[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 98 (Monday, July 16, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7671-S7678]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2002--Continued
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, what is the matter now pending before the
Senate?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. H.R. 2311.
Amendment No. 980
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the substitute
amendment be agreed to, the bill, as amended, be considered original
text for the purpose of further amendment, and that no points of order
be waived by this request.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Reid] for Mr. Byrd and Mr.
Stevens, proposes an amendment numbered 980.
(The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under
``Amendments Submitted.'')
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the amendment is
agreed to.
The amendment (No. 980) was agreed to.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, this afternoon we begin consideration for
the Fiscal Year 2002 Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act.
The legislation we take up today was reported unanimously from the full
Committee on Appropriations last Thursday.
Before I begin my description of the contents of this bill, I want to
share one strongly felt opinion with my colleagues. It is my opinion, I
believe--I have a real suspicion that Senator Domenici, the ranking
member of the subcommittee, will agree--that this subcommittee has
always been among the most bipartisan in the Senate.
As I look back over the time that my role was filled by Bennett
Johnston, I know he and Senator Domenici had an outstanding
relationship. They worked very closely together. This bill was always
one of the first to come up. This bill is the second to come up this
appropriations cycle. I have tried--and I have no doubt, based on my
experience with Senator Domenici, that he has tried--to be as
bipartisan as possible on this bill. Despite the unusual circumstances
this year with the shift in power of the Senate, this tradition has
continued unabated.
My friend, the senior Senator from New Mexico, and I have, with the
tireless efforts of our very professional and good staff, produced a
bill that we acknowledge is not perfect. But it addresses the important
issues facing our Nation. There are many important issues we are
dealing with in this legislation.
We received 300 more requests than last year on this bill. It is
certainly fair to say that there have been over 1,000. Most requests
were to enhance new funding for water projects within the Corps of
Engineers, an organization the administration cut by 14 percent in its
budget request this year. We have done in this bill as much as we can
on a bipartisan basis to enhance the funding for these water projects.
Mr. President, you are a new member in the Senate. I think a lot of
people who are new to the Senate and people outside the Senate would
question water projects. Why do we need water projects? Are these
things you throw to a House Member in his district to make him or her
feel good? These water projects are essential to the country. There is
criticism given to the water projects. We have added $400 million to
the budget of the Corps of Engineers, $64 million to the Bureau of
Reclamation.
I wish we could give three times that much to each organization. But
with these additional funds, we have tried to accommodate as many
requests and priorities as possible.
Let me give you a few examples of these water projects and why they
are important. For the examples that I give, I will be very succinct.
There are hundreds and hundreds of projects in this country that are
life-and-death projects.
One is in the State of Nevada: Flood control. There are people who
write all over the country: Reid got pork for Las Vegas; flood control.
People think: It never rains in Las Vegas. It rains 4 inches a year in
Las Vegas--4 inches a year. You can get that much rain in other parts
of the country in an hour, certainly in a day. But we get 4 inches a
year in Las Vegas. Yet when it rains, it can be devastating because we
have what we call cloudbursts.
Now we have 1.5 million, 1.6 million people in that valley. When that
rain comes, it is very difficult. I can remember as a lieutenant
governor, we were told by the Park Service that we were going to have
to close a little facility on the Colorado River, Nelson's Landing. It
has been there well over 100 years. We were going to have to close
[[Page S7672]]
it. The Governor assigned me to look at that and the complaints we were
getting. We prevailed on the Park Service not to close it. They said we
were going to have a 100-year flood. I went and talked to people and
they said they had never known that much rain coming down that canyon:
The Federal Government, they don't know what they are talking about.
Mr. President, it rained. This isn't something I am proud of, but it
is something that is a fact. It rained. It rained in a very small area.
It rained very hard. But all of that water dumped down this canyon, and
people looked up and they saw a wall of water 100 feet high coming at
them. It washed cars away. It killed seven people. We never found the
cars and mobile homes that washed away.
In southern Nevada, again Nelson's Landing--but in Las Vegas we have
had floods that have been just as devastating. We have not lost at one
time seven lives but we have lost lives.
Caesar's Palace, this great resort--I can remember rains that washed
away everything in the parking lot. It was just washed away as if they
were toothpicks.
The Tropicana-Flamingo Wash in Nevada is the fastest growing
community in the Nation. We have been able to save lives and huge
amounts of property by virtue of the fact we have flood control
projects going on there as we speak. It has cost a lot of money, but we
have saved a lot of lives; and that is for what the Federal Government
has an obligation, to assist local governments. There has been local
money put in it, too.
The Everglades: I have seen the Everglades. I really do not
understand them because I understand the desert. I understand aridity.
I understand when it does not rain much. I understand out of my little
home in Searchlight I have creosote bushes that are not very tall that
are 100 years old. They do not grow very much. So I do not really
understand the Everglades. I am fascinated by them. But it is water
intensive. It is as water intensive as the desert is not water
intensive.
We have worked hard with the Senators from Florida on a project-by-
project basis to take care of that. It is now a huge priority not only
of the Congress, as it has been in the past, but of the administration.
I think part of that could be that Jeb Bush is Governor. It does not
matter. It is an important project that the Federal Government should
be involved in--and we are. There is a lot of money in this bill for
the Everglades.
Not far from where we stand is the Chesapeake Bay. Books have been
written about the Chesapeake Bay. It is a wonder of nature. But because
of the growth that is occurring in this area, the Chesapeake Bay has
been threatened. The health of that great body of water has been
threatened. It affects Maryland and Virginia very much. The bay is
threatened as a natural resource.
