[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 4625-4628]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               SBIR/STTR

  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I appreciate everyone's cooperation in 
trying to help us move the SBIR bill through the Senate this week. It 
is a very important bill. Hopefully, we can get back on that bill 
officially this afternoon as the leaders are negotiating about the 
amendments that are pending or those amendments filed against the bill. 
I see, at this time, the Senator from Maryland who is on the floor and 
wants to speak for just 1 minute about the bill and then Senator Boxer 
came down to speak about an amendment. Senator Vitter is also here, and 
I know he would like to be recognized in just a few minutes as well. 
Then we will alternate back and forth through morning business. There 
is no consent agreement at this point, but we will try to be fair to 
the Members, to move back and forth through the afternoon until 3 
o'clock.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask the Senator if she will yield for a 
question.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. The Senator would go after Senator Cardin.
  Mrs. BOXER. I wanted to clarify that.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Then Senator Vitter, if that is OK.
  Mrs. BOXER. Because I have a pressing event after, I wanted be sure.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland is recognized.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I wish to go back to the SBIR bill itself 
and compliment Senator Landrieu, the chairman, and Senator Snowe, the 
ranking Republican member. This bill is an important one. I think it is 
important we get back to it and that we deal with amendments relevant 
to this legislation and move it forward. We have been on this bill for 
a period of time. It is time to move on. I urge my colleagues, let's 
take up the amendments that are relevant to the legislation and move it 
forward.
  This is bipartisan legislation, passed out of committee by an 
overwhelming vote of Democrats and Republicans. It is a bill that will 
help create jobs in our community. We are talking about how America, as 
the President said, can outeducate, outinnovate and outbuild our 
competitors. We have to outinnovate. The SBIR bill makes it easier for 
small companies to innovate for America, to help this Nation grow, to 
help our economy grow. It is about jobs and innovation.
  The SBIR Program provides funds for small-tech firms to innovate and 
grow and create jobs and for America to continue to lead the world in 
innovation. That is what this bill is about. It provides predictability 
so if you are going to go into a business, you know the program is 
going to be here to give the permanency of reauthorization. It provides 
a greater share of the pie for our smaller companies. Why? Because that 
is where we are going to get the job growth in America and that is 
where innovation is going to come from.
  This is commonsense legislation we need to move forward. I know 
everybody has their particular amendment they want to get on that is 
not related at all to this bill. Let's do our small businesses a favor, 
let's do the American economy a favor, let's do something that can help 
not only create jobs but move America forward in innovation and let's 
get this bill moving for the sake of our economy.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California is recognized.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I need to tell the American people and my 
colleagues who have not been following this important debate on a very 
good bill, I am so grateful to the Senator from Louisiana, Ms. 
Landrieu, for this bill. Unfortunately, there has been an amendment 
that was attached to this bill on the very first day which would stop 
the Environmental Protection Agency forever from enforcing the Clean 
Air Act as it relates to carbon pollution.
  This is a first of a kind. It has never been done. It is essentially 
a repeal of the Clean Air Act as it involves one particular pollutant, 
carbon, which has been found to be an endangerment to our people. The 
EPA did not wake up one day and say: We think carbon is dangerous. No; 
the scientists in both the Bush administration and Obama administration 
found out carbon is a dangerous pollutant, dangerous to the health of 
our families. So EPA, in what is I think a very solid way, has started 
to prepare to regulate carbon. They have done it in a way that has said 
they are not going after farms, they are not going after small 
business, they are going after the biggest polluters in the country.
  Guess what. The friends of those polluters, right in this Senate 
Chamber, have decided--and they already did it in the House, the new 
Republican majority--they are going to stop EPA in its tracks. That is 
why I will ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a very 
good letter from the American Lung Association, the American Public 
Health Association, the Trust for America's Health, the Physicians for 
Social Responsibility, and Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America. I 
ask unanimous consent to have that printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                   March 30, 2011.
       Dear Senator: Our organizations have written to you 
     recently on legislation impacting the Clean Air Act. Today we 
     write to express our opposition to the amendments that will 
     come before the full U.S. Senate in the very near future.
       We oppose:
       1. Amendment No. 183 by Senator McConnell;
       2. Amendment No. 215 by Senator Rockefeller;
       3. Amendment No. 236 by Senator Baucus; and,

