Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes. I rise in opposition to this bill. I was on the committee back in 2007 when we first wrote the efficiency standards that Republicans are trying to repeal here today. The way I remember it, our current chairman, Mr. Upton, introduced the bill to set the standards. Our former House Speaker, Dennis Hastert, supported it, along with many Republicans. And, finally, President George W. Bush signed these standards into law. In fact, if you look at the history behind consensus efficiency standard, you will see that this used to be something that we all agreed upon. Beginning with President Reagan in 1987, Congress and the White House have enacted Federal energy efficiency standards five times, each time with bipartisan support. These standards were developed as consensus agreements with manufacturers, energy efficiency advocates, and States. There's more than 50 products on the market today that are covered by a variety of these Federal standards. Everything from dishwashers and refrigerators to traffic signals have become more efficient as a result of these Federal standards, saving the country energy and saving consumers money. These standards have been in effect since 1987, have saved Americans about 3.6 quads of energy. If we continue with enacting Federal efficiency standards, we can save up to 6.1 quads of energy by 2030. That is more energy than was used in my State of Pennsylvania in 2008.…”