Resolutions to Instruct Conferees

Floor Speech

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here for my 254th ``Time to Wake Up'' speech. In the time I have been giving these speeches, I have watched the shifting trajectory of climate denial. First, climate change was a hoax. Then, there wasn't enough science. Then, the science is still uncertain. Then, solving this problem would hurt our economy. Then, innovation will magically save us, and now there is a new entrant in the climate denial lexicon: China. ``China isn't doing enough on carbon emissions,'' goes the argument. So we shouldn't do anything at all.

It is a talking point you hear all the time from the fossil fuel industry and its array of front groups working to block climate action here in Congress.

Now, China has done plenty to complain about. China has stolen our intellectual property, manipulated its currency, jailed its political dissenters, set unfair labor rules, and more. I have been front and center with those complaints about China. Yet, before we offer up China as the latest ``climate denial lite'' excuse for doing nothing, let's take a look at what China is really up to.

For starters, China is still a party to the Paris climate accord, and China's President doesn't say stuff like ``wind turbines cause cancer.'' OK--a low bar, I concede.

Our President recently tweeted:

Which country has the largest carbon emission reduction? AMERICA! Who has dumped the most carbon into the air? CHINA!

Actually, that is not quite true. We have still dumped more CO2 into the air than China because we have been at it longer, and we still dump a lot more than China per capita, but China's 1 billion people do put out more carbon pollution than our 300 million. They overtook us as the world's top national emitter in 2007. Last year, China accounted for about 28 percent of global CO2 emissions, and the U.S. accounted for 15 percent. Cumulatively, China accounts for 13 percent of emissions, and the U.S. accounts for 25 percent, which is about twice as much. Americans' per capita carbon emissions are among the highest in the world. The average Chinese citizen--China is here--accounts for less than half the per capita emissions of the average American.

We actually don't have lots to brag about on our emissions, but that is not where it looks the worst for us. Forget the past. Look to the future at climate action. That is where China is blowing us out of the water.

As the Trump administration slavishly fronts for fossil fuel--and is even turning the agencies of our government over to this corrupting industry--China is leaning in hard on a green energy future. China is resetting its economy for a clean energy future. China began implementing a national cap-and-trade system--a price on carbon--for its power sector in 2018, which will go into full force across the country next year. Several provinces already run cap and trade locally. This year, China is launching a mandatory renewables quota, requiring that 35 percent of its electricity be renewable by 2030, and its energy plan seeks 50 percent of total electric power generation from nonfossil sources by 2030.

China is also investing to dominate clean energy manufacturing and technology. In 2017, nearly half of the world's new renewable energy investment took place in China--triple the investment made in the United States. China leads the world in renewable power deployment with there being more than twice as much capacity as in any other nation. Almost 30 percent of the world's renewable power capacity right now is in China, including the most solar, the most wind, and the most hydro. China dominates the global deployment of solar panels. It has several times greater installed solar generation capacity than the United States. In fact, we virtually lost solar panel manufacturing to China.

On this graph, China is the yellow, and it shows China outdoing all of the other countries in total capacity. We are here compared to China there, and the gray is the general category for the rest of the world. China is even bigger than the rest of the world, not counting the United States, Japan, Germany, and India.

So that is China's lead in total renewable electricity deployment, with more than double the installed capacity of the United States and nearly a third of the total global renewable electricity capacity. Here is the world's total. There is China at 404. Then you actually have to scale down the graphic to get over here to the United States at 180-- 180 to 404. If you count nuclear power as clean energy, there is China.

China currently has the world's largest nuclear power construction program. It has 37 nuclear reactors in operation, 20 under construction, 40 in planning, and proposals for an additional 100. Next generation nuclear technologies originally designed in the United States are among those Chinese proposals. If all of those reactors are built, China will end up with twice the U.S. nuclear fleet.

In the transportation sector, we feel pretty good in the United States. We all see Teslas driving around, and Chevy has its terrific Bolt. There are emerging EV manufacturers, like Rivian, that are proposing extremely cool vehicles. Again, there is China--far out front in building electric vehicles and in deploying the infrastructure needed to run electric vehicles. China now requires that 10 percent of vehicles sold be electric or plug-in hybrids. This quota increases to 12 percent in 2020. By the end of 2018, 45 percent of all of the electric cars on the planet were in China. Last year, China manufactured nearly half of all of the electric vehicles that have been manufactured in the world.

In other areas, it is China, China, China. China dominates global markets for electric buses and two-wheelers. Exxon fabulously predicted to its shareholders that there would be zero electric buses by 2040; China is already operating 400,000.

High-tech batteries will power transportation and balance the electric grid of the future. China is planning for three times as much battery manufacturing capacity as the rest of the world combined. Carbon capture will grow as an industry as soon as it has a business model, which, by the way, carbon pricing, including China's cap-and- trade plan, will provide them. On carbon pricing, there is China, with 20 carbon capture projects under construction or in development--more than in any other nation.

Of course, it is not all good news on climate out of China, not by any stretch. The Chinese continue to build more coal-fired powerplants than any other country, not just in China but around the world. However, the difficult truth for us is that China's progress on climate change is real, and it is way more than ours. China is not doing this to be nice. It is doing this to outdo us economically and politically.

If we keep kicking our own renewable industries in the teeth here in America just to please Trump's coal industry donors while China invests in these new technologies, we will be making a losing bet. China's one- party government has put economic growth above all else. Chinese scientists see the same data that ours do. Chinese economists see the same economic risks that ours do. Chinese businesses see the same threats and opportunities for their workers and their supply chains that ours do. Chinese cities see the same threat from sea level rise that ours do. Yet the Chinese Government has chosen a smarter path because it is not under the thumb of the fossil fuel industry. The Chinese are acting out of self-interest. They are acting on climate because they want their country and their economy to succeed. They want to own these industries of the future. Rather than compete, we are now helping them win--all to make some grubby political donors happy.

The Global Commission on the Economy and Climate reports that strong climate action could deliver at least $26 trillion in economic benefits worldwide through 2030 compared with business as usual--a $26 trillion relative benefit. Over that period, these actions would generate over 65 million new low-carbon jobs globally and avoid over 700,000 premature deaths from air pollution, by the way. Whoever acts swiftly will get the biggest share of these riches.

Last year, Stanford's economists found that keeping global warming to 1.5-degrees Celsius as opposed to the riskier 2-degree safety limit would likely save more than $20 trillion in economic damages around the world by the end of this century--$20 trillion.

The world power that positions itself to reap the economic benefits of a carbon-neutral technology and that helps lead the world away from runaway climate calamities will garner tremendous economic, strategic, and diplomatic advantage. In particular, China recognizes the diplomatic advantage to acting on climate as the United States withdraws from its traditional position of international leadership.

The last century has been called the American century. We are fast handing over the next century to become the Chinese century. We are doing it to ourselves, and we are doing it for the worst of all possible reasons--to cater to and kowtow to a corrupt industry. Making sure that the next century is the American century, as well, is as good a reason as any for us to wake up and act on climate.

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