Senators Mikulski, Sarbanes, Warner, and Allen have aggressively
sought money to restore that waterway to what it used to be so oysters
can be harvested there and not make people sick. The oyster industry in
Maryland and Virginia is huge, but it has not been as huge recently
because of the condition of that bay. The restoration of the beds at
relatively low cost, we believe, will ultimately generate hundreds of
millions of dollars in economic benefit and jobs. This is a water
project.
The Port of Los Angeles: We move from the Chesapeake Bay 3,000 miles
to the Port of Los Angeles. The administration had made a decision to
stretch this out. The problem we have found with these promises is that
even though it sounds OK, you stretch it out and it winds up costing
much more money. You are better off doing less projects and doing them
well. Congress has funded this project very aggressively and has saved
the Federal Government 25 percent of the total project cost and has
accelerated the economic benefits to California.
So these are just four examples of water projects. But there are many
more. I am happy we have worked together with our members, our
Senators, and, of course, many requests from people in the House, to do
what we could with these projects.
Even with the additional funding the committee has added, we are
still hundreds of millions of dollars shy of current year levels. We
are also shy of the House mark. The other body was able to artificially
raise their numbers for the Foreign Bureau by moving defense dollars in
these nondefense accounts. We cannot do that. Under Senate rules, we
cannot do that. In my opinion, not only the budget resolution but
common sense does not allow us and should not allow us to move these
funds back and forth.
But I will say to everyone who is listening, in the past, the water
numbers have always gotten better for everyone as we have moved along
the process; that is, we hope we can do a better job when we get to
conference. There is no guarantee of that, but we will work on that.
Our bill provides about $25 billion in budget authority and
approximately $24.7 billion in outlays. When you work with Senator
Domenici, you always have to make sure the outlays are smaller than the
budget authority. This bill exceeds the President's total request by
$2.6 billion.
Let's talk about a few of the areas. The Army Corps of Engineers: The
Senate bill provides $4.3 billion, which is $405 million above the
President's request but $236 million below the current year level. Due
to the funding constraints, this bill contains no new construction
starts and no new environmental infrastructure projects.
The intent in drafting the bill was to continue to focus on ongoing
construction and operations and maintenance projects at appropriate
levels. The committee is eager to avoid stretching out schedules and
costs on projects that are already underway. Any new construction
starts will have to be considered in conference. We will do what we can
at that time.
A lot of people are very concerned about things they want to do. I
have a lot of familiarity with the Bureau of Reclamation because they
have had such a big presence in the State of Nevada. The very first
project in the history of the Bureau of Reclamation was called the New
Lands Project in 1902. It took place in Nevada. It is still there. The
Senate's bill provides $884 million, which is $64 million above the
President's request and $67 million above the current year level.
This funding for the Bureau is higher than it has been for many
years. It is higher because of CALFED. This is a big project in
California. It is a reclamation project. The State of California has
spent billions of dollars on it already. The House put nothing in the
bill for that. Senator Domenici and I put $40 million in this bill for
the CALFED and CALFED-related projects. The subcommittee has funded
CALFED-related projects using existing authorizations under other
accounts. Senators Feinstein and Boxer have both been very tireless
advocates for the Bay-Delta Program. Senator Domenici and I are both
delighted to provide substantial funding.
The Department of Energy: We in Nevada have great familiarity with
the Department of Energy. Nevada has been the place for 50 years where
almost 1,000 nuclear devices have been set off in the desert--most of
them underground but not all of them. I know about the Department of
Energy. This bill contains over $20 billion for the Department of
Energy. This is $2.1 billion over the level of the President's request
and $1.9 billion over last year's level. Most of this additional
funding is being used to provide adequate funding for the National
Nuclear Security Administration, to enhance funding for the
Environmental Management Program, and to add funding for the renewable
energy program.
Senator Domenici and I have received a letter signed by nearly two-
thirds of our colleagues calling for more money for renewable energy
programs. Our bill takes care of that. Our bill provides $435 million,
or $160 million above the President's request and $60 million above the
current year level. In a year when our Nation has struggled with energy
production and distribution issues, I am pleased to be able to enhance
funding levels for these important research and development issues.
Consistent with the budget resolution, this bill provides $6.1
billion to the National Nuclear Security Administration for stockpile
stewardship activities. This funding is $705 million over the
President's request and $1.05 billion over the current year level. I am
only going to speak a little while
[[Page S7673]]
about the National Nuclear Security Administration, known as NNSA. I
defer to Senator Domenici on this subject. Senator Domenici was the
primary congressional architect of the creation of the National Nuclear
Security Administration. He worked tirelessly to get it authorized and
has been dogged in his pursuit of funding to make sure that this
important organization gets the resources it needs to succeed. To his
credit, he convinced his colleagues on the Budget Committee that the
safeguarding and rehabilitation of the Nation's nuclear weapons was a
critical issue that has been underadressed and underfunded in recent
years. Senators Byrd and Stevens followed up with appropriation
resources designed to support the levels in the budget resolution.
This morning I spoke to the interns for Senators Lincoln and
Hutchinson of Arkansas. I don't know how many interns there were--maybe
50--a lot of young men and women. One of the young people asked me:
What do you think is the most important problem facing the world? I
thought for a minute. I said: Nuclear weapons. I really do believe that
with the deteriorating condition of the former Soviet Union, Russia's
nuclear stockpile, and the responsibilities we have, that is a very
important issue. I can't think of anything more important for my
grandchildren than to make sure they live in a safe world.
One of these weapons that we control and certainly one that the
Soviet Union controls could accidentally go off. It would be
devastating. It would make Chernobyl look like nothing. Chernobyl was
just a nuclear reactor gone bad. We are talking about a nuclear weapon
gone bad. I believe that is the No. 1 problem facing the world. We have
a number of different ways of addressing it. We have to spend more
money on terrorism. There are efforts being made for a nuclear shield
for this country. But what we are talking about in this bill is doing
what we can to make our nuclear stockpile safe and reliable. Our bill
spends some money, maybe not enough, to work on the Russians to see if
we can help them.
