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“THE GREENING OF OUR ENERGY THINKING” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Energy was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H5575-H5576 on May 13, 2009.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
THE GREENING OF OUR ENERGY THINKING
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 6, 2009, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko) is recognized for 10 minutes.
Mr. TONKO. Mr. Speaker, we are at the threshold of energy policy that can transform not only our energy thinking but respond to the economic crises that are gripping this Nation. With the leadership of a new administration, with a President who has expressed the boldness of a vision for energy generation, energy transmission and energy storage, an innovation economy sparked by that source of greening up of our energy thinking can be just what the doctor ordered in curing our economic ills and allowing us to go forward with a stronger sense of security, security that is expressed by our energy security, our job security, our economic security and certainly for those measures, our national security.
It is no wonder that our gluttonous dependency on a fossil-based economy has caused us to rely on importing, from some of the most troubled spots in the world, our energy supplies. These are countries that have unstable governments that have ruled the day for our economy.
And certainly when we look at the failed measures of the previous administration, the average household has been paying, or the average citizen has been paying $1,100 more in energy costs because of the failure of that energy policy during the Bush-Cheney administration. So it is a challenge to us and a dictate to the American public to go forward with a new vision, a boldness of greening up our energy thinking so as to spark this innovation economy.
When we look at what can happen in this country, there are many promising statistics. We can understand that some 5 million jobs can be created in the clean energy economy if we were to enhance by 25 percent our renewable energies. And just for the electricity supplies we require and the transportation needs that we have, if we advance a 25 percent improvement by the year 2025, we could realize those 5 million additional jobs in the economy. And dollar for dollar, it is calculated that four times the job growth is realized in the clean energy economy than is realized in the dependency and the continuation of the oil and petroleum economy.
So those statistics speak nobly to the challenge that befalls us, that we need to move forward with a new order of thinking, that we can, as we enhance our energy security, grow American jobs that produce American power for America's energy needs.
Now that is a strengthening of our economy in a way that will put new jobs, job opportunities, on to the grid that have not previously been there. It allows us to cover the array of job opportunities from the trades that are involved on over to the engineering, the inventor, the innovator types that can produce the prototypes and then pulling them into the manufacturing and commercial sectors of emerging technologies that will allow us to very cleverly encourage new generation formats, new storage formats and new transmission opportunities in the realm of energy.
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The transitioning will allow us to impact industries from manufacturing to engineering to all sorts of lab opportunities for our given communities.
When we look at situations in New York State alone, we are looking at some 132,000 or so jobs that could be created in a clean energy opportunity in New York State. Obviously with an unemployment rate that is above 8 percent in New York State, that would be a welcomed bit of opportunity.
We need to simply look at the practicality of some of the experiences out there that have enabled us to move forward, to move forward in a way that allows us to utilize the strength of our intellect as a Nation and use that brain trust and invest in our future.
Recently when we were visiting with a former energy minister for the country of Denmark, he had visited with the SEEC caucus that has been formed here in Congress of which I serve as Chair, the Sustainable Energy and Environment Caucus has entertained guests who will share with us their ideas and their success stories.
Denmark has done well by changing its format of energy design. It was important to note that they have very boldly stepped forward and invested with some ideas that actually came from the United States and perhaps even patents that originated here. So it behooves us to move forward and utilize this American think tank and put it to work here in our country to meet our energy needs. While I was at NYSERDA where I served as president and CEO of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, we were able to advance several new ideas: kinetic hydro that allowed us to utilize the turbulence of the East River along the Manhattan shoreline, and just utilizing that turbulence allowed us to do subwater surface energy creation, energy generation simply by the motion of the water.
We have several opportunities with the many bodies of water in New York State, and with turbulent bodies as such, to perhaps achieve as much as 1,000 to 1,100 megawatts worth of power.
The demonstration project, funded through the assistance of NYSERDA, made modifications possible through Denver, through the Department of Energy labs, and we have reformulated the design of the energy turbine blades. We have recalculated the assembly, the core assembly of such a turbine, and we are able to go through with these improvements that now offer great hope for the kinetic opportunities.
That is just one sampling of cutting-edge technology, emerging technologies that can strengthen our American economy and our energy consumers' future here in this country.
I think also of the geothermal applications that we have made with campuses like the Culinary Institute of America where the geothermal applications are used now to heat and cool six new dormitory areas, lodges as they are referred to, at the CIA. This is another practical application that allows us to create a sustainable future, one that is working in a benign fashion with the environment and utilizing the resources of our air, our water, and our soil to respond to our energy needs.
This is the boldness of vision that has been imparted by President Obama and his administration. It is the boldness of vision embraced by Speaker Pelosi in the House, and other leaders; our Energy and Commerce Chair, Henry Waxman; and Barton Gordon of Science and Technology, to name just a few. But as we go forward, we will continue to advance this progressive order of policies and the resources required to advance the development that we require.
I think it is important for us as a society to invest well beyond the prototype. The prototype is the idea that comes to life in the research labs across the country, but that is not where we should end with the story. We need to deploy that magic into the manufacturing and commercial sectors so we can take full advantage of the earlier investments into prototypes.
Just this week I was able, Mr. Speaker, to travel to the GE Research and Development Center in my district. They announced their plans for new battery technology, battery technology that will enable us to add to the diversity of battery types of the future. There are efforts within the stimulus package advanced by the White House and approved by the House and the Senate on the Hill that was recently signed into law as the Recovery Act for America that will invest billions of dollars into cutting-edge thinking in battery application. It was at GE that they announced this formulation of a sodium chloride and nickel mix that allows for us to deal with heavy-duty equipment, the more stressful vehicular applications. It also holds promise for energy generation and energy storage, very key and critical to the intermittent nature of several of our renewable sources.
So with all of that being said, there are samplings out there that today are speaking to the progress that can be made. And it is that source of job creation that is inspired by the efforts made by researchers and engineers and inventors and innovators that then allow for trade application in the practical applications as we retrofit our schools, our businesses, and our homes in a way that allows us to meet our energy needs.
So with all of that, I call upon this House to continue to move forward and advance the agenda of green energy policy that will transform our economy, strengthen our job market, and allow for us to have a stronger sense of energy security and national security.
I thank you, Mr. Speaker, for the opportunity to share my thoughts.
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