[[Page 4626]]


       4. Amendment No. 265 by Senator Stabenow
       By blocking the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) 
     authority to update clean air standards, each of the above 
     amendments, in its own way, will weaken the Clean Air Act.
       If passed by Congress, these amendments would interfere 
     with EPA's ability to implement the Clean Air Act; a law that 
     protects public health and reduces health care costs for all 
     by preventing thousands of adverse health outcomes, 
     including: cancer, asthma attacks, heart attacks, strokes, 
     emergency department visits, hospitalizations and premature 
     deaths.
       Additionally, the public strongly opposes Congress blocking 
     EPA's efforts to implement the Clean Air Act. A recent 
     bipartisan survey, which was conducted for the American Lung 
     Association by the Republican firm Ayres, McHenry & 
     Associates and the Democratic polling firm Greenberg Quinlan 
     Rosner Research, indicates the overwhelming view of voters:
       69 percent think the EPA should update Clean Air Act 
     standards with stricter limits on air pollution;
       64 percent feel that Congress should not stop the EPA from 
     updating carbon dioxide emission standards;
       69 percent believe that EPA scientists, rather than 
     Congress, should set pollution standards.
       The above amendments would strip away sensible Clean Air 
     Act protections that safeguard Americans and their families 
     from air pollution. We strongly urge the Senate to support 
     the continued implementation of this vital law.
           Sincerely,
     Charles Connor,
       President and Chief Executive Officer, American Lung 
     Association.
     Georges C. Benjamin, MD, FACP, FACEP (E),
       Executive Director, American Public Health Association.
     Dean E. Schraufnagel MD,
       President, American Thoracic Society.
     Bill McLin,
       President and CEO, Asthma and Allergy Foundation of 
     America.
     Peter Wilk, MD,
       Executive Director, Physicians for Social Responsibility.
     Jeffrey Levi, PhD,
       Executive Director, Trust for America's Health.

  Mrs. BOXER. They say we ``strongly oppose Congress blocking EPA's 
effort to implement the Clean Air Act.'' That is one of the things they 
say in the letter.
  Then, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record--by the 
way, these are new letters, yesterday one of them--a letter from 
Business for Innovative Climate + Energy Policy.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                   Business for Innovative Climate


                                              + Energy Policy,

                                                   March 28, 2011.
     Re: Business Support for EPA's authority to regulate GHG 
         emissions

       Dear Senate Majority Leader Reid and Senate Minority Leader 
     McConnell: We are writing as major U.S. businesses to urge 
     you to oppose all amendments or other measures that would 
     block, delay or curtail EPA's ability to take action on the 
     regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.
       For nearly two years, our coalition, Business for 
     Innovative Climate and Energy Policy (BICEP), has worked with 
     Members of Congress toward passage of comprehensive climate 
     and energy legislation, because we believe it is critical to 
     the health of our businesses and essential for job creation 
     and innovation in the United States.
       It is important to underscore that we have always believed 
     strongly that Congress should lead on setting climate and 
     energy policy for the United States. However, in lieu of 
     Congress's ability to pass a comprehensive bill, EPA's 
     legitimate authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions 
     should not be constrained at this time.
       We urge you and your Senate colleagues to remain focused on 
     the vital task of passing a comprehensive climate and energy 
     bill that will create jobs, reduce harmful emissions, 
     encourage clean energy development and enhance national 
     security.
           Sincerely,
                                                    Anne L. Kelly,
                                                  Director, BICEP.

  Mrs. BOXER. The letter says ``Business Support for EPA's authority to 
regulate greenhouse gas emissions.'' It is a letter from Anne Kelly, 
who is director of this organization. She writes:

       We are writing as major U.S. businesses to urge you to 
     oppose all amendments or other measures that would block, 
     delay or curtail EPA's ability to take action on the 
     regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.

