Directing Administrator Of General Services To Install A Photovoltaic System For The Headquarters Building Of The Department Of Energy

Floor Speech

DIRECTING ADMINISTRATOR OF GENERAL SERVICES TO INSTALL A PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEM FOR THE HEADQUARTERS BUILDING OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY -- (House of Representatives - February 12, 2007)

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Mr. OBERSTAR. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Over 30 years ago, Mr. Speaker, as a second-term Member of the House and serving on the Public Works Committee, as it was called then, and the Subcommittee of Public Buildings and Grounds, I heard an extraordinary presentation about the use of photovoltaics in public buildings and how, as a result of this study, energy could be saved, burning of fossil fuels could be avoided, and the Federal Government could save enormous amounts of energy costs by using a then-new technology known as photovoltaics.

I was so enthralled by the idea, I drafted legislation which I shared with my then-colleague in the Senate from the State of Minnesota, Senator Hubert Humphrey, who introduced the companion bill in the other body; and together we got the legislation enacted, signed by President Carter, funding for the first 3 years of a 3-year investment by the Federal Government in converting Federal civilian office space to photovoltaic energy. Unfortunately, President Carter lost the election. President Reagan came in and decided that the alternative energy program was an unnecessary investment of the Federal Government, and the entire alternative energy budget was deleted.

Years passed. Interest in photovoltaic cells continued. Research and development and testing and application in the private marketplace, as well as by government agencies, continued and the cost of photovoltaics dropped from $1.75 a kilowatt hour in 1977 to about 25 cents a kilowatt hour today, compared to 7 cents produced by conventional fossil fuel power centers.

Well, I thought the time was ripe again for us to make another effort at having the Federal Government lead the way and being the template, being the exemplar in the marketplace for alternative energy use and deployment and reducing its cost.

So the bill that is before us today, it was reported, we had a hearing and markup in the subcommittee and markup in the full committee to use the Department of Energy headquarters as the exemplary facility for the Nation in use of photovoltaics. The Department of Energy building, just down the street from the Capitol, on Independence Avenue and what is also known as the Forestall Building.

In 1999, our then-Secretary of Energy, Bill Richardson, conducted a national competition to get the best architectural firms to develop a conceptual design for a photovoltaic system to be installed on the south wall of the Department of Energy. Solarnet, the winning design, will transform that south wall, which was deliberately built in a solid face with no windows and no doors. It will transform that rather ugly, nondescript wall into this very attractive piece that is depicted in the panels before us in the well of the House. But that solar wall will generate 460,000 kilowatts of energy. It is 300 feet long, 130 feet high, will contain 24,750 square feet of power-generating panels.

The Federal Government is the largest single consumer of energy in the country. We are in a unique position to show the rest of the Nation how to conserve energy, how to be efficient in doing it, and to do so with our trust of management of Federal civilian office space.

The Department of Energy estimated in 2005 that the cost of energy consumption of all forms by Federal agencies was $14.5 billion; $5.5 billion of that was spent on buildings and facilities, meaning electricity.

GSA, General Services Administration, manages 387.7 million square feet of non-military, non-postal civilian office space. It ought to set the stage, it ought to set the standard for the Nation in being energy efficient and reducing the cost to the taxpayer of operating these Federal buildings.

We ought to, also, change our management of Federal office space both in the construction and in the leasing of those office facilities to life-cycle cost considerations, not just the lowest initial cost of construction; but we are going to be the tenant, we are going to be the owner of those facilities, tenant in the leased operations and owner in those that are outright owned by the Federal Government for as long as we are in there, and we ought to do the best that we can for the taxpayer, and we ought to set the stage and help create a marketplace for production of photovoltaics that will, in volume production, reduce their cost.

Photovoltaics are very simple devices. The sun strikes a panel that has lines of filament that create resistance, transmit that resistance across a grid and collectively produce direct current electricity that is then converted into alternating current electricity. It can run all the lights, the elevators, the escalators, everything, computers, everything that uses electricity in the Department of Energy building, and have excess power at the end of the day to turn back into the Potomac Electric Power Company grid so that the electric meter will run backwards at the Department of Energy at the end of the day. That is what we ought to be doing. We can do that.

It is within our authority of this committee to set the stage for advances in technology. Already some 25 buildings of the Federal Government nationwide use photovoltaics in one way or another. The Department of Agriculture does, also just down the street, Independence Avenue. The Park Service, the Forest Service, NOAA, on their weather buoys, the space program all use photovoltaics to gather information, transmit. The Highway Departments, on traffic monitoring signs, use photovoltaics, gathering electricity during the day, storing it in batteries and run those signs at night off solar power.

We are only addressing one project today, but that could be multiples in the future. And we are here doing what we can within our ability. It is not going to solve all of the problems of global climate change, but we have an obligation to do our part and to do what we can within this committee.

Toward that end, I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. LaTourette) for his participation through the subcommittee and then to the full committee.

I thank our full committee ranking member, Mr. Mica, for his support and initiative on this matter and moving us to this point where we could pass this bill in the House.

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I am very deeply touched by the gentleman's comments, Mr. Speaker. And I thank the gentleman for his thoughtfulness and for his very much appreciated comments about my service on the committee and my work over the many years.

I do recall the hearing that the gentleman chaired. He opened the hearing to the subject of photovoltaics. I remember that the gentleman did an enormous amount of homework, and he came to the hearing and surprised me with a recitation of the evolution of photovoltaic cells and the different types of materials that go into the production of photovoltaic cells and their application in a wide diversity of uses.

The gentleman deserves enormous credit in his own right for his studious and thoughtful leadership on the committee and the several responsibilities that he has held, economic development and railroads and in the public buildings and grounds arena.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. OBERSTAR. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Again I thank the gentleman from Arkansas for his thoughtfulness. And I recall our very pleasant visit to his district on transportation and economic development issues many years ago when we saw so much of the progress that has been done through the Economic Development Administration, the need for highway investments, for which the gentleman has been a strong advocate. And I also remember a very special feeling, the presentation by the Fort Smith Chamber of Commerce of a unique award: a noose. I don't know what happened to it. I never did take possession of it to bring back with me, but someday I will make a return visit to Fort Smith. There is a long story we need not describe in this setting about Fort Smith and its role in the early days of territories and frontiers.

The sun wall design, as these posters describe it, will be a very attractive facility aesthetically but attractive energywise and more than a statement, a demonstration by the Federal Government, the leadership role that it can play and it should play in moving the Nation toward energy independence.

The Department of Energy conducted an analysis some time ago of the potential for photovoltaics and demonstrated that in a 100-mile by 100-mile square area of the Arizona desert, all the energy needs of the United States could be produced by photovoltaics. Well, we are making a start on that commitment with this legislation, moving in the right direction. It is long overdue, but we are making that step in the right direction.

I thank my colleagues on the committee, Chairman MICA for his willingness to move ahead with this legislation; and the gentleman from Ohio for his thoughtful and studious advocacy of the legislation; and Ms. Norton, the Chair of our Public Buildings and Economic Development Subcommittee, for their participation in bringing the bill to this point.

If there are no further speakers, if the gentleman yields back, we will yield back our time.

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Mr. OBERSTAR. Mr. Speaker, I hope no raccoons will be caught in the energy wall because that is the sort of place that raccoons like to frequent.

Again, I thank my colleagues for their participation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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