September 12th, 2008
“Good Morning and welcome to the Senate’s Bipartisan Energy Summit. I want to thank Majority Leader Reid and Minority Leader McConnell for asking the Energy and Natural Resources Committee to organize this event. Senator Domenici and I have worked together to gather energy policy experts and high level executives of energy-related industries to address all facets of the energy challenges confronting our nation.
“I congratulate the Majority Leader for the National Clean Energy Summit he hosted in August. A number of excellent policy recommendations came out of that summit.
“The purpose of today’s Energy Summit is to foster a bipartisan dialogue on how we achieve a more secure, reliable, sustainable and affordable energy future for the American people. And, obviously, this is indeed a challenging goal.
“To put this in context, in June the Energy Committee held hearings on a comprehensive and provocative report that was put out by International Energy Agency that detailed the mix of technologies – ranging from carbon capture and storage to concentrating solar power – that need to be developed and deployed to meet out energy needs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Transforming our economy from one based on fossil fuels to one based on clean energy will not happen overnight. It will require investments in the range of $45-to-$50 trillion is the estimate we hear. Our goal is attainable if we encourage private sector investment in clean energy today; if we prioritize and sustain support for energy technologies over the long term; and if we ensure that the technologies that we develop are manufactured and deployed here in this country.”
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