I have to admit, I was a skeptic when Senator Domenici and others
approached me about the creation of this autonomous organization
several years ago. I thought it was a partisan ploy to maybe embarrass
the administration. But as it turned out, it is working very well. I
have come to believe Senator Domenici was right.
One of the people who has done a good job of convincing me of that is
the person running that agency. We as a country, as a world, are so
fortunate that a retired general would take charge of this operation.
He believes in it. He is a very competent, dedicated, patriotic
American. With him heading this office, we should all go to sleep at
night resting well that everything possible is being done to make sure
we do have a safe and reliable nuclear stockpile. I am going to do
everything I can to give him the resources he needs to do his job. He
has a job that is very difficult.
I am also, of course, holding him accountable for getting the job
done. I have been a long-time critic of cost overruns and management
incompetence within the weapons complex. I know General Gordon will
take these enhanced resources and use them to get some fresh blood and
fresh thinking going on within the Department of Energy.
I am not going to go into more detail. I know Senator Domenici will
speak about this, since this is his so-called baby. It has grown up and
is about to become a teenager. It is something to which the Senator can
speak with more authority than I.
Finally, I am very pleased to report that the committee has made
great strides in restoring and enhancing the devastating cuts made in
the Environmental Management Program at DOE. This Senate bill provides
$7.23 billion, $900 million above the President's request and $450
million above the current level. The biggest beneficiaries of these
additional clean-up dollars are the Hanford, Washington site, hundreds
of millions of dollars; Savannah River site, almost $200 million, that
is in South Carolina; Idaho, over $150 million; Ohio and Kentucky, tens
of millions of dollars.
As with water programs, I realize there are never enough resources we
can spend to clean up the legacy of the cold war and other activities,
but we have done our best.
These are some of the highlights, from my perspective, of this bill.
It is a bill I have learned to like. It is a bill I have grown to
understand. I have grown to acknowledge the importance it has to our
country. I hope my colleagues will realize how hard we have worked on
this legislation.
Senator Domenici and I would like to have a cutoff time for the
filing of amendments. We tried tomorrow at 11 and 12, and we have
received objections to that. We are here. If somebody wants to offer
amendments, they can certainly do that. They have to have offsets or
figure out some way to fund them because we are down to the nubs. We
have no more money. If people don't like the way we have worked the
bill, it is their privilege to come forward with amendments.
I do think it would be in everyone's interest to have a finite list
of amendments filed at an appropriate time. If anyone has any
suggestions when that should be, Senator Domenici and I are open for
discussion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, let me first acknowledge the wonderful
cooperation that exists between the chairman and this Senator as
ranking member. I believe under the circumstances and considering the
variety of things this subcommittee has to fund, we have done a pretty
good job. I couldn't ask for more understanding than I have received
from the distinguished Senator, the chairman of this subcommittee.
I believe our staff has worked together, and I hope I have been
equally considerate and concerned about issues of importance to the
good Senator from Nevada.
As a result of this effort, we are together in trying to get this
bill passed and get it off to conference and getting these issues
resolved as soon as possible.
Let me say to my good friend, he was talking about a flood that
occurred in the State of Nevada in one of those dry rivers where for
most of the year no water runs. But then you have a little cloudburst
up in the mountains and these dry rivers turn into flooded, huge water
resources plowing down the hills right into housing. In our State we
call these dry rivers a Spanish name, ``arroyos.''
In my home city of Albuquerque, I was pleased to serve 4 years as the
city councilman, sort of chairman of the commission, which made me the
closest thing to a mayor as you could have. I remember one Sunday
afternoon in the year 1968. I was very young. I had just been on this
council as chairman for awhile. It started raining Sunday afternoon. I
called up one of my good friends on the city council who knew more
about the details of the streets and everything else than anybody in
the city.
I called him up and said, ``Harry, this rain is coming down in the
wrong places; something is going to happen.'' He said, ``Where are
you?'' He picked me up and we rode around. Rain kept coming down harder
and harder, and these dry rivers started to show a little trickle. Four
hours later, we were riding the streets of Albuquerque and big manhole
covers over the tunnels that carried water underground to avoid floods
were standing or dancing on the water. The water raised those man holes
up 4 or 5 feet and stood them up while the place got flooded. We saw
more and more of them. I told my friend, ``This is a real problem.'' He
said, ``No, things will be all right.'' Finally, 2 hours later, we got
a call from the police chief. He said that in one whole piece of our
city, maybe as many as 10,000 homes were under water. They had water in
the kitchens, close to the tops of the stoves. It was a gigantic flow
of water that came down these dry arroyos.
I remember coming here with a group of Albuquerqueans. I was city
councilman then. We appeared before the Public Works Committee, which
had to authorize the project after which it went on to get
appropriated. We came up to ask if the Federal Government would expand
a program that was about to run out so we could build these rivers so
they would be safe. Now if one flies over Albuquerque, as you approach
the airport you see two giant cement waterways that are around the
edges of
[[Page S7674]]
the town--huge. They catch the water in these dry rivers up by the
mountain and run them down these no longer dry rivers, but they are
cement-lined ditches, big ones. Water comes down, and now you can be
riding around and your commissioner friend Harry can say, ``It is
raining hard, Mr. Chairman,'' and you can say, ``It might hurt
something else, but it won't flood anymore.''
That is the kind of thing we pay for in this bill for hundreds of
places across America. We hope we get them before they flood, but
sometimes we don't. Sometimes we pay for them after they flood. But to
make sure we are not building white elephants, we require a very
substantial match. The community has to come up with money. That is the
way we finally decide it must be important, because they are not just
asking us to have a construction project, they are going to pay for
part of it.
