what we are doing in America, and could you 
imagine if the rest of the world did what we are doing, what 
greenhouse gas emissions globally would do? They would 
dramatically drop. It would empower America in terms of our 
jobs, in terms of our energy, in terms of lower greenhouse gas 
emissions here and abroad.
    What more can we do to make that a reality, besides 
adopting the Sullivan-Cramer-Lummis plan, which we know that 
you are all very enthusiastically supporting?
    Ms. Sgamma. Right. I think, and I know it is things you 
have addressed as well, is we need to stop the overregulation 
of the industry. Of course, we are heavily regulated, and we 
should be, but it is the additional regulations that they 
continue to pile on that are meant to get to an answer of no 
when it comes to natural gas projects. Move forward with the 
infrastructure, the pipelines, LNG terminals, so that we can 
export that same greenhouse gas reduction to the rest of the 
world.
    Senator Sullivan. Great. Thank you.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I would welcome the chance to 
have a hearing on our plan. We think it would be very 
bipartisan. Many issues discussed here today are in the plan, 
and it would have an impact like this.
    Who can argue with this? I don't even think my friend, Ed 
Markey, can argue with this. That is real success, and we need 
to continue it, not try to curtail it or shut it down.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Ms. Stainken. Mr. Chair, if I could just add one more thing 
to that?
    Senator Carper. Please.
    Ms. Stainken. I would like to say, from 2005 to 2020, I 
personally was working in the solar industry at that time, and 
that is when we saw the great advent of the renewable energy 
industry, solar coming online, wind coming online. So those 
reductions from the United States are all due to great policies 
that we adopted here to advance renewable energy.
    Ms. Sgamma. But not as much as natural gas.
    Senator Sullivan. With all due respect, those reductions 
that I am showing right there almost have zero to do with 
renewables. I am an all-of-the-above policy promoter in terms 
of energy, but that chart is due to the revolution in natural 
gas, and if you are claiming otherwise, you don't know what the 
facts are.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Carper. Ms. Stainken, do you want to finish your 
comment?
    Ms. Stainken. I would just say, in terms of China here, I 
mean, I think we need to be really aware of the made-in-China 
2025 strategy there, which is advancing them toward 
transportational electrification. They have their own policies 
there that want to get off oil for the same reasons that we are 
seeing here, because of the price spikes and the volatility 
there. They want to be advancing in electric vehicles because 
of the critical minerals processing that they control right 
now, and they want to be looking toward adopting autonomous 
vehicles and 5G technology, which is the future of a lot of 
different facets of their economy.
    So, I think we really need to keep an eye on China and what 
they are doing, and if they are moving forward aggressively 
with transportation electrification, then we need to do the 
same.
    Senator Carper. Thanks so much.
    I think Senator Duckworth is trying to join us by WebEx. 
Senator Duckworth, are you out there?
    Senator Duckworth. I sure am, Mr. Chairman. I am so glad we 
are having this hearing, thank you.
    Senator Carper. Thank you, ma'am.
    Senator Duckworth. I just want to start off by talking a 
little bit about oil and the global economy. The narrative that 
one individual in one country can control the global oil 
economy is a false narrative. Additionally, the narrative that 
more leases would decrease today's gas prices and immediately 
help secure energy independence from Russia is also a false 
narrative.
    There are almost 9,000 leases on Federal lands right now 
that go unused every year, and new leases take three to 10 
years to get online to start contributing to the global market, 
with little comprehensive effect. In fact, there are 3,000 
leases where the oil companies have started drilling, have all 
the permits, have all the approvals, and they simply have 
stopped drilling because that was a business decision they 
made.
    For example, Keystone Pipeline, if operable today, would 
only impact our global production by less than 1 percent. The 
United States is the largest producer of oil and natural gas 
and will produce more oil than ever before by 2023, so the 
ability to produce is not our problem.
    The oil market works like most markets. It is impacted by 
supply, demand, and market speculation on future prices. 
Recovering from a global pandemic, coupled with the Ukraine 
crisis, are naturally going to have an impact on our oil 
futures. We can't control that.
    However, one of the major contributors to the oil market 
that we do control is production or supply. Selling SPR is 
helpful, but without supply to meet the demand, prices will 
rise. That is simple economics.
