[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Pages 13500-13501]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           ENERGY EFFICIENCY

  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I know the Presiding Officer has some 
thoughts on this efficiency bill, and we are going to hear from him 
later. I appreciate that. I thank Senator Thune and others who have 
come to the floor to not offer their amendments officially because we 
have this issue we need to resolve on the health care front but to talk 
about good amendments to the legislation and ways to improve it. I know 
Senator Gillibrand was earlier talking about her amendment, which is a 
commonsense approach to ensure that as you do retrofits after natural 
disasters, you can use more energy-efficient appliances and so on.
  There are some commonsense ways for us to move the efficiency agenda 
forward with an ``all of the above'' energy strategy. We have had a 
good debate today on that topic. I think we have actually gotten a 
number of amendments that have been proposed--I can count seven of them 
that are bipartisan that have been discussed here on the Senate floor 
that are going to help us as we proceed on this bill.
  I am hopeful that we will have votes on Monday and Tuesday and that 
we can move forward with resolving the outstanding issues on the health 
care front to be able to move to the bill. I do hope my colleague from 
Louisiana

[[Page 13501]]

does get a vote on his health care bill. I think it is important. I 
think it is important that the Senate be heard. But let's also be sure 
that we actually move forward with this underlying legislation. This is 
an unfortunately rare example of where Republicans and Democrats have 
come together here in the Senate to put forward legislation that has 
been worked out carefully, thoughtfully over time, that addresses one 
of the concerns we have as a country, which is that the energy used in 
our manufacturing facilities and by us as individuals and families and 
certainly by our Federal Government makes our economy less competitive 
and increases our costs.
  There are ways to make our economy stronger, certainly improve the 
environment, and also make us less dependent on foreign energy by 
moving forward with energy efficiency as one leg of really a 
combination of things we need to do in an ``all of the above'' energy 
strategy.
  Some of that, of course, should be producing more energy. I think 
this is a great opportunity for America, particularly in States such as 
Ohio, which I represent, where we have a tremendous opportunity to 
produce more natural gas--so called wet gas that is very valuable right 
now--and also oil. That will help to have not only lower energy costs 
but more stable energy costs going forward to bring back manufacturing. 
That can actually lead to a rebirth of some of the great industries in 
States like mine, Ohio, but also around our country to help get this 
economy back on track as we face high unemployment and low economic 
growth. But along with producing more, we need to use less and use what 
we have more efficiently. This is a conservative approach because we 
want to be sure that what we have is used most effectively and 
efficiently.
  We have seen a lot of gridlock on Capitol Hill recently on other 
issues. Again, this is one where we do have Republicans and Democrats 
who have worked together with the Senator from New Hampshire, who spent 
2\1/2\ years working on this. That is one reason we have over 200 
businesses supporting us. We have over 260 organizations, ranging from 
the Chamber of Commerce, which agreed today to ``key vote'' this 
legislation, to the National Association of Manufacturers on the one 
hand and the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and 
other groups on the other hand. So it is an interesting combination of 
folks who believe energy efficiency is low-hanging fruit. It is a way 
for us to use less energy and therefore have a more productive economy, 
have a better environment, and make us less dependent on foreign oil.
  This is an opportunity for us to do something else, in my view, which 
is to not just pass good energy legislation for the first time really 
in several years here on the floor but also to provide a model of how 
we can maybe work on some issues that are even bigger than energy 
efficiency, such as dealing with the debt and deficit and broader 
economic growth issues such as tax reform. So I am hopeful we can move 
forward with this debate.
  I appreciate people being patient today as they came to the floor and 
waited for their turn to be able to speak about their amendments. I 
also appreciate those who are trying to work out some sort of unanimous 
consent agreement with my colleague from Louisiana so we can move 
forward on the actual votes.
  I know we are going to hear from our colleague who is currently 
presiding tonight and others this evening about energy efficiency, but 
I would like to end by saying that there is a way for us to make 
progress on these issues. We have shown it with this legislation.
  Let's get through these procedural hurdles, and let's be sure we can 
in this instance break the gridlock and get something done that helps 
my State of Ohio, helps the American people, and helps us move forward 
in terms of better economic growth, a cleaner environment, and also a 
better national security situation, where we are not dependent on these 
foreign sources of oil, sometimes from very dangerous and volatile 
parts of the world. As we have seen in the last several weeks, that is 
problematic. There is a better way. There is a better way forward. This 
energy efficiency bill is one of the steps we can take moving forward.
  With that, I appreciate the Presiding Officer's work on this issue 
and look forward to hearing his comments later.
  I yield the floor.
  I see my colleague from Ohio is on the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The senior Senator from Ohio.

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