  It is not business friendly. It is friendly, these terrible 
amendments, to the biggest polluters in America who today took out a 
full-page ad. I guess they can afford $20,000--maybe it is 50, I don't 
know what it costs--for a whole page, saying: ``Stopping EPA's job-
killing greenhouse gas regulation.''
  Of course, who are they? The Industrial Minerals Association, the 
National Mining Association, the National Petrochemical & Refiners 
Association, Petroleum Marketers Association of America, Society of 
Chemical Manufacturers, et cetera, et cetera.
  I guess the question for us as a body is, Whom do we stand with, the 
biggest polluters in America or the American people, 69 percent of whom 
said in a bipartisan poll: ``EPA should update Clean Air Act standards 
with stricter air pollution limits.''
  This group in this body, for whatever reason--and I respect their 
reasons, I just strongly disagree with them--are saying: Stop EPA, 
stop. Mr. President, 68 percent believe Congress should not stop EPA 
from enforcing Clean Air Act standards.
  That is what these amendments do. I say show me one other thing 
besides we all love our mothers that would get 68 percent of the 
American people in a bipartisan vote.
  Mr. President, 69 percent believe ``EPA scientists, not Congress, 
should set pollution standards.'' But we have Senators playing 
scientist, putting on their white coats, deciding what EPA should do, 
when it ought to be based on science. What is the science telling us? 
That it is dangerous to breathe in air pollution with lots of carbon in 
it.
  I ask unanimous consent to have another letter printed in the Record 
from 1Sky, Center For Biological Diversity, Clean Air Task Force, Clean 
Water Action, Conservation Law Foundation, Defenders of Wildlife--I 
can't even take the time to read them all--Interfaith Power and Light, 
League of Women Voters, NRDC, Safe Climate Campaign, Sierra Club, Union 
of Concerned Scientists, Republicans for Environmental Protection--I 
love that one--Voices for Progress, World Wildlife Fund. I ask 
unanimous consent that be printed in the Record. It is dated March 30 
of this year.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                   March 30, 2011.
       Dear Senator: On behalf of the millions of members, 
     activists, and supporters our organizations represent, we 
     urge you to oppose all amendments to S. 493, the SBIR/STTR 
     Reauthorization Act of 2011, that would block the 
     Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) ability to protect 
     public health, including Senator McConnell's amendment 
     (#183), Senator Rockefeller's amendment (#215), Senator 
     Baucus's Amendment (#236), and Senator Stabenow's amendment 
     (#265). Each of these amendments will stop the work underway 
     to clean-up health-threatening carbon dioxide pollution, 
     putting families across the country at risk and stifling 
     investment in a clean energy economy.
       For 40 years, the EPA has protected our health and for 40 
     years the Clean Air Act has been reducing dozens of different 
     air pollutants--all while contributing to America's economic 
     prosperity. These amendments would block the EPA's authority 
     to do this critical job, giving big polluters a free pass to 
     spew carbon dioxide and other pollution without limit. 
     Stopping the EPA from doing its job now means more Americans 
     will suffer ill health, not fewer; more clean energy jobs 
     will be outsourced overseas, and fewer American jobs will be 
     created here at home.
       Time and again, some in industry have made dire claims in 
     order to avoid taking responsibility for polluting our air. 
     And time and again, the industry predictions have proven 
     false. In fact, between 1970 and 1990 the Clean Air Act 
     returned $42 in benefits for every dollar spent. And for 
     every dollar spent cleaning up our air from 1990 to 2020, 
     Americans are expected to receive 30 dollars in economic 
     benefits. The Clean Air Act is a clear financial winner.
       Medical professionals and public health organizations agree 
     that carbon dioxide pollution is a serious public health 
     issue. Compromising the work of the EPA means more Americans 
     will suffer the impacts of severe asthma attacks, more 
     children will end up in hospitals attached to respirators, 
     and more seniors lives will be put at risk from heat waves 
     and severe weather.

[[Page 4627]]

       Once again, we urge you to oppose all amendments to S. 493 
     that would block the Environmental Protection Agency's 
     ability to protect public health. By doing so, you will stand 
     up for our health, our economy, and our environment. The 
     American people deserve the cleaner air, better health, and 
     saved lives that are made possible by the Clean Air Act.
           Sincerely,
       1Sky, Center for Biological Diversity, Clean Air Task 
     Force, Clean Water Action, Conservation Law Foundation, 
     Defenders of Wildlife, Earthjustice, Environmental Defense 
     Fund, Environment America, Friends Committee on National 
     Legislation.
       Friends of the Earth, Interfaith Power & Light, League of 
     Women Voters of the United States, Natural Resources Defense 
     Council, Republicans for Environmental Protection, Safe 
     Climate Campaign, Sierra Club, Union of Concerned Scientists, 
     US Climate Action Network, Voces Verdes, Voices for Progress, 
     World Wildlife Fund.

