Hill Heat

Hearing page

Opening statement by John Garamendi

Continuing the work we began in previous years, the Readiness mark addresses vulnerabilities in installation resiliency and energy resiliency, both in response to climate change and in ensuring that our forces can accomplish their missions even in the event of power disruption, either natural or man-made.

Committee mark

The committee commends the Department of Defense for pursuing policies to increase energy resilience, and to reduce the carbon emissions of installation and operational energy to reduce climate risks. However, the committee is concerned that the Department may not be fully considering all carbon-free energy technologies, nor is it fully assessing the ability of carbon-free emitting energy technologies to meet the reliability, resilience, and performance requirements for installations and operations, especially for action strategies that do not maximize the achievement of both mission objectives and climate goals.

Accordingly, the committee directs the Secretary of Defense to submit a report to the House Committee on Armed Services not later than June 1, 2023. The report shall include at a minimum the following:

(1) an evaluation of the reliability, resilience, and performance characteristics of all existing and emerging carbon-free energy technologies, including grid-scale and micro-advanced nuclear energy;

(2) assesses whether carbon-free energy technologies are currently capable, if deployed, of meeting the reliability, resilience, and performance requirements for all agency energy uses at domestic installations for critical missions; and

(3) an assessment of emerging carbon-free energy technologies in research and development that could enhance energy resilience at domestic installations.

The committee commends the military departments on the use of energy savings performance contracts to improve energy resilience, decrease energy costs, and increase readiness at military installations. The committee notes that installation commanders and base personnel identify energy saving initiatives on their energy conservation measures list and that these projects could in turn become part of an energy savings performance contract. The committee is concerned that without a mechanism for sharing the contents of the energy conservation measures list with energy service companies, the Department of Defense is not able to utilize energy savings performance contracts to the fullest extent possible.

Therefore, the committee directs the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment to initiate a study and submit a report to the House Committee on Armed Services by January 1, 2023, on potential methods of securely sharing installation energy conservation measures requirements lists with existing Department energy services companies.