    Unfortunately, big oil controls production, and these 
private businesses are choosing to spend their capital 
elsewhere. This attitude of using their funds to pay high 
dividends rather than increasing production of oil is 
incredibly upsetting. They could increase production, start 
drilling again in those 3,000 leases that they already have 
permission and have already begun production on, but they 
choose not to.
    We had big oil's back when disaster hit, and it is time now 
for them to repay taxpayers with an increase in supply, which 
is very much within their control. Taking advantage of a global 
crisis to the financial benefit of an industry is immoral 
behavior. It reminds me of some oil companies' actions 
immediately following Hurricane Katrina, where they hiked up 
rates while people were drowning. Excessively increasing oil 
prices and unreasonably decreasing or halting supply to 
increase your profit margins is shameful.
    That is why I am introducing the Gas Price Gouging 
Prevention Act, making it a Federal crime during a period of an 
international crisis affecting the oil markets to sell oil at a 
price that is unconscionably excessive and indicates the seller 
is taking unfair advantage of the circumstances related to an 
international crisis to increase prices unreasonably. 
Protecting hardworking American families from corporate greed, 
in my view, should be a bipartisan goal, as I hope this bill 
will be.
    Of course, the legislative process can be difficult and 
lengthy. We all know that. And we must also push the Federal 
Government to exhaust all existing authorities to crack down on 
greedy price-gouging practices.
    That is why I called on President Biden to direct Attorney 
General Merrick Garland to establish a gasoline price gouging 
enforcement task force to carefully monitor and investigate oil 
and gas markets for potential violations of criminal or civil 
laws, including gasoline price gouging. These actions will 
signify that Congress will not sit idly by and allow any 
corporation to abuse their power by unfairly taking money from 
hardworking American families.
    Saving families money at the pump is also why I joined 
forces with my Republican Colleague, Senator Ernst, to 
introduce the Homefront Energy Independence Act, that will 
incentivize biofuel production and allow for the year-round 
sale of E15 fuel. This will give families a significantly 
cheaper fuel option at the pump, saving more than 50 cents per 
gallon, which leads, finally, to my first question.
    Secretary Mabus, I have been a huge fan of yours over the 
years. I think that if we have learned anything from the market 
these last few years, it is that we must lower our dependence 
on fossil fuels and shift to renewable energy, because if we 
remain fully and solely dependent on the oil market, we will 
continue to have an erratic future.
    While you were Secretary of the Navy, part of your 
admirable goal to decrease the Navy's petroleum consumption was 
the use of ethanol blends and E15. As gas prices continue to 
increase and American families are left paying unbelievable 
prices at the pump, do you think, Secretary Mabus, that having 
E15 fuel as a choice during the coming summer months will be a 
helpful alternative to combat high gas prices and reduce 
petroleum production?
    Mr. Mabus. Senator, I think in the near future, that is one 
way we can reduce what people are paying at the pump. You are 
right, we went to flex fuel vehicles, we went to agricultural 
biomass, which is what these things come out of. As you look to 
the future, when you get to second generation biofuels, you are 
going to be able to use the corn stalks, the stover, the wheat 
stalks, to do fuel so that you can sell the corn or the wheat 
for one thing, you can sell the stover for energy, and it will 
not only lower the price at the pump, but it will give American 
farmers a whole new energy stream, which a lot of them 
desperately need.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
    I am out of time, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
    Senator Carper. Thanks so much for joining us, Senator 
Duckworth, by WebEx.
    Second round for Senator Markey, and then we are going to 
have to wrap up. I need to leave fairly soon, but go ahead, go 
right ahead, please. You are recognized.
    Senator Markey. Thank you. I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman, 
very much.
    Again, I just want to come back to the point that I had 
made earlier, which is that there are 9,000 leases on Federal 
lands, offshore and onshore, that the oil and gas industry have 
already won and purchased. If they wanted to drill, they should 
have been drilling.
    Of course, they didn't, but to come in then and say they 
need more leases, when they haven't even used the ones that 
they have already purchased from us, that would be foolish on 
the part of the American taxpayer, because they should either 
use it or lose it. Use the ones you have or lose them, give 
them back to us, before you start asking for more leases that 
you are going to be using.
    Again, there are 6,000 other partially drilled operations 
all around the Country that they have just stopped. They are 
already permitted, those 6,000. They are not drilling on them 
right now, either.
    So just show us some good faith and start drilling there. 