My good friend, the chairman, outlined water issues. Clearly, there
is no end to the requests in our country for this. But we have the
rule: We don't fund them unless they have been authorized. The
committee has to work on them and have hearings. That bothers a lot of
our Senators because there is such a backlog of existing authorized
programs that we don't catch up very often. We have many billions
backlogged that we can't pay for. But we will keep working on it.
Overall, the proposed fiscal year 2002 energy and water bill is a
very fair and balanced bill that makes important investments in our
national security, our energy security, our economic prosperity, and in
the health of our environment. This bill is an important step in
implementing the President's National Energy Policy.
The Senate bill in total provides $25 billion in budget authority and
approximately $24.7 billion in outlays. The bill exceeds the
President's request by $2.6 billion, and exceeds the House bill by $1.4
billion. Without going into detail about all of the many great things
in this bill, I would like to focus my remarks on two broad areas: (1)
What this bill does for our energy security, and (2) What this bill
does for our national security.
For our nation's energy security, this bill represents a major step
in fulfilling the President's commitment to a balanced and diversified
energy policy--particularly in the area of expanding the supply of
clean energy from renewable sources and nuclear power.
But before If focus specifically on what this bill does in those two
areas, I want to take this opportunity to dispel two persistent myths
that have been unfairly associated with the President's National Energy
Policy. First, that the policy focuses only on supply and ignores
conservation and efficiency. And second, that the policy fails to
address the possible threat of global warming.
The policy is so clear on the first point that those who argue simply
haven't read it. There are more policy recommendations impacting
conservation and efficiency than supply. Over $6 billion in proposed
tax reductions are targeted at conservation and efficiency.
Furthermore, the whole policy is based on substantial gains from
improvements in conservation and efficiency. If we maintained the
current ratio between energy demand and the gross domestic product
(GDP), we would need 77 percent more energy in 2020 than we are
producing today--77 percent more. The National Energy Policy recommends
conservation and efficiency measures that would reduce the required
increase by over half--resulting in us only needing to produce 29
percent more energy by 2020. That is a substantial but necessary
commitment to conversation and efficiency.
Let me turn to that second myth, that the policy doesn't address the
possible threat of global warming. Once again, those who have read the
policy shouldn't make that statement. The policy has strong support for
clean energy sources.
Renewable sources are encouraged in many ways, including tax credits
for wind, biomass, solar, and the purchase of clean fuel vehicles. The
policy supports a major research program in clean-coal technologies,
advocates increased funding for renewable energy R&D and recognizes
nuclear energy for its very positive environmental benefits.
It is in these last two areas, renewable energy and nuclear energy,
that the energy and water bill takes a major step in implementing the
President's national energy policy.
The renewable energy programs are funded in this bill at $435
million. That's $60 million and 16 percent above the current year
level. There's no question that renewable sources can and should play a
larger role in our energy supply, and this budget will accelerate
progress towards that vision.
Within that renewable budget, several programs are slated for major
increases. Just to give a few examples:
Research on hydrogen-based technologies is up almost 30 percent over
last year. That research may lead to decreased use of petroleum
products in transportation, certainly a critical goal.
Research on high temperature superconductivity is boosted by almost
20 percent. That's a technology that may enable dramatic reduction of
losses we now experience in electric transmission lines and motors.
Geothermal research is 20 percent above last year and wind systems
are up more than 10 percent.
Nuclear energy received significant increases as well in this bill. I
strongly agree with the President's National Energy Policy in its
recommendation supporting the expansion of nuclear energy in the United
States. Nuclear plants offer emission-free power sources, help maintain
diversity of fuel supply, enhance energy security, meet growing
electricity demand, and protect consumers against volatility in the
electricity and natural gas markets.
This bill pushes nuclear power forward with a number of important
initiatives:
The bill includes $19 million for university research reactor
support--an increase of $7 million over current year--to make sure our
country has the educational resources necessary for an economy that
continues to rely substantially on nuclear power.
The bill includes $9 million--an increase of $4 million over current
year--to expand a program to improve the reliability and productivity
of our 103 existing nuclear power plants.
The bill continues the highly successful Nuclear Energy Research
Initiative (NERI) at $38 million--$3 million more than current year.
The bill provides $14 million--an increase of $7 million--to continue
work begun last year on advanced reactor development, including
research on generation IV reactors--reactors that will be passively
safe, produce less waste, and reduce any proliferation concerns.
The bill provides $10 million for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
to prepare to license new nuclear power plants.
The bill continues an R&D program we started two years ago on ways to
reduce the quantity and toxicity of spent nuclear fuel--called
``transmutation''. This technology, which was recently highlighted in
the President's National Energy Policy, will be continued at $70
million in 2002.
Let me emphasize that I used the phrase ``spent fuel'' rather than
``waste'' to refer to the materials coming out of our reactors. Right
now our national policy calls for disposing of those materials as waste
in a future repository. But we need to remember that these materials
still contain 95 percent of their initial energy content.
I've been concerned for years that it is highly debatable for us to
decide that future generations will have no need for this rich energy
source. With improved management strategies, possibly involving
reprocessing and transmutation, we can recycle that material for
possible later use, recover far more of the energy, and dramatically
reduce the toxicity and volume of the materials that are finally
declared to be waste.
As a final thought on energy security, Mr. President, I want to share
with my Senate colleagues a vision, which is encompassed in this bill
and which I've shared with President Bush.
We need to reach beyond the debate over Kyoto with a blueprint that
provides the tools to combat global warming.
I'm convinced that we can have growth and prosperity in America
without global warming.
And I'm equally convinced that we can help provide those same
benefits for the world.
