Thank you very much, Mr. Anderson.

It is clear to me that a lot of these fires, they are not natural fires. These are infernos that just come about as a result of neglect.

We have got to get some results because that is what our constituents are demanding of us.

I think what you will find in these discussions, and my sense is we are going to have lots of them, is that this committee, on both sides of the aisle, is going to make sure that we get results.

We are going to work very closely with Senator Bennett because we always do, my longtime ally.

Good for Senator Jon Tester! Please give this critically important legislation every consideration.

We must do a better job of this, and I think Secretary Vilsack's speech in August of this year on the national forests and the private forests emphasized the importance of collaboration.

I recognize the chairman of the full committee, Senator Bingaman, is here.

Understand that in the rural West, not only are people frustrated, they can't understand how it is that their Government can come up with billions of dollars...

If the Federal government can bail out our automobile companies and banks, it cannot support bailing out the timber industry in Montana?

I want to thank Senator Tester for his leadership and his friendship, and I look forward to working with him on this.

What we have always wanted in the West was a win-win. We wanted to have strong rural economies, and we wanted to protect our treasures.

please do the same with the landscape restoration suggested by the bill...mandate that too.

The subcommittee will come to order, and good afternoon to all.

Senator Wyden has urged that we have this hearing.

I want to make sure I understand what you were saying to Chairman Bingaman because your answer, I will tell you, troubles me.

There is something pretty bizarre, even by the standards of the Beltway, of throwing away the economic value, for example, of renewable energy because the wind is blowing or the tide is changing at 3 in the morning when demand is low.

Let us not let it get away.

I believe that continuing the Nation's commitment to research and development in this area offers the promise of further technology breakthroughs.

I think this is an extraordinarily important topic because I don't think the people of this country, nor those of us in public office recognize that we are wasting so much of our treasure trove, this extraordinary array of renewable energy…

I see a lot of 'wait and see' here, and what I want is something that is much more aggressive.

Yet we fritter away so much of this extraordinary resource because we have not set in place, as Senator Murkowski notes, the full array of storage technologies that would allow us to capture the full potential of these renewable resources.

Thank you, Madame Chair.

Isn't it fair to say that this country is missing the boat on energy storage.

We just got to get serious about this and quickly.