You already got the permits. If you really care about it, stop 
asking for more when you haven't even used what you have 
already got, especially the ones that are already half drilled, 
already partially drilled. Get to work. Get us that oil and 
gas, but don't say we are stopping you. The Democrats on this 
committee are not stopping you. Go and do it anytime you want.
    Again, when it comes to the renewable revolution, which we 
keep hearing is not the answer, well, here is the good news: 
renewables are cheaper, and their prices are stable. We 
actually can't say the same thing about oil and gas that we can 
say in terms of the pricing. Ninety percent of electricity 
waiting to be connected in the United States is renewables. Can 
I say that again? Ninety percent of all electricity waiting to 
be connected in our Country is renewables right now.
    So if I may, because I can see you have a superior 
educational background at Boston College, Ms. Stainken, could 
you comment on that? Am I accurate in my analysis?
    Ms. Stainken. Yes, Boston College is a great university. Go 
Eagles. I appreciate your accent, too; it takes me right back.
    Yes, absolutely. Renewables, they are ready to be connected 
to the grid right now, and that is going to power our electric 
transportation future.
    I would just like to point out, too, you were talking about 
the level playing field. Well, the United States spends, 
annually, $80 billion defending our oil investments, and China 
right now has invested $60 billion over the past decade for 
their transportation electrification future. So we have $80 
billion in 1 year here and $60 billion over the decade that 
China has been doing to take the commanding lead with 
transportation electrification. Let's talk about the level 
playing field.
    Senator Markey. So, what you are saying is, when you are 
deploying wind and solar here in the United States, we actually 
don't need the United States military deployed, as they are in 
the Middle East, to make sure that those tankers can come?
    Ms. Stainken. That is exactly what I am saying, absolutely.
    Senator Markey. That doesn't fully get factored in at all, 
or it doesn't get factored in at all. They want to pretend it 
is so; that is just some, like greenhouse gases are an 
externality, they really shouldn't be counted. So too is the 
military budget of our Country, so much of it 
disproportionately targeted toward the Middle East where, 
coincidentally, the oil that we import is coming from.
    So, can you expand upon that just a little bit more?
    Ms. Stainken. Sure. The electricity that is powering 
electric vehicles, that is being generated domestically here in 
the United States. It is cleaner; it is safer; it is more 
reliable here. We are creating great, excellent jobs here by 
expanding, Jim can say it too, by expanding our electric 
generation here.
    There was actually a report done by the Department of 
Energy in 2019 that showed that annually, we are putting on 
about an additional 12 gigawatts of electricity generation onto 
the grid that can more than meet the demand of electric 
vehicles coming on.
    Senator Markey. I agree with you 100 percent. We now 
actually generate 200,000 megawatts of renewables a year in the 
United States. Back in 2009 when Joe Biden and Barack Obama 
were being sworn in, it was 2,000 megawatts of solar total in 
history and 25,000 megawatts of wind. Now, we are up to 
200,000. It wasn't as though, all of a sudden, it got windier 
or sunnier, it is just that we got a lot of those obstacles at 
the State and Federal level out of the way.
    There is still more work to be done, but it includes 
ensuring that we are incentivizing transmission lines so we can 
get it from where it is being generated, wind and solar, to 
where it is needed, and that we also pass those tax breaks for 
the generation of wind and solar, onshore and offshore.
    I will add that we also passed the bill that is still 
pending, President Biden's bill for about $40 billion worth of 
tax breaks to actually manufacture the wind and solar here in 
the United States. That is critical as well, so that we can 
just say ``made in America'' for wind and solar as it comes 
down and we capture it. Then, the workers actually manufacture 
all of the technologies that accomplish that goal. It is all 
there, and it has nothing to do any longer with Russia or with 
the Middle East. We are energy independent if we do that.
    But of course, that is going to be blocked. And who will be 
blocking it? Who will be trying to stop it? It will be the oil 
and gas and coal industry, because they know that if we get the 
same subsidies, the same opportunities that the other 
industries did, that we will see this technological revolution 
unfold.
    I thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much for the opportunity to 
have a second round. I yield back.
    Senator Carper. You bet. Thank you so much for joining us 
for a second round.
    Baseball is about to get started. Folks are showing up for 
spring training. We are going to start playing real games in a 
couple of weeks. They have a term in baseball when a pitcher 
telegraphs his or her pitch. What it means there is something 
in the way they hold the ball or the way they wind up, release 
the ball, tells you whether or not they are throwing a split 
finger fastball, a curveball, a slider, whatever.