[[Page S7675]]
I propose that we provide worldwide leadership to eliminate the
threat of global warming by a commitment to prosperity and growth
through clean energy.
And I further propose that we accomplish this goal through
partnerships with our friends and allies, especially those in
developing countries.
I've specifically urged the President to lead this new initiative, to
accelerate our own research and build international partnerships for
joint development of all the clean sources of energy--renewables, clean
fossil fuels, nuclear energy, and hydrogen-based fuels. Then as we
transition to improved technologies in the future, our partner nations
will also be building up their energy infrastructure with the latest
and cleanest technologies.
Last year's energy and water development bill called for improvements
in the federal government's role in international development,
demonstration, and deployment of advanced clean energy technologies.
With this new bill and the President's policy, our nation is
developing a suite of energy supplies that will provide us with clean,
reliable, economic energy far into the future. But I continue to
believe that we should be looking beyond our own borders.
I submit that we should be seizing every opportunity to help the
developing nations around the world achieve much higher standards of
living. They simply can't do that without reliable electricity
supplies.
Each nation will make their own choices for fuel sources, exploiting
their own strengths. We have abundant natural gas--and it will make a
huge contribution to a cleaner future for our country. But every nation
needs diverse energy supplies, not a singular reliance on one source.
Other nations may be well positioned to exploit their solar or wind
resources--through this program these nations can make the choices best
for their needs.
The leadership shown by Senator Byrd on clean coal technologies
matches this vision very well. Some other nation's have immense coal
resources, through this vision they can benefit by Senator Byrd's
efforts to advance clean coal technologies.
We can leave the poorest countries to their own resources to develop
whatever energy they can, or we can offer substantial help to partner
with these nations to help them develop sources that are not only
reliable and reasonably priced, but also clean.
It's strongly in our self interest to do this. After all, we all
share the same air. And in addition, countries with strong economies
are our best choice for trading partners
Mr. President, let me state again how proud I am to have worked on
this bill with Senator Reid. With this bill, we'll be making real
progress on the technologies to fuel our, and perhaps the world's
economies of the future.
For our nation's national security, this bill makes a major
investment in solving serious problems in the nuclear weapons complex.
With the leadership and resources included in this bill, many of those
problems are going to get fixed.
The bill includes $6.05 billion for the nuclear weapons (stockpile
stewardship) activities of the NNSA, that is $705 million over the
President's request, $925 million over the House level, and $1.05
billion over the current year level.
I want to again commend Senator Reid, and our full committee
chairman, first Senator Stevens and Now Senator Byrd, for recognizing
the serious problems in the nuclear weapons complex and providing the
resources to fix those problems.
This bill makes three major improvements on the President's budget
request for nuclear weapons.
First, infrastructure. We know from the subcommittee's hearing on
infrastructure earlier this year, that our nuclear weapons facilities
have degraded to the point that it will take billions of dollars to
modernize for the future.
The average age of the facilities where we do nuclear weapons work is
over 40 years.
We will need to spend an additional $300-$500 million a year for the
next 17 years over currently planned levels to refurbish the weapons
complex to perform its basic mission. These expenditures will be
required even if the nuclear stockpile is dramatically smaller.
If we do not take action on these infrastructure problems
immediately, we will not be able to meet the Department of Defense
schedules for refurbishing three main weapons systems representing over
50 percent of our stockpile. We will not have the scientific facilities
required to certify weapons. Our technicians and scientists will
continue to work in unsafe facilities-increasing health risks and the
number of safety related shutdowns.
Although the work must begin immediately, the budget request included
no funds to begin such an initiative. Therefore, the bill before the
Senate includes $300 million to begin a major facilities improvement
program in fiscal year 2002 at facilities in South Carolina, Tennessee,
Missouri, Texas, New Mexico, Nevada, and California.
The second major improvement on the administration's budget request
is that the bill provides additional funding to rebuild current
weapons.
The average age of weapons in the stockpile is now approaching 18
years--most were designed for a life of no more than 20 years. Many
weapons components degrade substantially over time and have to be
replaced. The Joint Department of Defense/NNSA Nuclear Weapons Council
has recognized the fact that most of our weapons will have to be
rebuilt, but funds were not requested to do so.
Therefore, the bill includes an additional $295 million in fiscal
year 2002 to get the NNSA on track to rebuild weapons on the schedule
required by the Department of Defense.
The third major improvement on the President's request is that this
bill fully funds pit production on the required schedule.
We must soon have the capability to produce plutonium pits for
weapons, a capability we lost when Rocky Flats was closed down in 1989.
Plutonium pits are the ``triggers'' for nuclear weapons, that
occasionally must be replaced. Today, we are the only nuclear power
without the ability to produce them. The budget request puts off
indefinitely our ability to deliver a certified pit to the military,
but this bill adds $110 million to get the program back on track.
Finally, there are a series of programs at NNSA that may be just as
important to eliminating or controlling the global nuclear danger--
these programs are to reduce the threat of nuclear weapon proliferation
around the world.
The administration proposed deep cuts in this area for fiscal year
2002, even though a blue-ribbon review led by Senator Howard Baker and
Lloyd Cutler recently concluded . . .
The most urgent unmet national security threat to the
United States today is the danger that weapons of mass
destruction or weapon-usable material in Russia could be
stolen and sold to terrorists or hostile nation states and
used against American troops abroad or citizens at home.
The report also concluded that . . .
Current nonproliferation programs of the DOE . . . have
achieved impressive results thus far, but their limited
mandate and funding fall short of what is required to address
adequately the threat.
I am pleased that this bill adds over $100 million to the important
nonproliferation work the NNSA carries out in Russia and other
countries of the former Soviet Union. These programs to control the
material and expertise necessary to make weapons of mass destruction
address problems identified as ``the most urgent unmet national
security threat to the United States today.''