  Mrs. BOXER. It says:

       For 40 years the EPA has protected our health and for 40 
     years the Clean Air Act has been reducing dozens of different 
     pollutants--all while contributing to America's economic 
     prosperity.

  Every single time we try to rein in pollution, special interests say: 
No, no, no, a thousand times no. We will stop growth. We will stop 
jobs. We will kill the economy. It is awful, awful, awful.
  Let me give one economic fact: If you can't breathe, you can't work.
  Here is a picture of a little girl suffering, struggling. I urge my 
colleagues who support Senator McConnell to look at this. They are not 
here, but maybe on TV they will. Look at this picture. Is that what we 
want for her future?
  We have another picture of a little boy. This is what is happening in 
this country because of the polluters who will not clean up their mess. 
Here is another beautiful child. We all love children. How many 
speeches have we had on this floor--we love children, children are our 
future, we will fight for our children. Do we want their future to look 
like this, breathing through a device? Come on. This is clear.
  You go to any school. I defy my colleagues, try this. Go to any 
school in your State and say: By the way, how many of you have asthma? 
You will see the little hands go up. Then you say: How many of you know 
someone with asthma? You will see half the class raise their hands. Yet 
what are we doing on this beautiful bill--that Senator Landrieu, I 
know, wants to have cleaned up? She doesn't want these amendments on 
it. Regardless of how she may feel or I may feel, we both agree we 
should not have these amendments on it, but so be it. We have to vote 
these amendments down because we are responsible for these kids. All 
our side is saying is very simple: The Clean Air Act has worked.
  If I went up to you and I said: If you know something worked 
perfectly well, would you mess with it? Would you change it?
  No. Why would you, if it is working well?
  So let's take a look at how well the Clean Air Act is working. I know 
how strong the belief of the Presiding Officer is on this subject. 
Let's take a look at this.
  In 2010, the Clean Air Act prevented 160,000 cases of premature 
deaths. By 2020, that number is projected to rise to 230,000 cases of 
premature death. So if we stay on course and we fool around with the 
Clean Air Act--as my Republican friends have already done in the House 
and I pray to God they do not succeed--we are going to see more deaths 
in 2020.
  In 2010, the Clean Air Act prevented 1.7 million fewer asthma 
attacks. I showed you the picture of those children. Why do we want to 
mess with that? The Clean Air Act prevented 10,000 acute heart attacks. 
You read the stories: So-and-so went out on a heavy, bad air day, took 
a little jog, and collapsed.
  I have to tell you, we have a success story to tell about what the 
Clean Air Act is doing. I will show a chart of what happened in Los 
Angeles. A lot of you go to my beautiful State. I know the chairman of 
the committee said she was just there, and it was a terrific visit to 
my State. We have a magnificent State. But there were times when you 
went to Los Angeles that you saw the air. That is not a good thing. 
When you see the air, that is a bad thing. The air was thick. People 
were told on many mornings: Do not go out unless you must. The air is 
so dangerous.
  The Clean Air Act passed. Guess what. In 2010, we have had no 
mornings like that--none. We went from 166 days a year of health 
advisories in southern California to none in 2010. I have to say, if 
you show me any other law that has had this record of success, I will 
smile and be happy. We went from 166 days a year of smog advisories to 
none because of the Clean Air Act. I have already told you, we have 
saved lives, saved asthma attacks. We have done it all. Yet there are 
people in this Chamber who want to either postpone enforcing the Clean 
Air Act as it relates to carbon or want to stop it forever, which is 
the McConnell amendment and the worst amendment of them all, if I had 
to rate them.
  I have a couple other charts to share with you and then I will close. 
The McConnell amendment, which is the worst of all amendments--none of 
them are good--they all interfere with the Environmental Protection 
Agency, which is supported, the EPA, by 69 percent of the people.
  But the McConnell amendment is a disaster. It is the same as the 
Upton amendment, the Upton bill in the House, and the Inhofe bill in 
the Senate. The McConnell amendment--what does it do? It says that 
forever more, the EPA cannot do anything to regulate carbon pollution 
regardless of how dangerous it is, regardless of what the scientists 
tell us, regardless of what the physicians tell us, regardless of what 
the people tell us through the polls, regardless of what our 
communities tell us, what our States tell us, what our mayors tell us. 
Forever more, they are repealing the Clean Air Act as it relates to 
carbon pollution. Rather extreme. Outrageous. We have to beat it. We 
must beat it. It is so bad. It goes against the Supreme Court decision. 
By the way, there will be lawsuits up the wazoo if it ever becomes law, 
and it will not, I pray.
  The Supreme Court said that if we find--scientists--that carbon 
pollution is dangerous, we have to regulate it. Guess what. The 
scientists found that carbon pollution is dangerous. They made an 
endangerment finding. The EPA is ready to act, I think in a judicious 
way. They are very mindful. They are not going after farms, they are 
not going after small businesses. That is not good enough for these 
special interests who took out this huge ad today standing against--it 
is a beautiful ad. It looks almost environmental, green. This is not 
green; it is dirty--dirty air. That is what this ad stands for--dirty 
air.
  A lot of people did not want me to come back here because they knew I 
would come here and tell the truth about this. But I am here, and I am 
going to tell the truth every day in every way because I love my 
grandkids and I love everybody's grandkids. As far as I am concerned, 
that is why I am here--not to protect the rich polluters who make 
billions of dollars a year. They can clean up their act. We proved it. 
We proved it. We have said we do not want kids struggling for air, and 
we said we can do this right. We proved it. We not only proved we can 
clean up the air, we not only proved we can save lives, we not only 
proved we can save asthma attacks, we proved we can grow this economy.
  I am going to close now and let my friend from Louisiana have the 
floor, but I have to close with this. There is a lot of talk about how 
this is bad for business. But the fact is, every time the polluters get 
up and say: Do not pass any more Clean Air Act amendments, it is going 
to be bad for jobs. We found out that cleaning up the environment 
actually creates jobs. Not only does it create jobs, it creates new 
technologies. Not only does it create new technologies, but those 
technologies are exported to the world. And I will have printed in the 
Record the number of jobs that have been created as we moved to clean 
up the air.
  So the reason I am here--and I think it is quite a spirited 
discussion I am having with all of you--is because we are facing four 
bad amendments--four, count them, the worst being McConnell--all of 
which would either slow down the EPA or stop the EPA.

