[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 14352]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                 ENERGY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Florida (Mr. Klein) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KLEIN of Florida. Madam Speaker, it is an honor to be here today 
to talk in this House about energy. This is a moment in time when, I 
think, most Americans understand this great opportunity we have to 
really turn things around for our future in this country. It's about 
three principal elements that aren't just tied to the high cost of 
gasoline. It's about national security; it's about a better 
environment; and probably, as one of the most important things for this 
moment, it's about jobs. It's about a new economy.
  We'll just talk about national security. I think all of us understand 
very clearly, every American, no matter where one is from, the fact 
that importing oil is the basis for a lot of the dependency that we 
have. Sixty percent or so of the oil that we take in the United States 
comes from outside the United States. We depend, unfortunately, on many 
countries that are, at best, not our friends and that are, at worst, 
our mortal enemies, who fund terrorism and threats against the United 
States and against our allies around the world. The sooner that we can 
take oil out of the centerpiece of our natural resource dependency, the 
better. That's not to say we don't have oil in the United States and 
that, yes, we're going to drill more and all that kind of thing. What 
I'm talking about is the fact that much of our oil comes from places 
around the world, from the Middle East, from Venezuela and from other 
places that are not stable places for us to depend on this.
  Number 2 is our economy. We know that we have a great opportunity in 
terms of this next generation of jobs to be created relating to 
alternative energy and to the various kinds of alternative energies 
that are out there right now that are being developed by our 
scientists, by our engineers, and by our businesspeople.
  There is one thing that, I think, is just incredible and that I'll 
just give by way of an example because we know about solar and wind and 
a lot of other things. I'm from Florida, and I was speaking to one of 
our utility companies the other day, and they're talking about building 
the largest solar plant in the world in Florida. Over the years, we've 
heard, Oh, well, there isn't enough sun or maybe other things. Well, 
now there is a general recognition that anywhere in the United States 
there are great opportunities for solar. The technology is moving 
along, and we need to continue to incent that continued higher level of 
development of battery storage for solar and things like that.
  One of the things he said to me is, in building this plant, they have 
to import the mirrors--these are the pieces of equipment to hold the 
solar and to capture the power--from Germany. Hundreds of millions of 
dollars of this product have to come in from Germany because we don't 
produce it here in the United States.
  Why? Why don't we produce it? Why isn't that a job opportunity that 
is based right here?
  I think that one of the things that's going on right now in the 
investment recovery act that we've put together and other things that, 
I think, all of us share, Democrats and Republicans and as Americans, 
is the idea that, if we're going to talk about energy, we have to 
incentivize business and industry and the engineers in our universities 
to develop the science, to develop the entrepreneurship, to give the 
tax incentives for investment for that type of energy in the United 
States, and to build the equipment here in the United States.
  There is no reason. It costs a lot of money to ship fragile mirrors 
over from Germany. We can build it here. We can build it better. We can 
probably export it and can compete with the rest of the world.

                              {time}  1100

  I think that's a pretty exciting opportunity, and there are so many 
other areas. In my district off the coast of Florida, most of you have 
heard of the gulf stream. That's that perpetual current, 24/7, 365 days 
a year, that runs up and down up to north along the east coast. Well, 
right now, one of our local universities, Florida Atlantic University, 
is developing technology where they can put turbines in the Atlantic 
Ocean and capture that energy.
  I don't know if this is going to work long-term, but that's the kind 
of American ingenuity that we're looking for, and we as a government 
and private sector, our scientists, our entrepreneurs, we need to work 
together to capture that and build on that.
  And of course, there's the environment. We all understand that, and 
there is something going on in the world on climate. People can have 
different opinions. I think most scientists agree there's something 
going on, and whatever we can do in the United States and around the 
world to provide leadership to reduce the impact of CO2 and 
other things, it's good for all of us.
  I live in a coastal area, 75 miles on the Atlantic Ocean, some of the 
most beautiful areas in the world. We obviously are very sensitive to 
the hurricane activity, to the rise of the Atlantic Ocean, things like 
that, but I think we all understand there's an environmental issue at 
the same time.
  So what are we doing here in Washington? We're working very 
collectively, and there are a lot of business and industry actively 
supporting some of the various ideas that are coming forward to work on 
this in a very productive way to make sure that the United States is 
leading the world in these areas of alternative energy.
  And we're debating a bill right now and I know our colleagues are 
asking for comments from back home. We obviously want to do it in a way 
that allows for appropriate levels of transition for our industries who 
are dependent on old fuel sources to move to new fuel sources. We need 
to work together to make sure that the system eases in a way that is 
economically competitive. That's what we need to do. At the same time, 
we ought to be encouraging as much as we can getting these products 
into play.
  So I'm very excited about the fact that we can build a new energy 
future, and I look forward to working with all of our Members to do 
that.

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