    I am going to telegraph my pitch. The last question I am 
going to ask of this panel, including Secretary Mabus, is where 
is some consensus? Where do you think there is agreement?
    One of the things this committee is very good at, when you 
look at the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, roads, highways, 
bridges, transportation infrastructure, we reported out of this 
committee unanimously. Water, wastewater, sanitation, flood 
control, we reported out of this committee a year ago 
unanimously.
    I sense there is a fair amount of consensus here. We may 
not recognize it all during the course of this hearing, but 
there is consensus here. I am going to ask us to come back to 
that. I have a couple other questions I am going to ask, but I 
wanted to think about telegraphing that pitch and think about 
what you might want to say in response, OK?
    This first question is a question for Ms. Stainken. It 
deals with short-term solutions. I think all of us know and 
realize that many Americans are hurting right now. They are 
feeling pain at the gas pump when they fill up. They are paying 
higher home energy prices. It is only right that we discuss the 
long-term solution to this situation, in order to prevent it 
from happening again and to improve our Nation's energy outlet 
for the long run.
    However, it is also important that we explore short-term 
solutions that could provide more immediate relief for 
consumers who are struggling right now under the burden of 
unpredictable costs.
    My question, Ms. Stainken, is would you please take a 
minute for us to discuss any short-term solutions you think 
might encourage us as lawmakers to consider as we look to 
address the crises that our Country is facing, please?
    Ms. Stainken. I am happy to answer that. I mentioned some 
of this in my testimony there, but just to elaborate on that, 
we really do need a suite, a robust set of policies that 
complement what was done in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. 
Those are the foundational policies, but we need to invest 
further than in the vehicle purchase incentives, things for 
building further out with the EV charging infrastructure, 
electrifying the Federal fleet there, and then also providing a 
robust set of incentives focused on the manufacturing and 
ensuring that that is done here in the United States and also 
with our critical minerals.
    Senator Carper. OK, thank you.
    This is a question for Secretary Mabus, and I think maybe 
also for you, Ms. Stainken. The question is, how important is 
it for the U.S. Government, including individual agencies such 
as the Postal Service, General Services Administration, and the 
Department of Defense, how important is it for entities like 
that to lead in the fight against climate change and support an 
expeditious transition to a cleaner economy? That is the first 
part of the question.
    And in your view, this is for Secretary Mabus, in your 
views, can U.S. businesses, States and local governments help 
to transition our economy without the assistance from the 
Federal Government? Two questions, Secretary Mabus, would you 
take those, please.
    Mr. Mabus. I will concentrate on your first question with 
DOD. DOD absolutely has to take the lead. They are the largest 
users of fossil fuels on Earth. They can bring a market, they 
can accelerate this change exponentially, and it will help our 
national security. It will help us in terms of making us better 
war fighters and making us more secure.
    The DOD has always led in technological revolutions. You 
look at the internet, you look at GPS, you look at flat screen 
TVs. Those all came out of Defense. And this is one place; 
Secretary Austin says that there is nothing that Defense does 
that is not impacted by climate change.
    To answer your second question, I think the States and 
local governments are doing a lot right now, but they don't 
have the scope, they don't have the scale that the Federal 
Government does. The Federal Government can accelerate this so 
much by policies and by the things that we incentivize.
    This is going to happen. It is very clear. We have passed 
the tipping point in terms of moving to renewables. It is a 
question now of how fast we are going to go and how well we are 
going to do it. I think that you have to have the Federal 
Government taking the lead in that, particularly DOD, in order 
to succeed.
    Senator Carper. Great, thank you for that.
    Again, Ms. Stainken, same two questions. I am going to 
repeat the two questions, just for clarification, here. How 
important is it for the U.S. Government, including individual 
agencies like the Department of Defense, General Services 
Administration, to lead in the fight against climate change and 
to support an expeditious transition to a cleaner economy? That 
is the first question. Go ahead and answer that, and then I 
will give you the second one.
    Ms. Stainken. Great. Yes, it is absolutely critical that 
the Federal Government leads by example in this. The 
Electrification Coalition, we are huge supporters of 
electrifying the Federal fleet. They are, as Secretary Mabus 
was pointing out, they are the largest single fleet operator 
here. The U.S. Postal Service alone has 190,000 vehicles within 
their fleet, and I can certainly elaborate more on the U.S. 
