[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 37, Number 20 (Monday, May 21, 2001)]
[Pages 757-761]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks Announcing the Energy Plan in St. Paul, Minnesota

May 17, 2001

    Thank you. Please be seated. Thank you for that warm welcome. First, 
I want to thank my friend Norm Coleman. What a great leader he is for 
St. Paul. He's a very good friend. I think it's important for you all to 
know that when Norm calls over there to Washington, I'll answer the 
phone.
    Traveling with me today are two of my Cabinet officers: first, from 
the State of Michigan, the Energy Secretary, Spence Abraham; and the EPA 
Administrator, Christie Todd Whitman. I appreciate John's invitation to 
be here, and I want to thank the Capital City Partnership for giving me 
the chance to come and deliver a major policy address to the Nation.
    I'm also pleased to be in the home of the mighty Minnesota Twins. 
They're cost per win is astounding. [Laughter] It serves as a good 
example of what frugality can do for the Nation. [Laughter]
    But I'm not here to talk about baseball. The Twin Cities are a great 
place to discuss America's energy challenge. Minneapolis-St. Paul grew 
up as a mighty milling and transportation center because of the power of 
the Mississippi River. Your history was built on energy that was 
abundant and affordable and reliable. So, too, will be this Nation's 
energy future.
    I invite you to think with me about that future, and an early look 
at the future this morning, right here in St. Paul. I toured a plant 
that harnesses the best of new technology to produce energy that is 
cleaner and more efficient and more affordable. The plant boils enough 
water to heat 146 major office buildings in downtown St. Paul. Not a bit 
of energy is wasted--not even the waste. The excess heat generated as 
the water boils is captured and used to create steam, which generates 
still more electricity to power pumps and to deliver heat.
    The plant is a model of energy efficiency. It is also a model of 
energy diversity. It uses conventional fuels like oil and natural gas 
and coal, and renewable fuels like wood chips. And the plant is a model 
of affordability. While other energy prices rise, District Energy has 
not raised its heating and cooling rates in 4 years.
    We're beginning to see the power of the future, not only in office 
buildings but also in our homes and our cars. This spring the 
Sustainable Buildings Industry Council showcased a solar-powered home so 
advanced that it actually produces more energy than it uses. And some 
Americans are already driving hybrid cars that can convert to battery 
power to reduce emissions and get up to 70 miles a gallon of gas. These 
are our early glimpses of a future in which Americans will meet our 
energy needs in ways that are efficient, clean, convenient, and 
affordable.
    The future is achievable, if we make the right choices now. But if 
we fail to act, this great country could face a darker future, a future 
that is, unfortunately, being previewed in rising prices at the gas pump 
and rolling blackouts in the great State of California.
    These events are challenging what had become a fact of life in 
America, the routine, everyday expectation that when you flick on a 
light switch, the light will come on. Californians are learning, 
regrettably, that sometimes when you flick on the light switch, the 
light does not come on, at any price.

[[Page 758]]

    I'm deeply concerned about the impact of blackouts on the daily 
lives of the good people of the State of California. And my 
administration is committed to helping California. We're helping right 
now by expediting permits for new power production and by working as 
good partners to reduce our electricity at Federal facilities, 
especially during the peak periods this summer.
    My administration has developed a sane national plan to help meet 
our energy needs this year and every year. If we fail to act on this 
plan, energy prices will continue to rise. For two decades, the share of 
the average family budget spent on energy steadily declined. But since 
1998, it has skyrocketed by 25 percent. And that's a hardship for every 
American family.
    If we fail to act, Americans will face more and more widespread 
blackouts. If we fail to act, our country will become more reliant on 
foreign crude oil, putting our national energy security into the hands 
of foreign nations, some of whom do not share our interests. And if we 
fail to act, our environment will suffer, as government officials 
struggle to prevent blackouts in the only way possible--by calling on 
more polluting emergency backup generators, and by running less 
efficient, old powerplants too long and too hard.
    America cannot allow that to be our future, and we will not. To 
protect the environment, to meet our growing energy needs, to improve 
our quality of life, America needs an energy plan that faces up to our 
energy challenges and meets them.
    Vice President Cheney and many members of my Cabinet spent months 
analyzing our problems and seeking solutions. The result is a 
comprehensive series of more than 100 recommendations that light the way 
to a brighter future through energy that is abundant and reliable, 
cleaner and more affordable.
    The plan addresses all three key aspects of the energy equation: 
demand, supply, and the means to match them. First, it reduces demand by 
promoting innovation and technology to make us the world leader in 
efficiency and conservation. Second, it expands and diversifies 
America's supply of all sources of energy: oil and gas, clean coal, 
solar, wind, biomass, hydropower, and other renewables, as well as safe 
and clean nuclear power. Third, and finally, the report outlines the 
ways to bring producers and consumers together, by modernizing the 
networks of pipes and wires that link the powerplant to the outlet on 
the wall.
    Our new energy plan begins with a 21st century focus on 
conservation. The American entrepreneurial system constantly invents 
ways to do more with less. We pack more and more computing power onto a 
chip. We carry more and more messages over a cable. And we squeeze more 
and more power out of a barrel of oil or a cubic foot of natural gas. A 
new refrigerator you buy today, for example, uses 65 percent less 
electricity than one that was made 30 years ago. Overall, we use 40 
percent less energy to produce new goods and services than we did in 
1973. But this steady improvement slowed in the 1990s.
    Our energy plan will speed up progress on conservation where it has 
slowed and restart it where it has failed. It will underwrite research 
and development into energy-saving technology. It will require 
manufactures to build more energy-efficient appliances. We will review 
and remove the obstacles that prevent business from investing in energy-
efficient technologies, like the combined heat and power system I toured 
this morning. Conservation does not mean doing without. Thanks to new 
technology, it can mean doing better and smarter and cheaper.
    Innovation helps us all make better choices. Smart electric meters 
can tell homeowners how they're using power and how they might reduce 
their monthly electric bill. Sensors can turn off lights when people 
leave a room. And innovation is bringing us transmission wires that 
waste less of the electricity they carry from plant to home or to 
office.
    Conservation on a wide scale takes more than good ideas; it takes 
capital investment. Outdated buildings and factories have to be upgraded 
or replaced to consume less and pollute less. And here, some well-
intentioned regulations have created a catch-22--procedures intended to 
protect the environment have too often blocked environmental progress by 
discouraging companies from installing newer and cleaner equipment.

