On the recordDecember 15, 2022
Mr. President, certainly the chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee and I agree on so many goals when it comes to American energy. We both believe in American energy independence. We believe in affordable clean energy. We agree that we want to leave this world cleaner, healthier, and safer than we found it. But unfortunately I oppose his amendment and ask my colleagues to oppose it as well. I am afraid this amendment will do more harm than good. It will give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission--FERC, as it is known--the power to socialize the cost of new high-voltage transmission lines. That is right--a huge shift of power will go from the States to the Federal Government. Unelected bureaucrats would have the authority to make electric customers in mostly red States pay to deliver expensive and intermittent energy that fits the green energy dreams of blue States and in many cases causes rural America to pay for urban America's electricity. It would even give Federal regulators the authority to make residents of inland States pay for transmission lines that connect offshore wind farms to coastal States, such as California, New Jersey, and New York. It would allow these same regulators to make our residents pay for these transmission lines even if power on those lines would not serve them.…
Source
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