Jared Huffman: “Last week, in a Friday afternoon announcement designed to bury the news, the State Department released a very troubling…”

“Last week, in a Friday afternoon announcement designed to bury the news, the State Department released a very troubling supplemental environmental document regarding the Keystone XL pipeline, a project that would undo the progress our country has been making in recent years in showing leadership on climate change, in reducing gas emissions and transitioning to a clean energy economy. Unfortunately, environmental protection seems to be a ``foreign'' policy to our State Department. But even this pro-industry report cannot gloss over the fact that Keystone XL would unlock development of some of the dirtiest, most climate-damaging fuel on Earth, and it would lock the United States into deeper dependence on expensive tar sands fuel that would take this country in the wrong direction for our environment and our economy. Just this morning in the Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources, we heard about the enormous potential for wind energy to generate jobs and also cost-effectively improve energy independence. Other forms of clean energy hold the same promise. Madam Speaker, it's time to get serious about climate change and clean energy job creation. Importing dirty, expensive tar sands fuel is the wrong way to do that. ____________________”