Barack Obama and Bill Clinton talk energy efficiency, green jobs

President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton got together to talk about energy efficiency and the Better Buildings Initiative on December 2, 2011:

Bill Clinton:  Well, I never got to open for The Rolling Stones, so I’ll try to do my best for the President.

Thank you all for being here, and I want to thank all the people involved in the tour that we just received for their commitment to energy efficiency and all the people they put to work.

Mr. President, I want to thank you and Secretary Chu and Gene Sperling and your whole team.  Tom Donohue and Randi Weingarten, thank you for joining together today for what you are doing.  

When the President asked me to work with his Jobs Council on improving energy efficiency in buildings, I think he did it because the Clinton Global Initiative and my own climate change project have been working on these kinds of things for several years now, and I believe as strongly as I can say that this is good business, creates jobs, makes us more energy independent and helps to fight climate change.  It’s the nearest thing we’ve got to a free lunch in a tough economy, because all of the savings can be paid back within a reasonable amount of time -- I mean, all the costs of the construction -- through lower utility bills.

So we’ve been working on that.  And the President has an announcement to make about that today.

I just want to say how grateful I am to Rich Trumka and the AFL-CIO and to Randi Weingarten for the work that labor has done in putting up some of the pension funds from California and some other funds they have to actually invest their own money gambling that they can get a reasonable return and putting people to work.  And I appreciate the support that Tom has given to this, because there are a lot of construction firms that are going to lose really skilled, gifted workers if they can’t find something to do, because there’s not a big demand for new buildings today and therefore the best opportunity to preserve and rebuild this sector is through greater energy efficiency.

I want to thank all the people who have been involved in this.  And Mr. President, I just want to say how grateful I am for the meeting we just attended.  The President’s Jobs Council and economic team put together a meeting that we were just present at -- there were nearly 50 people there.  And he’ll tell you what they said they would do.  But -- I hate to sound like a broken record -- we could create an almost unlimited number of jobs out of this, even in this lousy economy, even with all this embedded mortgage crisis, if we can work out the financing.

And I am grateful to be able to support this, to offer the continued effort of our climate change project and the Clinton Global Initiative to help the partners we have that are involved in this and anybody else that wants it.  But I’m especially grateful that the President didn’t let this fall through the cracks. 

You know that I haven’t been in that job for a long time, and I’m getting older, but I have some memory left.  And a thousand people ask you to do a thousand things.  And one of the tests of whether things work out or not, since you can’t do all thousand, is whether you can actually set up a process to do things and follow up.  And I am full of gratitude and praise, Mr. President, for you and your whole team, not just for your commitment to green energy, but for your commitment to energy efficiency, which gives you -- on buildings like this, averages 7,000 jobs for every billion dollars invested -- by far the greatest bang for the buck of any available investment I know…

Barack Obama: Now, our longer-term challenge is rebuilding an economy where hard work is valued and responsibility is rewarded, and the middle class and folks who are trying to get into the middle class regain some security -- an economy that’s built to compete with the rest of the world, and an economy that’s built to last.

And that’s why we are here today, in a place where, clearly, there is some building going on.  President Clinton, leaders of business, leaders of labor, we’re all here to announce some new steps that are going to create good jobs rebuilding America.

This building is in the middle of a retrofitting project to make it more energy efficient.  Already, this retrofit is saving this building $200,000 a year on its energy bills.  And as I mentioned earlier, by the time it’s finished, it will have created more than 250 full-time jobs in construction here in this building.  Consider President Clinton is coming down from the New York, the fact that the owners of the Empire State Building did the same thing; they are retrofitting that iconic landmark from top to bottom.  It’s a big investment, but it will pay for itself by saving them $4.4 million a year in energy costs.  And it’s estimated that all the retrofitting that they’re doing will pay for itself in about four and a half years.

Making our buildings more energy efficient is one of the fastest, easiest and cheapest ways for us to create jobs, save money, and cut down on harmful pollution.  It is a trifecta, which is why you’ve got labor and business behind it.  It could save our businesses up to $40 billion a year on their energy bills -– money better spent growing and hiring new workers.  It would boost manufacturing of energy-efficient materials.  And when millions of construction workers have found themselves out of work since the housing bubble burst, it will put them back to work doing the work that America needs done.  So this is an idea whose time has come.