Once again, Senator Reid, I want to commend you for a balanced bill.
I do not agree with every aspect of the bill, but I cannot urgue with
the fair manner in which you have put it together.
I strongly support the bill, and urge all Members of the Senate to do
likewise.
Let me proceed as quickly as I can to summarize this bill. First, I
am very pleased to join with Chairman Reid in considering this fiscal
year 2002 Energy and Water bill. I note that in the chair is a new
Senator. I would think that he might wonder what in the world is an
appropriation bill called Energy and Water. Well, my good friend, the
new Senator from New Jersey, will never sit down and rationally decide
what is in this bill. What is in it has been decided between the House
and Senate as one of the 13 subcommittees of appropriation, and there
is no rationale to
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it. In it we fund water development projects, flood protection
projects, the harbors and rivers that need the Federal Government to
help. But on the other end, believe it or not, the entire nuclear
weapons development, preservation, and research for nuclear weapons is
also funded in this bill. It doesn't come under the rubric of energy.
Why is it here? It is here because that kind of activity was brought to
the Energy Department when the Energy Department was created. This
subcommittee pays for that.
So, overall, this is a very balanced bill. It covers what I have
alluded to. I have great detail with me about what has concerned us and
why we have had to fund the part of this that is for nuclear weaponry
at a higher level than the President. I am very hopeful that the staff
at the White House and the staff at OMB, who have looked at this since
putting their budget out, will understand that some of this new money
we had to put into the part of this bill that concerns itself with a
safe and reliable nuclear stockpile. And remember, Mr. President, every
time you say that, you can put a parenthesis in and you can say,
without underground testing, because we have voted not to test
underground. If you test, it makes it much easier to determine safety,
to determine reliability. But we have determined we are not going to do
that, and still we are going to spend money and put the finest
resources in America to work on the science and physics and
computerization part of maintaining this very, very serious and almost
unbelievable thing called the American nuclear weapons stockpile.
My good friend, Senator Reid, has been a marvelous student of this.
We have all had to learn together. I have more of a genuine parochial
reason, because two of the three laboratories frequently called the
nuclear laboratories--not exactly the right name--are in my State.
There is Los Alamos. Everybody knows that is where we did our first
nuclear weaponry work--atomic weapon work. It was a mountain, but there
is a city there now. In Albuquerque is Sandia Labs, an engineering
laboratory, which is part of this. The third one is in the State of
California. The three of them do much in addition to the work on
nuclear. There are great researchers who are on the cutting edge of
much of the science of the future in terms of energy needs and the
like. So that is in this bill.
And then, obviously, since it is an energy bill, it has an awful lot
in it about the energy research and development that is occurring in
the Department of Energy. First, let me quickly say that part of this
is the implementation of energy policy.
While we are still waiting around to debate and pass judgment on
whether we are going to have some tax incentives that the President
asked for in terms of developing new and different kinds of energy
called ``renewables,'' or whether or not we are going to decide to open
up more of the public domain to the development of gas and oil; in this
bill, we get along with getting some of these things paid for and done,
which everybody knows we should be doing. But it is most interesting--
and this is an opportunity to speak for a moment about the President's
energy policy in one regard. There is a lot said about: what about
conservation, and what about saving our energy? I am reminded that in
preparation for this activity, in marking up this bill, I chose to read
the President's policy in its entirety. I want to cite one piece,
because there is a lot said about there not being enough conservation
in this policy, not enough things that push us to conserve and save.
Well, I have come to the following conclusion, and if I am wrong,
anybody that would like to read the policy and discuss it, I would be
glad to do so.
As this energy policy tells us what we need in the future, up to the
year 2020, it says that we could have to produce 77 percent more to
meet our needs over this next 20 years--just for reasonable needs. But
would you believe that a huge portion of that possible need is
projected to come from conservation and saving energy, such that, of
the 77 percent, only 29 percent is from new production? So if you do
the arithmetic and subtract them, it is pretty obvious that there is a
very large amount that is expected by way of either legislation or
conduct in our country to save and conserve energy, along with
increasing production of various types of energy.
Let me talk about one. I am very pleased that both Senator Reid and I
and our staffs worked very hard on what's called renewable energy
programs. Because of the Senator's dedication and us working together
on this, we are funding the renewable energy programs at $435 million
in this bill. That is 16 percent higher than this year. There is no
question that renewable resources can and should play a larger role in
our energy supply, and we push that or accelerate that in this bill.
Within this renewable budget, several programs are slated for major
increases, and I am going to tick some of them off.
Hydrogen-based technology is up 30 percent over last year. Some
people think this whole area of hydrogen-originated energy sources is
one of our real solutions to clean and healthy production of energy
without having any adverse impact on global warming. The research may
lead to a decrease in the use of petroleum products in transportation.
We also have superconductivity and geothermal, both have 20-percent
increases. All of these can have an incremental positive impact on
helping us meet our energy needs without having a major impact on
global warming in the future.
Incidentally, the President has suggested we should move ahead with
nuclear and not abandon it. Nuclear energy has received a significant
increase in this bill. I strongly agree with the President's national
energy policy and his recommendations supporting the expansion of
nuclear energy in the United States.
I will state once--and if I have a chance I will do it a number of
times--nuclear power in its current form and future generations, new
generations, of nuclear powerplants do not contribute to global
warming. In other words, the future is protected from the global
warming pollution that comes from many of our traditional energy
sources so that the evolution, development, and research in the areas
of nuclear power can move us ahead in such a way as to provide energy
for growth, development, and prosperity for America and for our
industrial friends in the world and, yes, indeed, for those countries
which do not yet have much of an economic base.
