[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 89 (Thursday, June 20, 2013)]
[House]
[Pages H3982-H3984]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             CLIMATE CHANGE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from California 
(Mr. Waxman) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Speaker, today the Speaker of the House, not the 
presiding officer at the moment, but the Speaker of the House, John 
Boehner, made some irresponsible remarks about climate change. He was 
asked about the reports that the President is prepared to act to 
protect the planet and future generations from climate change impacts.
  And here's what the Speaker had to say:

       I think this is absolutely crazy. Why would you want to 
     increase the cost of energy and kill more American jobs at a 
     time when the American people are still asking, where are the 
     jobs? Clear enough.

  Well, I could not disagree more strongly with Speaker Boehner. 
Presidential action to protect the climate and future generations is 
absolutely essential. The House is controlled by leaders who deny the 
science and are recklessly ignoring the risks of a rapidly changing 
climate.
  The House has become the last refuge of the Flat Earth Society. That 
is why the President must act, using his existing authorities under the 
law.
  The Speaker's assertion that acting to reduce emissions will hurt the 
economy is absolutely wrong. We need to act to lead the world in the 
clean energy economy of the future. If we don't act, initiative, 
leadership, and economic growth will go to countries that do.
  Now, I've been in Congress for over three decades. I worked on the 
Clean Air Act reauthorization of 1990. I remember the testimony we 
received in the 1980s about how, if we tried to do more in the 
environmental area, we would lose our jobs and our economy would be set 
back. We would face another depression.
  Well, on a bipartisan basis, we adopted the Clean Air Act. We had the 
bill sponsored and signed by President George H.W. Bush, and that 
legislation led to accomplishments of reducing air pollution in some of 
our heavily polluted urban areas, including my own home of Los Angeles.
  We were able to stop the ravages of acid rain, which were causing 
destruction of our forests and rivers and ponds in the Northeast and in 
Canada. We were able to do something about toxic pollution, which was 
causing birth defects and cancer in large numbers of people who lived 
near industrial facilities. And we were able to get legislation passed 
and moved forward to stop the destruction of the upper ozone of our 
planet.
  We accomplished these goals because we didn't pay attention to the 
naysayers who told us our economy would be ruined, we would lose jobs, 
we should forget about a healthy environment, we should forget about 
pristine air in our national parks.
  Luckily, we had leadership, from Republicans and Democrats, to do 
something, and we can now talk about the great accomplishments that we 
achieved. And at the same time, we created more jobs. We created more 
industries. We created new technological developments.
  But let me talk about why the President needs to act on this question 
of climate change. On Monday, the International Energy Agency, IEA, 
released

[[Page H3983]]

a report concluding that the world is not on track to meet the goal of 
limiting global average temperatures below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, or 2 
degrees Celsius.
  Now, that is a tremendous concern because the scientists are telling 
us that if we don't achieve the goal of reducing the temperature rise, 
we are going to see some very severe impacts: flooding of our coastal 
cities, increased risk to our food supply, unprecedented heat waves, 
exacerbated water scarcity in many regions, increased frequency of 
high-intensity tropical cyclones, irreversible loss of biodiversity, 
including coral reefs.