And that’s why, in February, I announced the Better Buildings Initiative.  It’s an ambitious plan to improve the energy efficiency of America’s commercial buildings 20 percent by the year 2020.  And I asked President Clinton and my Jobs Council to challenge the private sector, as part of the initiative, to step up, make these cost-saving investments, and prove that it works, so that other companies follow their lead.

Now, I believe that if you’re willing to put people to work making your buildings more efficient, America should provide you some incentives to do so.  That’s something that would require congressional action.  And we have asked Congress to work with us to move on providing more effective incentives for commercial building owners all across the country to move forward on these energy-efficient steps.  But we can’t wait for Congress to act.  And if they won’t act, I will.

Which is why, today, I’m directing all federal agencies -- all federal agencies -- to make at least $2 billion worth of energy-efficiency upgrades over the next two years.  None of these upgrades will require taxpayer money to get them going.  We’re going to use performance-based contracts that use savings on energy and utility bills to pay the contractors that do the work.  And it should keep construction workers pretty busy.  In fact, this is something that the Chamber of Commerce has said is critical to private sector job creation.

The private sector and community leaders are also stepping up to the plate alongside the federal government.  President Clinton and the Clinton Global Initiative have been tremendous partners in rallying them to join this effort.  So in June, at CGI America, we announced initial commitments of $500 million to upgrade 300 million square feet of building space; some of these projects are already underway.

The good news is, today, we can announce that we’re going even bigger.  We’ve received larger commitments.  We now have 60 major companies, universities, labor unions, hospitals, cities and states, and they are stepping up with nearly $2 billion in financing to upgrade an additional 1.6 billion square feet of commercial industrial space by our target year of 2020.  That’s more than 500 Empire State Buildings.

I just had the chance, along with President Clinton, to meet with representatives of these 60 institutions that are involved and hear firsthand how they can put Americans back to work but also improve their bottom lines. 

So you’ve got companies like Best Buy and Walgreens that are going to upgrade store lighting, which is going to save them money.  You’ve got manufacturers like Alcoa that are going to make their manufacturing plants more efficient, dramatically reducing their operating costs which means they can compete more effectively all around the world. 

You’ve got property management companies that are upgrading their buildings to make their real estate portfolios more attractive to businesses, and one is already upgrading 40,000 units of military housing all across the country, which will give our military families lower utility bills and a higher quality of life.  And all of this will create jobs.

Barack Obama on Keystone XL, Payroll Tax Cut

President Barack Obama discussed the Keystone XL pipeline with reporters after a December 7, 2011 meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper:

Barack Obama: We did discuss the proposed Keystone Xl pipeline, which is very important to Canada.  And I think the Prime Minister and our Canadian friends understand that it's important for us to make sure that all the questions regarding the project are properly understood, especially its impact on our environment and the health and safety of the American people.  And I assured him that we will have a very rigorous process to work through that issue… 

David Jackson, USA Today: I have Keystone questions for both of you.  Mr. President, we’ve got some House Republicans who are saying they won’t approve any extension of the payroll tax cut unless you move up this oil pipeline project.  Is that a deal you would consider?  And also, how do you respond to their criticism that you punted this issue past the election for political reasons?

And, Prime Minister Harper, you seemed to suggest the other day that politics is behind the way the Keystone issue has been handled.  Do you really feel that way?

Barack Obama: First of all, any effort to try to tie Keystone to the payroll tax cut I will reject.  So everybody should be on notice.  And the reason is because the payroll tax cut is something that House Republicans, as well as Senate Republicans, should want to do regardless of any other issues.  The question is going to be, are they willing to vote against a proposal that ensures that Americans, at a time when the recovery is still fragile, don’t see their taxes go up by $1,000.  So it shouldn’t be held hostage for any other issues that they may be concerned about.

And so my warning is not just specific to Keystone.  Efforts to tie a whole bunch of other issues to something that they should be doing anyway will be rejected by me.

With respect to the politics, look, this is a big project with big consequences.  We’ve seen Democrats and Republicans express concerns about it.  And it is my job as President of the United States to make sure that a process is followed that examines all the options, looks at all the consequences before a decision is made. 

