James Davis: “I rise in support of the Skaggs amendment on energy efficiency and conservation programs. I appreciate the difficulty in…”

“I rise in support of the Skaggs amendment on energy efficiency and conservation programs. I appreciate the difficulty in balancing the critical needs of our country in preparing the Interior Appropriations Bill for Fiscal Year 1999. However, today I rise in strong support of the Skaggs amendment to restore much needed funding for our country's energy conservation programs. Of particular interest to my home state of Florida is the recommended $10 million increase in funding for building technologies. The windows and glazing programs, which is funded through the Building Technology Category, provides funding for a promising new technology with enormous energy saving potential for the commercial windows market. I am hopeful that the Skaggs amendment will lead to a funding increase in the windows and glazing programs, which would allow the further development of plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) techniques for electrochromic technologies. This technology provides a flexible means of controlling the amount of heat and light that pass through a glass surface providing significant energy conservation opportunities. The Department of Energy estimates that placing this technology on all commercial building windows in the United States would produce yearly energy savings equivalent of the amount of oil that passes through the Alaskan pipeline each year.”