We can produce clean energy for the future. With renewables, nuclear,
and other forms of energy joining together, we can say to the world:
You can grow and prosper. The poor countries will have an equal
opportunity to do that, and we will not have to reduce growth, we will
not have to put on caps, we will just have to use our ingenuity and
science better.
There are a number of things we did to let America take a good, solid
look at what the next generation of nuclear powerplants or even the
next one after that might look like and how it will help.
I want to share with my friend, Senator Reid, and those who are
paying attention to what we are doing today, a portion of my comments
today which I choose to call ``Reaching Beyond Kyoto.'' I, frankly,
believe the President of the United States has a rare opportunity to
lead the world beyond Kyoto.
I say to my fellow Senators, I have talked to the President about
this very issue. I have suggested it is a rare opportunity for him to
lead the world in reaching beyond Kyoto, and I will talk about that for
a minute.
This is a vision, and part of it is in this bill because this is what
we do in this bill. It says that we need to reach beyond the debate
over Kyoto with a blueprint that provides tools to combat global
warming. Further, we should ask the world to join as our partners and
move ahead,
I am convinced we can have growth and prosperity in America without
global warming. I am equally convinced we can help provide these same
benefits for the world. I propose we provide worldwide leadership to
eliminate the threat of global warming by a commitment to prosperity
and growth through clean energy, and I further propose we accomplish
this goal through partnerships with our friends and allies, especially
those in developing countries.
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I have specifically urged the President to lead this new initiative
to accelerate our research and build international partnerships for
joint development of all clean sources of energy--renewables, clean
fossil fuels which our distinguished chairman of the Appropriations
Committee, Senator Byrd, alludes to frequently as it relates to coal--
nuclear energy, and hydrogen-based fuels.
As we transition to improved technologies in the future, our partner
nations will also be building up their energy infrastructure with the
latest and cleanest technologies. And, yes, there is no question, then,
that we can send a message that the poor countries in the world can
grow and prosper. As a matter of fact, they, too, can participate in
this abundance of growth and prosperity for their people without
adversely affecting global warming.
Last year's energy and water development bill called for improvements
in the Federal Government's role in international development,
demonstration, and advanced clean energy technologies.
With this new bill which is before the Senate, and the President's
policy, our Nation is developing a suite of energy supplies that will
provide us with clean, reliable, economic energy for the future.
I continue to believe we should be looking beyond our own borders. I
submit that we should be seizing every opportunity to help the
developing nations around the world achieve much higher standards of
living. They simply cannot do that without reliable electrical
supplies. I believe we can help them with this global approach of
partnerships around the world to develop this technology and produce
the next generation of nuclear powerplants. But we should not start on
that path unless we set the goals for achievement of what they will
look like, what they will do, and what they will not do.
It is the same with clean coal technology: Set the goals and then
let's achieve them in this world so we can all grow and prosper. We all
know we have an abundance of energy supplies in our country. We have
natural gas. And it will make a huge contribution for our country. But
every nation needs diverse energy supplies, not a singular reliance on
a single source.
Leadership has been shown by Senator Byrd with clean coal
technologies that match this vision very well. Some other nations have
immense coal resources. Through this vision, they can benefit by
Senator Byrd's efforts to advance clean coal technologies. Through this
bill, we can fund renewables and ask our President to join worldwide
with efforts to push renewables even more and to greater ends. And it
is the same with all of those energies that have no effect, no impact
on global warming.
I can say, it may very well be, within a very short period of time, a
nuclear powerplant will be developed. It will be a small little plant
instead of a thousand megawatts. It might be 50 or 100 megawatts. It
will be a module. It will be self-contained. It will have no chance of
having a meltdown. Just by the physical facts about its evolution and
development it cannot, it will not. We might not have to touch it for
25 or 30 years.
Those are things we can work on as a criteria for development and
growth and then set our great scientists in the private and public
sector, with others in the world, to achieve this goal. What a great
opportunity in the midst of a world that is frightened about whether we
can grow, whether poor people can get rich, where the poor countries
have to remain undeveloped because they cannot contribute to global
warming. We will say we can all grow and prosper. America hasn't
stopped growing and prospering, but we can do it without affecting
global warming if we just say let's take a lead, let's do this, let's
ask our greatest companies, our best laboratories, our greatest
scientists, led by America, let's put some money in each year in a
consortium-type arrangement to get this done.
If I sound like I am excited about something, obviously for some of
you I have not even yet reached anything like an excited pitch, but in
any event, I am because I believe it is a rare opportunity to take the
genius of science--and I might say, I have a bias and prejudice but I
think it will work. I think we have nuclear power for a reason. I don't
think we have developed nuclear power to throw it away. I believe we
can develop another generation of nuclear power plants that can help
this entire world prosper and put global warming behind us.
Then we can ask, what is next? What have to be next are growth and
opportunities, and not just for us. We say to the world, let's be free.
But, we don't want people to think we are for them being free and poor.
We are for them being free and affluent, to grow and have what we have.
It cannot be done without better sources of clean energy.
I believe this bill has things in it which, if put together by the
President in a partnership arrangement, I think we could see real
daylight and perhaps might be able to set some goals.
My last comments will be very brief and have to do with national
security. As I said when I started, what a peculiar bill, energy and
water. Who would guess that sandwiched between those two words, energy
and water, are the U.S. national security interests in nuclear weapons.
We have a national policy, voted on this Senate floor on an amendment
by the distinguished Senator Hatfield from Oregon. We don't test our
nuclear weapons underground nor do we test them at all. We don't do
that anymore. That used to be the easy way. I say that because today it
looks easy. That is the way we used to determine reliability and
safety. We don't do that anymore. We don't test underground. We have
something to take its place. We have a whole body of science and
computerization that we put together. It is now in the Department of
Energy, and it has reached major nuclear laboratories. We fund a
program called science-based stockpile stewardship. Stockpile is the
nuclear weapons stockpile. We fund a part of the Department of Energy
that is called the NNSA. My good friend, Senator Reid, alluded to it
when he spoke of creating this new institution within the Department.