Now, that process is moving forward.  The State Department is making sure that it crosses all its t’s and dots all its i’s before making a final determination.  And I think it’s worth noting, for those who want to try to politicize this issue, that when it comes to domestic energy production, we have gone all in, because our belief is, is that we’re going to have to do a whole range of things to make sure that U.S. energy independence exists for a long time to come -- U.S. energy security exists for a long time to come. 

So we have boosted oil production.  We are boosting natural gas production.  We’re looking at a lot of traditional energy sources, even as we insist on transitioning to clean energy.  And I think this shouldn't be a Democratic or a Republican issue; this should be an American issue -- how do we make sure that we’ve got the best possible energy mix to benefit our businesses, benefit our workers, but also benefit our families to make sure that the public health and safety of the American people are looked after.  And that’s what this process is designed to do...

Reporter: Excuse me, Mr. President.  By rejecting a veto, would you veto any payroll tax cuts if it had something else on it?

Barack Obama:  I think it’s fair to say that if the payroll tax cut is attached to a whole bunch of extraneous issues not related to making sure that the American people’s taxes don't go up on January 1st, then it’s not something that I’m going to accept.  And I don't expect to have to veto it because I expect they’re going to have enough sense over on Capitol Hill to do the people’s business, and not try to load it up with a bunch of politics.

Newt Gingrich’s green conservatism

Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich used the term “green conservatism” to describe his 2007 book A Contract With the Earth at a May 27, 2011 house party in Manchester, NH. On Tuesday, the term popped up again during Gingrich's interview with conservative talk show host Glenn Beck.

  

Beck played an audio clip from the 2007 debate on climate change that pitted the former House Speaker against John Kerry, the Democratic Senator from Massachusetts.

“I think there has to be a, if you will, a green conservatism,” Gingrich said at the time.

This gem of a quote was dug up a few days before by Factcheck.org, which recently ran an excellent piece examining Newt’s rather complicated record on climate change.

  

What followed was an exchange that revealed what types of policies President Gingrich might be willing to embrace to address climate change:

Glenn Beck: Help me out. This is a multiyear stance. It’s not a moment in your life.

Newt Gingrich: Well, first of all, I fought in those (inaudible) and I believe in the environment in general and I think ‑‑

Glenn Beck: So do I.

Newt Gingrich: Okay. Second, I think that there is evidence on both sides of the climate change argument, and the point I was making was in a situation where, for example, having a larger nuclear program reduces carbon in the atmosphere, it’s a prudent thing to look at nuclear as one of the actions.

Glenn Beck: But you ‑‑

Newt Gingrich: It’s a prudent thing to develop a green coal plant that takes the carbon and puts it into carbon sequestration to use it to develop oil fields more deeply and can be actually economically done. We do it right now in West Texas…

Glenn Beck: Do you ‑‑ do you still believe in the, you know, the Inconvenient Truth as outlined by global climate change advocates?

Newt Gingrich: Well, I never believed in Al Gore’s fantasies and, in fact, if you look at the record, the day that Al Gore testified at the Energy and Commerce Committee in favor of cap and trade, I was the next witness and I testified against cap and trade. And in the Senate, I worked through American solutions to help beat the cap and trade bill. Cap and trade was an effort by the left to use the environment as an excuse to get total control over the American economy, centralizing a Washington bureaucracy. In the end it had nothing to do with the environment. It had everything to do with their desire to control our lives.

As a presidential candidate, Newt Gingrich has generally shied away from using terms like “green coal”. His 21^st Century Contract with America calls for expanded development of coal, but says nothing about it being clean.

Photo by Gage Skidmore

Jon Huntsman Climate Skeptic?

Jon Huntsman may be the latest Republican presidential candidate to turn climate skeptic, judging by his response to a question about global warming posed during his December 6, 2011 appearance at the Heritage Foundation:

Question: Do you believe that human activity is significantly or primarily contributing to the earth’s warming climate and, if so, what policies would you like to see put in place to deal with it?  

Jon Huntsman: I don’t know. I’m not scientist, nor am I a physicist, but I would defer to science on that discussion.

And I would say that the scientific community owes us more in terms of a better description or explanation about what might lie beneath all of this.

But there is not enough information right now to be able to formulate policies in terms of addressing it overall, primarily because it’s a global issue. 