[[Page 759]]

    Wise regulation and American innovation will make this country the 
world's leader in energy efficiency and conservation in the 21st 
century. Our goal is to use less additional energy to fuel more economic 
growth. And I know we can do so. I also know that conservation is the 
result of millions of good choices made across our land on a daily 
basis.
    Yet even as we grow more efficient, even as this Nation achieves the 
objectives in conservation, we will always require some additional 
energy to power our expanding economy. We learn that from the California 
experience. California has been an impressive conservation leader. It is 
the second most energy-efficient State in the Union. But California has 
not built a major new powerplant in a decade. And not even the most 
admirable conservation effort could keep up with the State's demand for 
electricity.
    So the second part of our energy plan will be to expand and 
diversify our Nation's energy supplies. Diversity is important, not only 
for energy security but also for national security. Overdependence on 
any one source of energy, especially a foreign source, leaves us 
vulnerable to price shocks, supply interruptions, and in the worst case, 
blackmail. America today imports 52 percent of all our oil. If we don't 
take action, those imports will only grow. As long as cars and trucks 
run on gasoline, we will need oil, and we should produce more of it at 
home.
    New technology makes drilling for oil far more productive, as well 
as environmentally friendly, than it was 30 or 40 years ago. Here is the 
result of one study, and I quote, ``Improvements over the past 40 years 
have dramatically reduced industry's footprint on the fragile tundra, 
minimized waste produced, and protected the land for resident and 
migratory wildlife.'' Those aren't my words. Those are the words of the 
Department of Energy study conducted during my predecessor's 
administration. Advanced new technologies allows entrepreneurs and risk-
takers to find oil and to extract it in ways that leave nature 
undisturbed.
    Where oil is found underneath sensitive landscapes, rigs can stand 
miles away from the oil field and tap a reservoir at an angle. In Arctic 
sites like ANWR, we can build roads of ice that literally melt away when 
summer comes, and the drilling then stops to protect wildlife. ANWR can 
produce 600,000 barrels of oil a day for the next 40 years. What 
difference does 600,000 barrels a day make? Well, that happens to be 
exactly the amount we import from Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
    We're not just short of oil; we're short of the refineries that turn 
oil into fuel. So while the rest of our economy is functioning at 82 
percent of capacity, our refineries are gasping at 96 percent of 
capacity. A single accident, a single shutdown can send prices of 
gasoline and heating oil spiraling all over the country. The major 
reason for dramatic increase in gasoline prices today is the lack of 
refining capacity. And my plan gives the needed flexibility and 
certainty so refiners will make the investments necessary to expand 
supply by increasing capacity.
    And America needs to generate more electricity. The Department of 
Energy estimates that America will need between 1,300 and 1,900 new 
powerplants over the next two decades. A high-tech economy is a high-
electricity consumption economy. Even the sleekest laptop needs to plug 
into an electrical outlet from time to time.
    More than half of the electricity generated in America today comes 
from coal. If we were not blessed with this natural resource, we would 
face even greater shortages and higher prices today. Yet, coal presents 
an environmental challenge. So our plan funds research into new, clean 
coal technologies. It calls on Congress to enact strict new 
multipollutant legislation to reduce emissions from electric 
powerplants.
    My administration's energy plan anticipates that most new electric 
plants will be fueled by the cleanest of all fossil fuels, natural gas. 
Our Nation and our hemisphere are rich in natural gas resources. But our 
ability to develop gas resources has been hampered by restrictions on 
natural gas exploration. Our ability to deliver gas to consumers has 
been hindered by opposition to construction of new pipelines, that 
today, are more safe and more efficient. I will call on Congress to pass 
legislation to bring more gas to market, while improving pipeline safety 
and safeguarding the environment.

