Climate Change and Ensuring that America Leads the Clean Energy Transformation

EPW Committee Aug 6, 2009 Inhofe comments
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR JAMES M. INHOFE
Climate Change and Ensuring that America Leads the Clean Energy Transformation
August 6, 2009

Excerpts include:
....so I think it's appropriate to take stock of what we've learned.
...this committee has held over thirty hearings on climate change.

We learned, for example, from President Obama that under his cap-and-trade plan, "electricity prices would necessarily skyrocket."

We learned from Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) that cap-and-trade is "a tax, and a great big one."

We learned from Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) that "a cap-and-trade system is prone to market manipulation and speculation without any guarantee of meaningful GHG emission reductions. A cap-and-trade has been operating in Europe for three years and is largely a failure."

We learned from Sen. Dorgan (D-N.D.) that with cap-and-trade "the Wall Street crowd can't wait to sink their teeth into a new trillion-dollar trading market in which hedge funds and investment banks would trade and speculate on carbon credits and securities. ..... most of the investment banks have already created carbon trading departments."

We learned from Sen. Cantwell (D-Wash.) that "a cap-and-trade program might allow Wall Street to distort a carbon market for its own profits."

We learned from EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson that unilateral U.S. action to address climate change through cap-and-trade would be futile. She said in response to a question from me that "U.S. action alone will not impact world CO2 levels."

We learned from Sen. Kerry (D-Mass.) that "there is no way the United States of America acting alone can solve this problem. So we have to have China; we have to have India."

We learned from Sen. McCaskill (D-Mo.) that if "we go too far with this," that is, cap-and-trade, then "all we're going to do is chase more jobs to China and India, where they've been putting up coal-fired plants every 10 minutes."

.......Democrats taught us that cap-and-trade is a great big tax that will raise electricity prices on consumers, enrich Wall Street traders, and send jobs to China and India-all without any impact on global temperature.

According to the American Farm Bureau, the vast majority of agriculture groups oppose it;

According to GAO, it will send our jobs to China and India;

According to the National Black Chamber of Commerce, it will destroy over 2 million jobs;

According to EPA and EIA, it will not reduce our dependence on foreign oil;

According to EPA, it will do nothing to reduce global temperature;