We can enact policies hear, but I wouldn’t want to unilaterally disarm as a country. 

I wouldn’t want to hinder job creators during a time when our economy is flat. 

When you’ve got other nations that are major emitters and they’re not willing to play by the same playbook, then you’ve got a real problem.

So as for me, I’m not one who is going to unilaterally disarm our economy or our job creators in this country. 

Complete video of Jon Huntsman at the Heritage Foundation, with his remarks on global warming starting at 34:51:

Watch live streaming video from heritagefoundation at livestream.com

Update: 

Jon Huntsman reiterated his belief in climate science on December 7, 2011 while responding to questions from reporters:

When you have 99 out of 100 climate scientists, there’s enough there for us to say we have an established body of science.

Now it would be a very good thing to coordinate that science with the other major emitters on the globe, recognizing that it is an international problem.

I don’t want to disadvantage this country during a time when we are weak economically and want to get back on our feet.

Get the full story on Politico:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1211/69981.html#ixzz1fw9H056X

 

Rick Santorum: Endangered Species Act is "poorly crafted legislation"

Rick Santorum described the Endangered Species Act as an example of "very broadly worded legislation that allow regulators to run amok" while responding to a question at the December 3, 2011 Huckabee Presidential Forum, which aired on Fox News:

Pam Bondi, Florida Attorney General: Senator, in Florida it’s been very frustrating because -- as you’ve probably heard – I’ve had to sue the EPA to stop them from imposing absolutely unsustainable water standards on my state, and it would be devastating to businesses in Florida.

The Obama administration, they have pursued numerous environmental policies that affect all of us in different ways that would impose staggering costs on the American people. 

What principles would you follow in deciding whether to approve any environmental regulations? 

Rick Santorum: Well, I would say this.

What we have seen is a radical environmental policy put forth by this administration, but it’s based upon some very poorly crafted legislation that is place right now.

You know, you have an Endangered Species Act, which is at the heart of the problems that we’ve dealt with in Pennsylvania. 

Look at the Central Valley of California. 

And we’ve seen these policies because you have poorly drafted – not poorly drafted, deliberately draft – pieces of legislation that are overly broad.

The former Senator from Pennsylvania and 2012 Republican presidential candidate also made it clear that he'd like to see the Endangered Species Act rewritten:   

Rick Santorum: What I believe we need to do -- and I’ve made this a proposal on the road – we have reauthorizations of all these acts that come forward. And a lot of the cases, they just straight reauthorize them because you can’t, you can’t – they don’t want to refight the war again.

But what I’ll say as President is, “I won’t enforce an Act. I won’t sign a straight reauthorization, and just won’t continue to enforce an Act that hasn’t been reauthorized.” 

We will force the Congress to go back and take these very broadly worded statutes that allow regulators to run amok and we will fix them and have Congress make the decisions as to what the laws are, not the regulators.

Santorum’s comments came just three days before today's hearing - "The Endangered Species Act: How Litigation is Costing Jobs and Impeding True Recovery Efforts" - held by Republicans in control of the U.S. House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee.

According to the Center for Biological Diversity, the Endangered Species Act has been a great success, as evidenced by the fact that “99.9 percent of species protected by the Act have been kept from extinction, and where measured, 93 percent of protected species are moving towards recovery.”

Watch video of Santorum's remarks starting at 18:25:

Huckabee Presidential Forum: Newt Gingrich on climate change

Newt Gingrich discussed his views on climate change and cap and trade at the Huckabee Presidential Forum, which aired on Fox News on December 3, 2011:

Ken Cuccinelli, Virginia Attorney General: Mr. Speaker, you speak passionately about first principles and small government -- smaller government – yet you’ve supported individual mandates for health insurance, joined Nancy Pelosi with respect to climate change, advocated for a significant role for the federal government in education, and had close ties to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Why should limited government conservatives like me trust that a President Gingrich will not advance these sorts of big government approaches when you are President?

Newt Gingrich: …I’ve said publicly, sitting on the couch with Nancy Pelosi is the dumbest single thing I’ve done in the last few years.

But if you notice, I never favored cap and trade. 

In fact, I actively testified against it. 

I was at the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee the same day Al Gore was there to testify for it. 

