Hill Heat

In cooperation with Members of the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate Renewable Energy & Energy Efficiency Caucuses – and in partnership with the House Sustainable Energy & Environment Coalition, House High Performance Building Caucus, House Algae Energy Caucus, House Hydropower Caucus, House Green Jobs Caucus, House Hydrogen & Fuel Cell Caucus, and House Green Schools Caucus – the Sustainable Energy Coalition is hosting the day-long 13th annual Congressional Renewable Energy & Energy Efficiency Expo + Forum.

This year’s Expo will bring together 50+ businesses, sustainable energy industry trade associations, government agencies, and energy policy research organizations (see list-to-date below) to showcase the status and near-term potential of the cross-section of renewable energy (biofuels/biomass, geothermal, solar, water, wind), fuel cells, hydrogen, energy storage, smart-grid, and energy efficiency technologies (e.g., lighting, appliances, vehicles, buildings, CHP).

Review current issues related to offshore oil and gas development including the Department of the Interior’s recent five year planning announcements and the accident in the Gulf of Mexico involving the offshore oil rig Deepwater Horizon.

Rescheduled from May 6.

Witnesses

Panel 1

• Dr. F.E. Beck, Associate Professor, Texas A&M University
• Bud Danenberger, Former Chief, Offshore Regulatory Program, Minerals Management Service

Panel 2

• Lamar McKay, President and Chairman, BP America, Inc.
• Steven Newman, President and Chief Executive Officer, Transocean Limited
• Tim Probert, President, Global Business Lines; Chief Health, Safety and Environmental Officer, Halliburton

The Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) invites you to a briefing to examine the potential effects of pending energy and climate legislation on the transportation sector and U.S. dependence on oil. Policies that create a sustained, stable, and predictable price on carbon for transportation fuels have the potential to promote fuel-efficient vehicles, low-carbon fuels, and more energy-efficient transportation decisions by businesses and consumers. However, how such a price is determined, how it is applied, and how generated revenues are used can greatly influence the benefits and costs of such a policy. This briefing will focus on the economic and environmental implications of alternative ways to reduce oil use and greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector and how key stakeholders are likely to respond. Speakers for this event include:

• Dr. David Montgomery, Vice-President, Charles River Associates
• Dr. Chad Stone, Chief Economist, Center for Budget and Policy Priorities
• Dr. Adele Morris, Policy Director for Energy and Climate Economics, Brookings Institution
• Dr. David Austin, Senior Economist, Congressional Budget Office
• Jack Basso, Director of Program Finance and Management, American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO)
• James Corless, Director, Transportation for America
• Patrick O’Connor, Legislative Counsel, NAFA Fleet Management Association

Fuel use in the transportation sector is widely regarded to be less sensitive to changes in price, relative to electricity and other sectors of the economy, due in part to limited availability of transportation options and substitutes for petroleum fuels. Recent swings in fuel prices, corresponding demand responses, and other research suggest, however, that modest price signals - especially sustained price signals - can spur investments in clean transportation and create significant benefits for the transportation sector. Options to create a carbon price through a fee on transportation fuels can be designed to be as effective and predictable as other policy options based on tradable allowances. Any revenues generated through such policies can be returned to consumers and businesses, reinvested in transportation infrastructure and advanced vehicle and fuel technology, or directed to a combination of public uses.

This briefing is free and open to the public. No RSVP required. For more information, please contact Jan Mueller at [email protected] or (202) 662-1883.

The effects of climate change and the way we use energy are significant U.S. national security challenges. Addressing them will be increasingly important for our nation’s defense. The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) invites you to attend an event that will examine these critical issues, featuring a keynote address by Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change.

A roundtable discussion among national security experts will follow the keynote address. Experts will address questions including: How will energy and water challenges in Pakistan and Afghanistan affect current operations in the region and U.S. military bases around the globe? How will competition for energy, strategic minerals, food, and water affect countries and regions of strategic importance – from Afghanistan to the Arctic, China to Yemen?

This event marks the launch of the groundbreaking CNAS report Broadening Horizons: Climate Change and the U.S. Armed Forces, which examines the dual pressures of climate change and energy on each U.S. military service and regional combatant command. Authors Christine Parthemore; Commander Herb Carmen, USN; and Will Rogers map a road ahead to improve the country’s ability to promote national security in the face of a changing climate.

