American Energy Manufacturing Technical Corrections Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. WELCH. I thank the gentleman from California, and I look forward to returning to the committee and working with my colleagues on the other side of the aisle as well.

I'm very pleased to be here supporting this legislation. Energy efficiency makes sense. We have brutal arguments here about climate change, about what is the right fuel source. They're dividing us. But the fact is whether you believe in climate change or not, even under the bill that was passed--not this session, but a session ago--we could have met one-third of our climate reduction, carbon emission goals through efficiency. There is an enormous potential in efficiency to make this economy better, to create local jobs, to save people money. This legislation starts down that road, and it's very good.

I look and see some of my colleagues over there, even my friend from Georgia. I think we accidentally voted the same on one or two pieces of legislation this year--and I'm not quite sure who made the mistake. But our eyes are wide open on this one with efficiency. We know that this is good for Georgia, it's good for Vermont. And it does not matter what your fuel source is--you can be a nuclear person or a clean energy person--using less is good for the pocketbook, it's good for the economy.

I would like to expand on this when we come back next year, find that area where we're in agreement on efficiency and energy and intensify it. When I served on the committee, we did pass HOME STAR. I've partnered this session with Mr. McKinley of West Virginia on a version of that, the HOMES Act, where we would give some incentive to homeowners to retrofit their homes. The evidence is that if you did this in an aggressive way, 95 percent of the materials that are used in retrofitting a home are manufactured in America, so we put those manufacturing jobs back online.

Number two, the folks who do the work are the trade folks, who are really still reeling from the housing slump. So they've got the skills and they need the work; we put them back to work. Then your bill at home, as a homeowner--whatever your heat source--goes down. This is sensible and we can do it.

It's going to take some decisions on spending. I hope we can get past this notion that every dollar spent is a bad dollar spent. There are times when it makes sense to invest because you get a good return on it, and that's from somebody who does believe that we've got to bring our budget in balance.

So I say to the sponsors of this legislation, our leaders on the committee, and my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, this is a tremendous down-payment on efficiency that will be good for this Congress to work together on and good for this country to get it done.

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