Political Quotes

“I might observe, the State of Florida is in company here with a lot of other corporations. Nevertheless, I think what we have is people who are suggesting that, indeed, we have not examined sufficiently the ramifications of just what this mandate is. It has worked, in my opinion, with the States. Fourteen States have mandated renewables. It is working. Now we are coming out and saying one size fits all. In my State, if I want to have biomass, I am left out in the cold because I do not have anything but timber on public land. But it says in here that unless it is slashing, I can't even use waste from mature logs that happen to be harvested. I can't use the bark, can't use the sawdust, unless there is an amendment to this. Maybe we can get over that. There is not an awful lot of thought that has gone into this. In my opinion, it has been an effort to try to accommodate various concerns. Yes, renewables are good. We ought to really have renewables. But we are forgetting how much it costs. We are also forgetting a very important feature associated with renewables, and that is we continue to support fundamentally the funding that we have had, which has been in the area of almost $7 billion in the last 5 to 6 years in developing these renewables. But they do not come free. When we do a mandate, I really question the wisdom of it. I know it is very convenient to walk out of here and say we have all voted for renewables. That is comforting. It is good.…”