                              {time}  1620

  Recognizing this danger, our country and other countries around the 
world joined together in 2010 and said that we've got to do what we can 
to keep the temperature rise below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. The IEA 
concluded that the world is failing to meet this goal. Greenhouse gas 
emissions are driving climate change, and it's happening with 
increasing rapidity. So can we just deny this is happening? Can we say, 
oh, it will cost jobs and we shouldn't pay any attention to it?
  On our committee, the Energy and Commerce Committee, which has 
jurisdiction over this whole question, the Democratic leaders on the 
committee have asked that we have hearings to bring in the scientists 
because some of our Republican members have said they don't believe in 
the science. We sent over 36 letters asking that the scientists be 
brought before the committee to tell us why they think these terrible 
things may happen, and we have never gotten a response from a single 
letter of request for hearings.
  Can you imagine the people running the Congress denying the 
scientists and then refusing to hear from the scientists or claiming 
the science is uncertain and not resolved and then refusing to hear 
from scientists who can come in and talk about what they have learned?
  Now, if we're facing a world where all the accumulated greenhouse 
gases stay in that atmosphere and to the point where our planet is 
heating up and we're facing terrible consequences, you don't have to 
buy everything they say, but what are the chances that they're right? 
Ten percent? Would we take the risk that we're going to face a 10 
percent chance of all these catastrophic consequences and do nothing 
about it? Well, that seems to be what the Republican leaders are 
saying, including the primary leader of the House, the Speaker.
  Now, let's look at some other more recent examples. When the 
President announced historic fuel economy standards, critics said cars 
would get smaller and more expensive, and it would hurt the sales of 
our automobiles. Well, they were completely wrong. Vehicle sales are 
booming. They are at high levels now. Consumers are saving money 
because cars are more fuel efficient. This is an accomplishment--an 
accomplishment--despite all the naysayers. When the Obama 
administration issued mercury standards for power plants and other 
sources, House Republicans said it would cost jobs and raise 
electricity prices.
  Well, that hasn't happened. Implementation has gone smoothly, and 
electricity prices have not gone up. In fact, wholesale prices actually 
went down, and there have been no rolling blackouts as predicted by the 
doomsday scenarios.
  In 2011, the EPA issued a report on the benefits of the Clean Air Act 
over the period from 1990 to 2020. According to the study, the direct 
benefits of the Clean Air Act in the form of cleaner air and a 
healthier population, more productive Americans, are estimated to reach 
nearly $2 trillion in the year 2020. We're talking about saving money 
by protecting our environment.
  So when the Speaker says that we shouldn't pay attention and that 
it's crazy to pay attention to the concerns about climate change, he's 
absolutely wrong. When he says action to reduce carbon emissions would 
harm the economy, just the opposite will happen. We will create new 
clean energy businesses and more economic growth.
  The President has said that if Congress won't act, he must act; and 
he is absolutely right. The President must act, and he has the 
authority to act under existing laws. Congress will not act because the 
leadership of the House of Representatives denies reality. They want to 
politicize science. They want to politicize science by ignoring it. 
Well, science is not another political opinion. Science is looking at 
the evidence. Turn on the television news any day of the week, and you 
will hear stories about droughts, superstorms, new hurricanes, new 
climate events, and new record levels of temperatures. Don't we think 
that something might be happening and that we have some responsibility 
in government to try to do something about this issue?
  Addressing climate change will require actions over the long term, 
but the IEA report highlights four policies that can be implemented now 
and through 2020 at no economic cost, policies that will help reduce 
local air pollution and increase energy security.
  First, that report recommended that countries adopt specific energy-
efficiency measures. We don't have to build new power plants if we use 
our energy resources more efficiently. We can have more efficient 
heating and cooling systems in residential and commercial buildings, 
more efficient appliances and lighting in residential and commercial 
buildings. Energy-efficiency measures can account for half of the 
emissions reductions that the report proposes through the year 2020.
  Secondly, the report said that if countries limit the construction 
and use of inefficient subcritical coal-fired power plants and switch 
instead to cleaner and more efficient plants, we will see the air get 
cleaner and the threat from climate change be dramatically reduced.
  Thirdly, the report recommended that countries reduce emissions of 
methane, a potent greenhouse gas from upstream oil and gas production, 
by installing readily available technologies in the short term and 
pursuing additional long-term reduction strategies.
  And, fourth, the report proposed that countries accelerate the phase-
out of fossil fuel subsidies which exacerbate climate change by 
encouraging consumption of carbon pollution emitting energy. Why are we 
subsidizing the oil companies with special tax breaks? Is a tax break 
for an oil company any different from appropriations of dollars for the 
oil companies? They're doing very well on their own.
  What we need to do is to provide a level playing field for 
competition for renewable fuels, alternatives and efficiency. These are 
the things that we ought to be focusing on rather than keeping oil and 
coal the predominant sources of our energy for electricity and fueling 
our motor vehicles.
  Things are changing. They're changing because investors don't want to 
buy into stranded investments because they know climate change is 
happening. The American people are getting a clear sense that something 
is happening in the climate, but they don't hear Congress even talking 
about it. And around the world, others are moving forward. Why should 
we allow others, whether it's the Chinese or the Europeans, to develop 
the technologies? We have always been the leader in developing 
technologies for the future. We developed the catalytic converter to 
control pollution from automobiles. We invented the scrubbers that 
could be used on power plants to reduce the emissions that come from 
these power plants. We have made all these advances over the years 
because we've given a clear incentive for anti-pollution control 
devices because we wanted to reduce pollution, and now we have a 
Congress where they want to deny at the highest levels of leadership in 
this Congress that climate change exists and the President shouldn't 
take any action.

  Imagine the top leader of the House of Representatives saying:

       I think it's absolutely crazy. Why would you want to 
     increase the cost of energy and kill more American jobs at a 
     time when the American people are still asking, where are the 
     jobs?

                              {time}  1630

  Well, the jobs can come along with efforts to reduce pollution. We 
have always seen the economy and our protection of the environment go 
hand in hand. We shouldn't say that we have to choose. We can have 
both. We have a long history in this country of bipartisan support for 
the proposition and the reality that we can preserve the environment 
and protect our economy

[[Page H3984]]

and prosper, if we are willing to adopt policies and show some 
leadership.
  Mr. Speaker, I remember when the compliance costs were being thought 
of, when we were trying to deal with the acid rain problem. Industry 
after industry on the record--and it's all available to review--claimed 
the costs would be enormous. Then when we passed the law, the actual 
costs were a small fraction of what was being predicted. When they were 
told that they had to accomplish the goal under a cap-and-trade program 
to reduce sulfur emissions that were causing acid rain, we accomplished 
the goal at a fraction of the original estimates--which I think were 
highly inflated for scare purposes--but we accomplished the goal 
because we said this is the goal, accomplish that goal. You can benefit 
from new technologies and new ways to accomplish our environmental 
objectives. And that's exactly what we did, we moved out with the acid 
rain pollution problem.
  So my colleagues and Mr. Speaker, let's not have leaders who say we 
have to say that we're going to ignore the threat from climate change 
in order to protect jobs. We can protect and promote jobs and protect 
our environment at the same time.
  And Mr. President, you were so right when you said if the Congress 
will not act, you must act, you must lead. We are looking to the 
President to show that leadership because we're not going to get it 
from this House of Representatives.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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