KEYNOTE ADDRESS

• Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change

PANEL DISCUSSION

• Dr. David Kilcullen, President and CEO of Caerus
• Rear Admiral Philip Hart Cullom, USN Head of the Navy’s Task Force Energy Director, Fleet Readiness Division on the Navy Staff
• Robert Kaplan, Senior Fellow, CNAS Correspondent, The Atlantic Monthly
• Christine Parthemore, Bacevich Fellow, CNAS

2:30-3:00 p.m.: Check-in and registration
3:00-5:30 p.m.: Event
5:30-7:00 p.m.: Cocktail reception

Location:
The Willard InterContinental Hotel
1401 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

The “green” technology boom is being heralded as the next technological revolution, able to lower greenhouse gas emissions, promote economic growth and create millions of new jobs. A number of new policies are being adopted at both the national and local levels to foster the growth and adoption of the new green technologies—including production tax credits for solar, wind and geothermal; renewable portfolio standards; and feed-in tariffs, to name a few. Solar energy has benefitted from increased private investment and public subsidies in recent years but seems to remain ever on the edge of breakthrough.

On April 28, the Energy Security Initiative at Brookings will host the first in a series of events that will examine the prospects for these potentially game-changing energy technologies to make the shift from alternative to mainstream. Experts from many sectors will discuss the key political and economical barriers and opportunities for utility-scale solar energy. Two panel discussions will explore a wide range of questions, including: What will it take to grow a viable solar industry in the United States? What policies could move solar energy into more widespread use and achieve grid parity? What are the job implications for the United States if other countries take the lead in developing the technology? And what role is public awareness or a lack thereof playing in solar energy adoption?

After the program, panelists will take audience questions.

Introduction

Charles Ebinger, Senior Fellow and Director, Energy Security Initiative, The Brookings Institution

Keynote Remarks

Stephanie Burns, CEO, Dow Corning

Panel 1: Policy and Economics

• Moderator: Charles Ebinger, Senior Fellow and Director, Energy Security Initiative, The Brookings Institution
• Richard Kauffman, CEO, Good Energies
• Dr. Lola Infante, Director, Generation Fuels and Market Analysis, Edison Electric Institute
• Charles Hemmeline, Market Transformation, Solar Energies, Technology Program, U.S. Department of Energy

Panel 2: Technology, Market Deployment and Job Development

• Moderator: John Banks, Nonresident Fellow, Brookings Institution
• Robert Boehm, Director, Energy Research Center, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
• Steve Kalland, Director, North Carolina Solar Center, North Carolina State University

The Brookings Institution
Falk Auditorium
1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036

RSVP

The Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) and Center for Climate Strategies (CCS) invite you to a briefing on The Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Policy Options on the U.S. Economy, a new study by CCS that examines the nationwide impacts of 23 major strategies formulated by over 1,500 stake-holders in more than 20 states to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and achieve energy and environ-mental co-benefits. At a time of recession and high unemployment, many question putting demands on our economic sectors and fear that increased energy prices will slow the economy and harm jobs. But macro-economic analysis of a diverse set of policies and measures selected and designed by stakeholders in numerous states shows that addressing climate change and promoting energy policy can spur the economy, create jobs, and reduce energy prices. The briefing panel will provide perspectives on local, state and federal program opportunities for economic development and job creation in all sectors.

Speakers for this event include:

• Adam Rose, Economics Professor, School of Policy, Planning and Development (SPPD), University of Southern California
• Jeff Wennberg, Project Manager, Center for Climate Strategies; former Vermont Environment Commissioner and former Mayor of Rutland, Vermont
• Joe Sherrick, Climate Change Program Manager, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
• Tom Peterson, President and CEO, Center for Climate Strategies, Adjunct Professor at the Johns Hopkins University Global Security Center

More than 30 states have created comprehensive state climate action plans, comprised of balanced portfolios of mitigation measures aimed at reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and saving or diversifying energy within their states. These policies address several sectors of the economy, including energy supply, manufacturing, agriculture, buildings, transportation, and waste management. Many are highly cost effective, save consumers money, and have other co-benefits—such as improving public health or reducing reliance on imported oil. The report looks at recommendations for action at all levels of government under a national policy framework developed by stakeholders through climate planning.

This briefing is free and open to the public. No RSVP required. For more information, contact Laura Parsons at (202) 662-1884 or [email protected].

Today, President Barack Obama discussed the initial findings of an investigation by Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, Mine Safety and Health Administration chief Joe Main, and MSHA Administrator for Coal Mine Safety and Health Kevin Stricklin:

THE PRESIDENT: Good morning, everybody. On April 5th, the United States suffered the worst mine disaster in more than a generation. Twenty-nine lives were lost. Families have been devastated. Communities have been upended. And during this painful time, all of us are mourning with the people of Montcoal and Whitesville and Naoma and the Coal River Valley. The people of West Virginia are in our prayers.

But we owe them more than prayers. We owe them action. We owe them accountability. We owe them an assurance that when they go to work every day, when they enter that dark mine, they are not alone. They ought to know that behind them there is a company that’s doing what it takes to protect them, and a government that is looking out for their safety.

In the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, I asked the officials standing with me – Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, and Joe Main and Kevin Stricklin with the Mine Safety and Health Administration – to lead an investigation into what caused the explosion at Massey Energy Company’s Upper Big Branch mine. I asked them to report back with preliminary findings this week.