I testified against it. 

And through American Solutions we actively fought it in the Senate. 

And I think we played a major role in defeating it.

The former House Speaker and 2012 Republican presidential candidate also reiterated his desire to eliminate the EPA as we know it today:

Scott Pruit, Oklahoma Attorney General: President Obama seems to think Washington has all the answers to our national problems, but as you know all national problems don’t require national solutions.

Can you name some national problems that neither the President nor Congress should solve?

Newt Gingrich: … I want to develop an Environmental Solutions Agency to replace the EPA with an agency which has to have economic rationality, has to look for innovation and entrepreneurship, and has to collaborate rather than dictate to state and local governments. 

Later in the evening, Newt Gingrich answered a follow up question about his 2006 television ad with Nancy Pelosi:

Scott Pruit: Mr. Speaker, I want to follow up a little bit on the appearance with Nancy Pelosi.

Newt Gingrich: Yes.

Scott Pruit: … and climate change. You’ve said and you said earlier this evening that was the dumbest thing you’ve ever done.

Newt Gingrich: Well, in recent years. I don’t want to run my whole career through it. 

Scott Pruit: Was it done because it was bad politics or done because it was bad policy?

Newt Gingrich: Well, first of all what I said there I think was accurate, which was that you need innovation and you need to look at positive ways of solving things.

I was trying to make a case about a conservative environmentalism, which is the reason I am for an Environmental Solutions Agency to replace the EPA.

It was largely done because, frankly, she became so radioactive that it was impossible for any conservative to be in the same set and not have everybody go, “That’s crazy!” and so they never heard your message.

I wrote a book with Terry Maple called Contract with the Earth and it was an effort to argue that there were sound, promarket science and technology innovations that would lead to a better environment, actually a more improved environment than you get out of lawyers and regulators and the EPA. 

Watch full video of the Huckabee Presidential Forum below. Newt Gingrich's remarks on climate change start at 2:41; on the EPA at 6:30; follow up question on Nancy Pelosi ad at 10:10.

Ron Paul talks energy policy at Portsmouth NH Town Hall (Video)

Ron Paul laid out his plan for partially eliminating the Department of Energy while responding to a voter's question at a November 30, 2011 Town Hall style event held in Portsmouth, NH. The Republican presidential candidate and Texas Congressman also explained his free market approach to energy policy:

Voter: You propose to eliminate five departments. Let’s pick on one. Let’s pick on the Department of Energy. I’m not really sure what the Department of Energy really does, but how would you go about doing it?

How do you think you can accomplish it?

Would you replace it with another energy project?

Ron Paul: No – one out of five – Department of Energy – How do you go through the process? 

You go through the process by eliminating it, but you don’t eliminate every single function of the Department of Energy, because there will be some with nuclear materials and other things. That would be transferred.

The program that I’ve devised takes that into consideration.

But the question that we hear so often, and it’s a serious question, but it’s somewhat misleading. They say, “Well, what is the energy policy?”

“Who’s going to do the energy policy?”

Well, the market does the energy policy and not the government. Therefore you're not involved in trying to figure out who should get the subsidies and who should get the help, because the market would determine it.

What you want to do is get the regulations out so you don’t need a lot of regulators in the Department of Energy.

But the President would have a lot of authority to shrink the size of it. You would work with the Congress as well in making sure that some of the functions you need to take care of are transferred.

Because it’s in the Executive Branch, the President certainly does have the authority to just shrink the size of this thing and release some of the decision making to the people and talk Congress into making sure that you don’t give subsidies to corn, but not to some other substance.

They give us bad policy. They’ll subsidize corn.

But today I read, well I think it’s been known for a while, that we probably use up more hydrocarbons making corn than we do otherwise. But there was an article today that I’d never thought about and they said, “Boy if you really want to protection your…”

This guy at least was posing as a mechanical expert, he said, “Don’t ever use that ethanol, it’s really bad for your engine.”

I’ve never heard of that one. Have you heard of that? I wouldn’t be surprised.

But you know, this is like governments shouldn’t be making these decisions. I want them out of that.

You don’t need many people to do it, but you could protect some vital functions by transferring it to other – like if it had to do with nuclear waste or nuclear power, you could have the DOD take care of it.