[[Page 4628]]

  By the way, the McConnell amendment is so terrible that it even says 
EPA can no longer have anything to do with tailpipe emissions of cars, 
which is such an important part of the dirty air we are facing.
  In closing, according to information from the Institute of Clean Air 
Companies--those are American companies that oppose these big polluting 
companies--from 1999 to 2001, the number of boilermakers in the United 
States increased by 6,700--a 35-percent increase--even though we said: 
You have to clean up the air.
  The Department of Commerce shows that the U.S. environmental 
technology industry generated $300 billion in revenues, supported 1.7 
million jobs. The air pollution control sector produced $18 billion in 
revenue. Small and medium-sized companies make up 99 percent of the 
private sector firms in this sector of the economy.
  So here is what you have. You have these huge, multibillion-dollar 
polluters who can afford to take one-page ads, full-page ads in the 
Washington Post. They want to continue polluting the air, and they 
don't want to clean it up. And you have a whole other group of 
businesses that have written to us and said: Please let the EPA do its 
work. It saves lives, it saves our children, and it creates many jobs--
new jobs, clean jobs, good jobs.
  If we go down the path of the McConnell amendment and these other 
amendments, we are ceding our leadership in environmental clean tech to 
China. That is the last thing we want to do. They are already 
surpassing us in solar production, and we created it.
  So the bill before us is a fine bill. I hope, if we have to vote for 
these amendments, and they do come up as part of this agreement as we 
move forward, we will not pass any of them and we will allow the people 
to have their way. Sixty-nine percent of them say: Let the EPA do its 
job.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cardin). The Senator from Louisiana.

                          ____________________