We just concluded a meeting, where they briefed me on their investigation. I want to emphasize that this investigation is ongoing, and there’s still a lot that we don’t know. But we do know that this tragedy was triggered by a failure at the Upper Big Branch mine—a failure first and foremost of management, but also a failure of oversight and a failure of laws so riddled with loopholes that they allow unsafe conditions to continue.

So today I’ve directed Secretary Solis, Assistant Secretary Main, and Administrator Stricklin to work closely with state mining officials to press ahead with this investigation—so we can help make sure a disaster like this never happens again. Owners responsible for conditions in the Upper Big Branch mine should be held accountable for decisions they made and preventive measures they failed to take. And I’ve asked Secretary Solis to work with the Justice Department to ensure that every tool in the federal government is available in this investigation.

But this isn’t just about a single mine. It’s about all of our mines. The safety record at the Massey Upper Big Branch mine was troubling. And it’s clear that while there are many responsible companies, far too many mines aren’t doing enough to protect their workers’ safety.

Below is the text of the remarks from Dr. Lawrence Summers, the Director of the White House’s National Economic Council, to the U.S. Energy Information Administration Conference.

A few months before I came into government, my twin daughters completed their course in AP U.S. history at their local high school and I reviewed for their test with them. There were two aspects of that experience that stuck with me as I thought about my objectives in advising President Obama.

The first is that while I, as a macroeconomist, thought of the 1982 recession as a big deal, thought of the inflation of the 1970s as a big deal, thought about the 1987 stock market crash as a big deal, none of them got mentioned in my daughters’ history course.

On the other hand, they spent six weeks on the events of the 1930s.

And the lesson I took away, coming into office a year ago, was that our first priority had to be making sure that a depression was avoided. Making sure that the vicious cycle of deleveraging and contraction that then plagued the economy was first contained and then ultimately reversed. And so this was remembered as a very disturbing economic fluctuation, but not as the kind of depression that defined an era.

And the evidence, I think, suggests that the President has made very substantial progress with that objective.

• Fifteen months ago, a depression did not look unlikely as three-quarters of a million Americans were losing their jobs each month.
• The stock market was, after correcting for inflation, at 1966 levels.
• And the output was declining at 6 percent a quarter.

Today, we have a long way to go, but a 6 percent GDP loss in first quarter gave way to a 6 percent gain in GDP, according to the most recent statistics.

Markets have risen by 75 percent since last March as conditions have substantially normalized.

And while there are special factors and there will be fluctuations, the economy has begun to produce jobs again: 162,000 last month, the largest increase in the number of jobs in three years.

While we have a long way to go in an economy with 9.7 percent unemployment and $1 trillion short of potential, we are at last moving in the right direction.

As we move in the right direction, as this recovery unfolds, as what economists call the left tail of the distribution recedes in likelihood, it becomes essential that

• We think about the renewal of the American economy;
• We think about creating an economy with a stronger foundation for prosperity than the one that we inherited;
• We invest more and consume less;
• We technologically engineer more and we financially engineer less;
• We look to the long view and to the short view less;
• We compete in the global economy and we win.

To do so, in many areas, will require a change in our gestalt. Not the continuation of existing battles and of existing conflicts, but the reformulation of problems in new ways that permit us to cut across old debates and to as a nation move forward.

It is the accomplishment of those tasks of national economic renewal that are what came through again and again as what history remembered in that history course my daughters took.

Whether it was the land grant colleges and intercontinental railroad of President Lincoln, whether it was the Sherman Act and national parks and much more of President Theodore Roosevelt, whether it was the expansion of the concept of protection so as to save the market economy from itself with Social Security and unemployment insurance and deposit insurance of President Franklin Roosevelt, ultimately the most historically memorable accomplishments are those which renew our market system, which approach problems in different ways, and extend our efforts to create a more stable and more durable and more secure prosperity.

And it is that across a range of areas that will, I believe, define President Obama’s presidency when its history is written.

That was the motivation for the President’s historic battle for comprehensive health reform.

That was the motivation and is the continuing motivation for our efforts to insist that we rebuild our financial system and particularly the way in which it is regulated on a much more secure foundation after all the crises of the last generation.

And it is this approach of a new gestalt, a new view, a new paradigm, and a commitment to renewal that I believe needs to shape our approach to energy policy going forward.

To be sure, energy policy is about much more than economics.

There are only two ways in which mankind can affect the basic terms of life on earth on a planetary scale. One is what happens with respect to nuclear weapons. That’s outside my sphere, but in Prague later this week and in Washington next week we are making substantial progress with respect to the challenge of nuclear weapons.

The other, of course, is with respect to global climate change, where it is an imperative for this planet that we act so as to reduce the risks that current science points up.

