Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation Tax Act of 2008

RENEWABLE ENERGY AND ENERGY CONSERVATION TAX ACT OF 2008 -- (House of Representatives - February 27, 2008)

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Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this debate is not nearly so much about fossil fuels as fossilized thinking. Conceivably there was a time in this country when federal tax policy that was ``of, by and for Big Oil'' meant dependable energy for our families. But now that approach of overreliance is as outdated and ill-conceived as eight-track tapes and President Bush's ``Mission Accomplished'' banner.

Today's legislation would mean more renewable energy production, more solar energy, more wind energy, and provisions that I authored to encourage plug-in hybrid vehicles and geothermal heat pumps. And we don't borrow the money to pay for this renewable energy policy as the spend-and-borrow Republicans always insist. We pay for the measure by asking Big Oil to share just a tiny part of the tax subsidies that they have received for decades with these emerging renewable energy sources.

One of the new tax loopholes that we close in this bill would otherwise have allowed Big Oil to claim a dollar for every gallon that it produced by simply dropping a little dab of grease in petroleum, ironically a provision intended to assist biofuels companies to help us achieve energy independence. And the cost of this modest increase in addressing these unjustifiable tax breaks for Big Oil is so small that I doubt it will even warrant a footnote in the astronomical earnings report of ExxonMobil.

The charge made here today that the price of gas will go up if this bill passes is ludicrous. Does anyone here remember the price of gas going down when the oil companies got this unjustifiable tax break? It didn't go down a dime. And this charge comes from the same crowd that stood idly by while the cost of gas at the pump skyrocketed and did absolutely nothing.

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Of course the biggest subsidy of all for our fossilized foreign energy police is the military presence that we must maintain in foreign lands, places as volatile as the petroleum underneath them. We need real change in our energy policy that will bring us closer to a solution for both global warming and global war. I am proud that the City of Austin, Austin Energy, and people throughout Central Texas have taken a leadership role to move us in that direction.

The bill we have today is green. It is a green light to green jobs and a green environment. And the only folks that are seeing red today are those whose padded profits compel them to block the door to progress that this legislation would open.

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