Postal Service and them going electric.
    But you know, this represents significant savings to the 
American taxpayer by going electric. Electric vehicles save 50 
percent on the maintenance costs compared to an internal 
combustion engine, and same thing with the fuel savings. That 
is significant. Studies have shown, you know, that we are 
talking in the billions in terms of the savings. That was when 
gas prices were at $2.50 a gallon, and now that they are up at 
$4, $5, we are talking significantly more savings.
    Senator Carper. Yes, thanks. The second question, again, 
any of you, can U.S. businesses, States, local governments 
transition our economy without the assistance from the Federal 
Government?
    Ms. Stainken. We have been without leadership from the 
Federal Government prior to this Administration. So States have 
moved forward with doing what they can in advancing the right 
policies and putting forward significant investments in this 
sector. But we definitely need the support of the Federal 
Government to be at the right scale that we need.
    Senator Carper. Yes. I am not going to dwell on the Postal 
Service, but I would just offer this: roughly 200,000 vehicles 
in the postal fleet may be the largest fleet of vehicles in the 
Country. Today, they are almost all gas and diesel. If there is 
someplace in the Country where, frankly, that makes sense, 
there are vast expanses in this Country where there aren't a 
lot of people living, and the Postal Service still has an 
obligation to deliver to every mailbox 6 days a week. So in 
some cases, it makes sense to have liquid fuel vehicles for 
maybe a good long while.
    A lot of places, that doesn't make much sense. I fear if we 
don't take at a time when the Postal Service's fleet of almost 
200,000 vehicles is about 25 years of age, if we don't use this 
as an opportunity to upgrade and move into the future, we will 
live to regret it. When you look at what they are doing in 
FedEx, what they are doing in UPS, when we look and see what 
Amazon is doing in terms of moving to more energy efficient, 
clean delivering, low or no emissions, it is time for us to 
act.
    Last question I would ask of one of you, just one of you, 
then I am going to ask a question of all of you that I 
telegraphed, but this is for Congressman Matheson. This deals 
with support for electric cooperative transition. If the Postal 
Service makes the transition from gas and diesel to more energy 
efficient, low emission vehicles, the Federal Government has an 
obligation to help write down the cost of those vehicles to 
help the Postal Service. They have an obligation to help with 
fueling stations, whether it is hydrogen or be it charging 
stations, as well. It is not all on the Postal Service.
    Congressman Matheson, how necessary is the Federal 
Government support to help the electric cooperative transition 
from older, inefficient power plants to cleaner, efficient 
energy generation?
    Mr. Matheson. I appreciate the question. I would say, first 
of all, we have been making investments all along in our 
plants, so I would suggest that we have been making investments 
in efficiency. I would not describe the whole fleet of 
generating assets owned by coops as particularly old or 
inefficient.
    That being said, I do think that there are a couple things 
the Federal Government can do that would be helpful. One, you 
have heard me say two or three times, and that is the direct 
pay provision in terms of the tax credits that have been 
provided to the rest of the electric utility sector for a long 
time now, the Federal level for investing in new energy 
technologies, renewables production tax credit for nuclear, tax 
credit for carbon capture sequestration.
    We don't get the benefit of that. So the way it works is, 
if we want to be involved with, let us say, a solar plant, a 
third party build the solar plant. They take the tax credit; 
they take a profit; they sell the output to us. That works, and 
we have those relationships.
    But in terms of the value of that Federal Government 
support going to consumer at the end of the line, that doesn't 
happen because there is that third party in the middle of that 
transaction. So I think you would see a significant increased 
investment out of electric cooperatives when the direct pay 
provision goes through. I know you are familiar with it. You 
have been active on it. I don't want to sound like a one trick 
pony, but that really is something that is right in front of us 
here that Congress could do that would really help in terms of 
electric cooperative investment in this energy transition. I 
think it is the most important thing I can emphasize.
    The second thing I want to mention though, and it has been 
talked about a lot, about electrification, is that as we move 
to a more electrified economy in the future, which I believe we 
are going to do, the delivery of that electricity, and I am not 
a transmission engineer, but the delivery of that electricity 
creates new challenges for the grid. We need to be thoughtful 
about looking for how we make sure the grid can meet this need 
to charge a whole bunch of electric vehicles, where consumers 
may want rapid charging.