[[Page 760]]

    America should also expand a clean and unlimited source of energy, 
nuclear power. Many Americans may not realize that nuclear power already 
provides one-fifth of this Nation's electricity, safely, and without air 
pollution. But the last American nuclear powerplant to enter operation 
was ordered in 1973. In contrast, France, our friend and ally, gets 80 
percent of its electricity from nuclear power.
    By renewing and expanding existing nuclear facilities, we can 
generate tens of thousands of megawatts of electricity at a reasonable 
cost, without pumping a gram of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere. New 
reactor designs are even safer and more economical than the reactors we 
possess today. And my energy plan directs the Department of Energy and 
the Environmental Protection Agency to use the best science to move 
expeditiously to find a safe and permanent repository for nuclear waste.
    Our energy plan also supports the development of new and renewable 
sources of energy. It recommends tax credits to homeowners who invest in 
solar homes, and to utilities that build wind turbines or harness 
biomass and other environmentally friendly forms of power. It removes 
impediments to the development of hydroelectricity. It proposes 
incentives to buy new cars that run on alternative fuels, like ethanol, 
that consume less oil and, therefore, pollute less. It supports research 
into fuel cells, a technology of tomorrow that can power a car with 
hydrogen, the most common element in the universe, and emit only steam 
as a waste product.
    In all these ways, we will expand the diversity of our energy 
supply. But as with conservation, new energy supply alone is not the 
whole answer. There's a third element we must address: modernizing the 
network that delivers the supply to the point of demand.
    In 1919 a young U.S. Army officer was ordered to lead a truck convoy 
westward across our country. He was astonished to discover that the 
journey took 62 days. His name was Dwight David Eisenhower. And the 
memory of this bumpy transcontinental ride led to the creation of a 
modern transportation system.
    Today, our electrical system is almost as bumpy as our highways were 
80 years ago. We have chopped our country into dozens of local 
electricity markets, which are haphazardly connected to one another. For 
example, a weak link in California's electrical grid makes it difficult 
to transfer power from the southern part of the State to the north, 
where the blackouts have been worse. Highways connect Miami with 
Seattle; phone lines link Los Angeles and New York. It is time to match 
your interstate highway and phone systems with an interstate electrical 
grid.
    And here, too, technology will make a big difference. Electricity 
markets used to be localized because wires could not carry electrical 
current over long distances. More and better wires can efficiently ship 
power across the country, reducing the threat of local blackouts or 
outages.
    And it's just not our electricity delivery system that has fallen 
behind. The energy report projects that natural gas consumption will 
rise rapidly, as electric utilities make greater and greater use of this 
environmentally friendly fuel. We will need newer, cleaner, and safer 
pipes to move these larger quantities of natural gas--up to 38,000 new 
miles of pipe and 263,000 miles of distribution lines.
    We'll also need to recognize the energy potential of our neighbors, 
Canada and Mexico, and make it easier for buyers and sellers of energy 
to do business across our national borders.
    And finally, we must work to build a new harmony between our energy 
needs and our environmental concerns. Too often Americans are asked to 
take sides between energy production and environmental protection, as if 
people who revere the Alaska wilderness do not also care about America's 
energy future; as if the people who produce America's energy do not care 
about the planet their children will inherit. The truth is, energy 
production and environmental protection are not competing priorities. 
They are dual aspects of a single purpose: to live well and wisely upon 
the Earth.
    Just as we need a new tone in Washington, we also need a new tone in 
discussing energy and the environment, one that is less suspicious, less 
punitive, less rancorous. We've yelled at each other enough. Now it's 
time to listen to each other and act.

[[Page 761]]

    And it's time to act. The energy plan I lay out for the Nation 
harnesses the power of modern markets and the potential of new 
technology. It looks at today's energy problem and sees tomorrow's 
energy opportunity. It addresses today's energy shortages and shows the 
way to tomorrow's energy abundance.
    I have great faith in our country's ability to solve the energy 
problem, and our energy plan shows the way. But most of all, I have 
great faith in the American people. Our land's ingenuity, our 
innovation, our entrepreneurial spirits, is this country's greatest of 
all resources. And thank God they are never in short supply.
    God bless.

Note: The President spoke at 10:30 a.m. at the RiverCentre Convention 
Center. In his remarks, he referred to Mayor Norm Coleman of St. Paul; 
John Labosky, president, Capital City Partnership; and President Saddam 
Hussein of Iraq. The President also referred to ANWR, the Arctic 
National Wildlife Refuge.