For the first time, the U.S. Energy Information Administration is hosting a major energy conference in partnership with the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University. The conference attracts U.S. and international attendees from government, industry, non-profit organizations, the media, and academia.

2010 Energy Conference with Keynotes

• Dr. Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy
• Dr. Lawrence H. Summers, Director of the National Economic Council

Session	Moderator
U.S. Climate Change Policy: What’s Next After Copenhagen	Richard Newell (EIA Administrator)
Short-Term Energy Prices — What Drivers Matter Most?	Howard Gruenspecht (EIA Deputy Administrator)
The Energy-Water Nexus: Availability and Impacts	Howard Gruenspecht
EIA’s 2010 Annual Energy Outlook Highlights	John Conti (EIA)
Regulating Energy Commodities	Steve Harvey (EIA)
Biofuels: Continuing Shifts in the Industry and Long-Term Outlook	Michael Schaal (EIA)
Natural Gas: U.S. Markets in a Global Context	Glen Sweetnam (EIA)
Smart Grid: Impacts on Electric Power Supply and Demand	Joseph Paladino (DOE, Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability)
Energy and the Economy	Adam Sieminski (Deutsche Bank)
Energy Efficiency: Measuring Gains and Quantifying Opportunities	Deborah Bleviss (School of Advanced International Studies)

Confirmed speakers

• Paul N. Argyropoulos (Environmental Protection Agency)
• David M. Arseneau (Federal Reserve Board)
• Thomas Beauduy (Susquehanna River Basin Commission)
• Guy Caruso (Center for Strategic and International Studies)
• Brooke Coleman (New Fuels Alliance)
• John Conti (EIA)
• Sean Cota (Cota & Cota)
• Tom R. Eizember (Exxon Mobil Corporation)
• Michelle Foss (University of Texas)
• Peter Gross (EIA)
• Jason Grumet (Bipartisan Policy Center)
• Karen Harbert (U.S. Chamber of Commerce)
• M. Michael Hightower (Sandia National Laboratories)
• Skip Horvath (Natural Gas Supply Association)
• Gina McCarthy (Environmental Protection Agency)
• Edward L. Morse (Credit Suisse Securities)
• Deanna L. Newcomb (McDermott Will & Emery LLP)
• Mary Novak (IHS Global Insight)
• Matthew C. Rogers (DOE)
• Timothy D. Searchinger (Princeton University)
• Benjamin Schlesinger (Benjamin Schlesinger and Associates/Galway Group)
• Andrew Slaughter (Shell)
• Glen Sweetnam (EIA)
• Jeff Wright (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission)

International Trade Center
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W.
Washington, DC 20004

Today, President Barack Obama announced a sweeping new offshore drilling policy, opening “vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling” for the first time. This plan would also restore the ban on drilling in Alaska’s Bristol Bay. White House officials “pitched the changes as ways to reduce U.S. reliance on foreign oil and create jobs,” the Associated Press reports. For years, Obama has explained that new offshore drilling would not “reduce U.S. reliance on foreign oil” :

“The days of running a 21st century economy on a 20th century fossil fuel are numbered – and we need to realize that before it’s too late.”

“The truth is, an oil future is not a secure future for America.”

“We could open up every square inch of America to drilling and we still wouldn’t even make a dent in our oil dependency.” 9/15/05

“It would be nice if we could produce our way out of this problem, but it’s just not possible.” 2/28/06

“Instead of making tough political decisions about how to reduce our insatiable demand for oil, this bill continues to lull the American people into thinking that we can drill our way out of our energy problems. ” 8/1/06

“Now is the time to end this addiction, and to understand that drilling is a stop-gap measure, not a long-term solution. Not even close.” 8/28/08

In the beginning of August 2008, as Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions for Winning the Future (ASWF) “Drill Here, Drill Now” campaign overlapped the presidential campaign, and oil and gas prices were skyrocketing to record levels, Obama abandoned his “blanket opposition to expanded offshore drilling,” saying that he would be willing “to compromise in terms of a careful, well thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage” in order to get Republican votes for comprehensive climate and energy reform.

In 2005 and 2006, Obama talked about the “tough decisions” of “how to reduce our insatiable demand for oil” and “investing in more hybrids and renewable energy sources, raising CAFE standards and helping our auto industry transition to a fuel-efficient future,” instead of drilling. In his State of the Union speech in 2010, in contrast, Obama said that “clean energy jobs” means “making tough decisions about opening new offshore areas for oil and gas development.”

Conservatives are treating the announcement with disdain— ASWF said the president’s plan “is likely to be an attempt by Obama to seduce the public (into) believing that he will do something in the future on offshore drilling,” but amounts to little more than window-dressing. Americans for Prosperity vice president Phil Kerpen commented that “the idea that this is a big concession in exchange for which Congress should jumpstart climate legislation is ridiculous.”