    That creates, that is technologically feasible, don't get 
me wrong, but that creates a new set of operating dynamics that 
we need to think about. What investments do we need to make in 
the grid to meet those needs? I find that a great opportunity 
to have a conversation where there may be a Federal role, with 
advice from the labs, quite frankly, because it is a huge 
resource the Federal Government has at its disposal. That could 
be an area where we should have a conversation about grid 
modernization to meet this more electrified economy of the 
future.
    Senator Carper. Great. Thank you. I like to quote Einstein, 
who said, among other things, in adversity, lies opportunity. 
There is actually, when I talked to the utilities around the 
Country, they talk about where their growth is going to be for 
selling electricity, and most of them point to mobile fleets.
    Now, the pitch I will telegraph. I am going to go to 
Secretary Mabus first on this, then Ms. Sgamma, we will ask 
you, then Congressman, and then Ms. Stainken.
    The question is, as we have gone through, we have been here 
a couple hours now, so people listening to us might say, well, 
they don't agree on anything. Actually, I think there is quite 
a bit of consensus on a lot of what we have talked about here. 
I am just going to ask if, Secretary Mabus, you could lead us 
off and say where you think some of that consensus might be, 
and where might it lead us, please. You are first.
    Mr. Mabus. Senator, thank you again for allowing me to 
testify. I think we have got some real agreement, and it is 
important, that climate change is real and that we have to, 
have to reduce emissions. That is one message that has come out 
of this hearing loud and clear that everybody agrees on.
    Second, that the solutions going forward have to be 
domestically based, that we can't allow ourselves to be held 
hostage by international events. Finally, that we need to take 
immediate steps to ease the pain for consumers at the gas pump 
right now for the American family.
    Senator Carper. Thank you for those comments.
    Ms. Sgamma.
    Ms. Sgamma. I think there is probably consensus that the 
regulatory environment needs to change so that we can site new 
mines for rare earth minerals, so that we can produce oil and 
gas, so that we can site those transmission lines. Because the 
process right now is so cumbersome that, I mean, we talk about 
producing those rare earth materials here in the United States, 
but good luck to anybody who wants to start, open up a mine. 
You can't get it done with the process.
    Senator Carper. OK, thank you, ma'am.
    Congressman.
    Mr. Matheson. I think there is consensus that we are 
entering a phase of transition. I would like to think there is 
consensus that we all agree that supporting reliability and 
affordability in our energy sector is important to the 
foundation of how our economy operates.
    In terms of this transition, I think we need to be 
thoughtful about where we are in terms of the State of 
technology and the timing in which it can be deployed in an 
appropriate way, and the investments in infrastructure it is 
going to take to make that transition successful.
    I think there is consensus, while in the details we may 
have differences of opinion, we want to approach it in that way 
to be thoughtful, to make this transition be less disruptive, 
more productive, and more successful.
    Senator Carper. Thank you, sir.
    Ms. Stainken.
    Ms. Stainken. Great, yes. I have got a couple takeaways 
today where we found agreement.
    Senator Carper. You can talk more slowly.
    [Laughter.]
    Ms. Stainken. From the east coast, originally. First of 
all, there is pain at the pump. We are all recognizing that, 
and something needs to be done here. Second, we need to protect 
the consumers from the volatility of oil prices spiking, and 
that this hasn't happened before. This happened in the 1970's, 
the 1980's, the 1990's, again and again and again. As Jim was 
just saying here, it is time to do something about this. It is 
time to make a change and transition.
    I think a lot of us agree here that electric vehicles are 
the future, and it is not a matter of if, it is just when. We 
are of the nature that we need to be adopting the right 
policies now, and I think, probably others here disagree about 
when, but longer-term, like this is the solution, it is the 
solution right now and also longer term.
    Finally, I think we need to be watching what China is doing 
for various points that you can come at it from, but certainly 
watch what China is doing. My personal takeaway from you, Chair 
Carper, is that EVs are the hat trick. I am going to use that 
in the future.
    Senator Carper. Thank you for that. Yesterday, Senator 
Young, one of our colleagues in the Senate, and I were invited 
to address the Nation's business leaders at the Business 
Roundtable. Jamie Dimon was the immediate past chair, and the 
current chair of the National Business Roundtable is Mary 
Barra, who was also the CEO for General Motors.