The current leader is four-star General Gordon. He's doing a great job
of pulling together and making sure there is one spokesman worried
about the nuclear weapons aspects of the Department of Energy,
reporting only to the Secretary. In a very real way he's making sure we
do a better job with what we spend on this stockpile. Nonetheless, we
have to spend money on it. The biggest difference between our budget
and the President's budget is what to do with replenishing some of the
physical facilities that are now old and broken down that are part of
this NNSA.
This bill says, let's get started in multiyear repair and
replenishing of some of the facilities that are nearly 50 years old in
which we ask the world's greatest scientists to work to help keep this
program and do this very difficult job. It will take many years to
replenish these physical facilities, these laboratories.
In addition, there are specific items such as major improvements in
the funding of pit production. You simply must soon have the capability
to produce plutonium pits for weapons, a capability we lost when Rocky
Flats was closed in 1989. We had to put extra money in this bill, in
order to keep that program on the calendar on which it is expected to
be. We have put these funds in because we know they are needed. Add it
all up and we have a very well rounded bill covering mundane things as
well as the complex and difficult.
In closing, let me say, that as part of this Department of Energy, we
have developed some great research laboratories and not just those
created and involved in nuclear work. There are many others that work
on various aspects of research in America, most in the fields of
energy, but not all, where some of the very best scientists in the
world and some of the very best basic science research activities take
place.
In summary, we think we have a bill that takes care of, as well as
possible, water resource needs of our country. It takes care of the
basic energy needs we can promote through the Energy Department in
moving ahead with another generation of nuclear reactors. And it
encourages more progress on renewables. Through this bill and another
dealing with cleaning up our coal so we can use it cleanly, we can have
a prosperous future without having a negative impact on global warming
and the future of our country and the
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world's people. We think we have done that fairly well.
We have spent more than the President asked. We hope we will be able
to explain to the White House and OMB why and how that was done. We
will have time after the bill is debated to do that. In the meantime,
as the amendments come forward, perhaps the White House will have some
suggestions. I hope they don't ask us to change our vision. I think the
vision in this bill is to move ahead with new sources of energy beyond
Kyoto so we can say we are going to do it in a way that everyone will
grow and prosper, so the poor can get rich in the world.
I yield the floor.
Mr. REID. We are on the energy and water bill. I know the Senator
from Arizona wishes to speak.
Mr. KYL. I want to take 30 seconds to compliment the Senator from New
Mexico, and then I will ask unanimous consent to speak no more than 5
minutes in morning business.
Mr. REID. My friend from Oregon also wishes to speak for 20 minutes
in morning business. I ask that the Senator from Arizona be recognized
to speak for up to 10 minutes in morning business and the Senator from
Oregon be recognized for up to 20 minutes.
Mr. DOMENICI. Reserving the right to object, Mr. President, what are
you thinking in terms of the bill?
Mr. REID. I will visit with you now.
Mr. DOMENICI. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. KYL. I will not take the full 10 minutes.
I take 30 seconds to simply say, Senator Domenici each year has a
significant responsibility, as well as the other Members of the
subcommittee on which he sits, to put together a bill for energy and
water. As he pointed out, a great deal of the jurisdiction of that
subcommittee deals with our nuclear weapons program. Senator Domenici
does not simply put together what he has been told is a good idea. He
has taken a career to learn from these laboratories--a couple of which
he represents, and the people in those laboratories--what is best in
our national interests and what needs to done. It is not glorious work
and there is no big political payoff. Very few people have the
knowledge he does. He relies on people such as his staff, Clay Sell and
Dr. Peter Lyons, a nuclear physicist from Los Alamos Laboratory, to
assist him in developing the kind of plans that the Senate then needs
to act upon, particularly with the comments about the development of
nuclear energy that will be safe and that we need to promote for this
country.
I think he is absolutely right on the mark. I plan to join him in his
efforts to promote that in the coming months.
Mr. DOMENICI. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. KYL. I am happy to yield.
Mr. DOMENICI. I should have mentioned in my remarks, one of the
Senators who has helped me in the many months that we engaged in trying
to make the Department of Energy more focused with reference to our
nuclear weapons problems was the distinguished Senator from Arizona. I
thank him for that help. We are not over that hurdle yet. Indeed,
General Gordon and that semiautonomous agency have not been totally
formulated. They are not grown up yet and are still walking along,
maybe comparing it to high school and the eighth grade. They still have
to get the diploma. This bill should enhance it or give them some of
the tools they claim they need.
In the meantime, I thank the Senator for observations and comments
regarding a world beyond Kyoto. Clearly, if we do this right, we can
have an abundance of energy and there need be no atmospheric pollution;
we can do it another way. Clearly, we can get it done.
I thank the Senator for his observation.
Mr. REID. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. KYL. I yield.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Clinton). The Senator from Nevada.
Mr. REID. The Senator from Arizona missed my brief statement today
about how I had become a late believer in the work that he and Senator
Domenici had done on the National Nuclear Security Administration. As
you may recall, last year I fought that initially. As I said to Senator
Domenici, I thought it was being done, initially, for reasons other
than what it turned out to be. I commend the Senator from Arizona--I
have already done that to Senator Domenici--for the great work being
done by General Gordon and the people working with him. It certainly
has been a step in the right direction.
With the deep concern I have with the nuclear arsenal, I think there
is not anything we could be more devoted to than making sure General
Gordon has enough money and general resources to do what he has to do
which is so important.
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