Podcast Transcript
Secretary Salazar Cites Progress on Renewable Energy in Hill Speech
Intro/music: This is a podcast from the U.S. Department of the Interior
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar addressed the Alliance to Save Energy’s Capitol Hill summit on Thursday, September 17th.
He told the gathering that the Department of the Interior is making progress toward the development of clean Renewable Energy.
Salazar: We have already begun to change how the Department of the Interior does business. We are now managing America’s public lands, not just for balanced oil and natural gas and coal development, which we need, but also for the first time ever to allow environmentally responsible renewable energy projects that can help power the nation’s vision and the president’s vision for a clean energy future. These changes to how we do business are vital. In large measure the vast deserts, plains, forests and oceans that belong to every American, have until now, have been largely unexplored for their vast renewable energy potential.
Since January, the Department of the Interior has been operating swiftly to implement President Obama’s clean energy agenda, building a framework for future development and cutting through red tape.
Salazar: We at the Department of the Interior have done the following: We have created the first-ever framework for offshore renewable energy development. We have cleared out the bureaucratic red tape that had been in place between FERC and Interior that was creating unnecessary confusion and creating obstacles to potential offshore renewable energy development. We have invested $41 million through the President’s economic recovery plan to facilitate a rapid and responsible move to large-scale production of renewable energy on public lands. We are creating renewable energy permitting offices in western states and hopefully one in the Atlantic as well that will help swiftly complete reviews on the most ready-to-go solar, wind, geo-thermal and biomass projects on public lands. And we have identified 24 solar energy study areas, that’s a thousand square miles of land, that the Department of the Interior, I have set aside, to evaluate for environmentally appropriate solar energy development across the West. These areas alone could generate nearly 100,000 megawatts of solar electricity, just from these areas, enough electricity from these solar zones to power more than 29 million American homes.
The Department of the Interior, Secretary Salazar pointed out, is leading by example, considering its own carbon footprint and taking action.
Salazar: Who would’ve thought that the Department of the Interior, with its reputation for focusing almost exclusively on conventional energy production, would today have a green roof on our building. Who would’ve thought that the Department of the Interior would be undertaking its first-ever carbon footprint project within that department, and would’ve thought five years ago that many of Interior’s facilities and parks and refuges and public lands would soon be equipped with energy saving measures and equipment such as solar panels and wind micro-turbines. We have come a long way in a very short period of time. To be sure, the road ahead the new energy frontier will be difficult, but the urgency of the problems we face and the speed which our world is changing gives us no choice. We need to transform this moment of crisis into a foundation for lasting economic growth.
Renewable energy is an important step toward energy independence, the lack of which the Secretary said puts our nation at risk.
Salazar: We all know the degree to which our dependence on foreign oil puts our national security, our environmental security and our economic security at risk. We export hundreds of billions of dollars every year to buy the oil that we need to power our country, to power our homes to power our businesses. We can’t afford to continue down that path anymore. And we can’t afford to let the rising cost of our failed energy policy to continue to go unchecked.
This has been a podcast from the U.S. Department of the Interior; I’m Ron Tull, Washington.