    I have known her for a while, and a couple of years ago, to 
meet one or 2 years ago, I was talking with her, trying to urge 
General Motors to join four or five other auto companies, along 
with California and maybe 20 or so States on greenhouse gas 
emissions, like the timeline in reductions and time, and to see 
if maybe GM wouldn't join the half dozen auto companies that 
already had come to agreement with a bunch of States, including 
California.
    At the time, she said that GM was not ready to do that, but 
she said, I am all in on electric vehicles. She said, I am all 
in, that is where we are going. She said, not only are they fun 
to drive, but they are a lot cheaper to maintain. She added to 
that, she said, there are three things that we need at General 
Motors, and she said, other American auto companies. There are 
three things that we need in order to be able to sell the 
vehicles if we build them. No. 1, 300-mile range on recharging. 
No. 2, the ability to recharge batteries in minutes, not hours.
    She said the third thing that we need is for there to be 
charging stations throughout the Country where people are 
driving, to the extent we can do that. Those are the three 
things we need. She said the first two are on us, GM, 300-mile 
range, the ability to recharge batteries in minutes, not hours, 
and they have met that challenge.
    My wife and I own an electric vehicle now to replace my 
2001 Chrysler Town and Country Minivan, with 600,000 miles. We 
have an electric vehicle that gets past the 300-mile range, and 
we can charge the battery in minutes, not hours. The industry 
has come a long way in that regard.
    The Federal Government, we put a lot of money in the 
infrastructure package to help with charging stations for, 
among other things, school buses, electric buses, and just 
general electric vehicles. We still have some ways to go, we 
still have some ways to go.
    We have a lot of hearings in this committee here. I have 
been on this committee for, gosh, 20 years. This is probably as 
important and timely a hearing as we have had. It has been just 
a superb one.
    I bragged on you a little bit when I introduced you at the 
beginning of the hearing. It is an excellent hearing. We are 
grateful to those who come from Arizona and from Utah, sort of. 
Kathleen, tell us again where you live now.
    Ms. Sgamma. I am in Denver.
    Senator Carper. Denver.
    And my friend Ray Mabus. Ray was Secretary of the Navy. For 
100 years, there has never been a ship, submarine, or aircraft 
carrier named after the State of Delaware. We are the first 
State, and we hadn't had a ship or anything named after 
Delaware for a hundred years.
    About six, 7 years ago, I called Secretary Ray Mabus, and I 
said, Mr. Secretary, it has been a hundred years or more since 
a ship, submarine, or aircraft carrier was named after my 
State. In the meantime, almost every other State and a lot of 
cities have had ships named after them, vessels named. I said, 
do you think we /could do something about it? I will never 
forget what he said. He said, let me think about it, and give 
me a couple of months. I will call you back. And I am thinking, 
sure.
    A couple months later, he called me back. He said, the Navy 
is going to contract to build four or five fast attack 
Virginia-class nuclear submarines. The first one will be the 
U.S.S. Delaware. One week from this coming Saturday, he is 
going to join us in Delaware with the ship's sponsor, the 
submarine's sponsor, the First Lady, Jill Biden, and I think 
she may bring a date, I am not sure. But we will have a couple 
thousand people there to welcome the U.S.S. Delaware and 
celebrate the fastest, most modern fast attack nuclear 
submarines in the world.
    Secretary Mabus, you are a hero for a lot of Americans, and 
we are grateful for all of your service and for being with us 
today. I will see you in maybe 10 days or so.
    With that, I think I have to do some housekeeping here. 
Before we adjourn, Senators will be allowed to submit written 
questions for the record through close of business on 
Wednesday, April the 6th. We will compile those questions, send 
them to our witnesses. We will ask you to reply to us by 
Wednesday April the 20th; that is 2 weeks.
    I am by nature an optimistic person. I come out of this 
hearing more optimistic, not less. What were the words of Henry 
Ford, founder of Ford Motor Company? I will give Ford some 
equal time here after talking about GM. The founder of the Ford 
Motor Company was Henry Ford, and among other things, Henry 
Ford said these words. He said, if you think you can, or you 
think you can't, you are right. Think about that. If you think 
you can, or you think you can't, you are right.
    On this point, on these issues, I think we can, and I think 
your testimoneys today have brought us closer to the point 
where we will, so thank you very, very much.
    With that, this hearing is adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 12:22 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
    [Additional material submitted for the record follows:]
    
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