Click here or on the image above to watch Senator Capito’s opening statement. Click here to watch Senator Capito’s questions for witnesses. 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, today participated in a hearing entitled Addressing Climate Change in the Electric Sector and Fostering Economic Growth.

HIGHLIGHTS: 

SUPPORTING AMERICAN JOBS: “If we’re looking to keep our manufacturing base—and part of Build Back Better is bringing more American jobs, manufacturing jobs into this country—do we need a diverse set of resources to power our domestic industries? Can we do it all on renewables? Are capital investments in manufacturing based on the presumption that they get access to affordable and reliable electricity?”

STREAMLINING PERMITTING: “We’ve heard a lot about the NEPA process being 4.5 years. I mentioned in my opening statement that we can’t ‘Build Back Better’ if we can’t build…So the timelines that we’re looking at for full renewable and net-zero emissions at 2035…unless we can get these things permitted in a much shorter timeframe in terms of transmission and pipelines and other things, I don’t know how we get to this aspirational goal of zero emissions in the power sector by 2035.”

 

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