Solar Technology Roadmap Act

Floor Speech

Solar Technology Roadmap Act

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Mr. HIMES. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I'd like to begin by thanking Chairman Gordon for his excellent work on this very, very important bill guiding us towards where this country needs to be in energy in the coming years and generations.

I rise today to offer an amendment which I think is about a topic at the forefront of everybody's minds right now, which is jobs, jobs, and jobs. This bill is about the creation of good, high-paying jobs for American workers and, in the process, restoring our competitiveness in one of the most important industries of the next century.

Mr. Chair, every new solar panel system we install in this country creates new business for roofers, for electricians, for engineers, and for construction workers. But I'm most excited about what solar power can do for America's manufacturing.

I refuse to believe that America's days as a world leader in manufacturing are over. An industry report by Duke University found that by 2016, only 7 years from now, solar manufacturing could replace 500,000 jobs that have been lost, say, in the auto industry; 500,000 jobs, the manufacturing sector of the 21st century, if we make the right investments now.

Back when very few of us were talking about solar power, the U.S. was quietly leading the world in the production of solar technology. Well, through the 1990s, no country on Earth invested more in solar than we did. So how is it that here in 2009, only 5 percent, 5 percent of the world's solar panels are made in America? There's a one-word answer to that question, and that word is ``investment.''

Look at China. Through their Golden Sun program, the Chinese Ministries of Finance, Science and Technology and the National Energy Administration are subsidizing half of the construction and connection costs for on-grid solar power plants and 70 percent of the cost of off-grid installations from now until 2011. And American companies are following these investments.

First Solar, of Tempe, Arizona, recently signed an agreement to build a 2-gigawatt plant, 2 gigawatts, one of the largest solar plants in the world, in Ordos City in Inner Mongolia. Now, I have nothing against Mongolia, but I, for one, would prefer to see those jobs in Bridgeport or Stamford or any of the other American cities that saw their manufacturing sectors decimated in the last 50 years.

I'm especially excited about this bill because solar power is creating jobs right now in my district. Opel, Inc., of Shelton, Connecticut, is making and installing some of the most advanced solar technology anywhere on the market, and technology that is the subject of my amendment today.

Concentrated photovoltaic or CPV systems employ lenses and tracking systems to focus sunlight into a small beam concentrated on a photovoltaic surface. This relatively new technology is already showing dramatic potential. In May 2008, IBM demonstrated a prototype CPV using computer chip cooling techniques to improve an energy density of 2,300 suns.

As we accelerate our efforts to raise the efficiency and lower the cost of solar power, it is worth pointing out that CPV systems provide greater power production--20 to 40 percent more kilowatt hours--with lower costs and less land usage than any solar technology science has yet produced.

CPV technologies are an ideal source of scalable, utility-grade solar electric power production that will move solar energy faster toward grid parity costs. My amendment merely clarifies that these leading-edge technologies will be included among those funded as part of the solar road map.

The global race to a clean energy economy is on, Mr. Chair, and millions of new jobs are on the line. We may have fallen behind a bit, but this is our chance to catch up.

I thank Mr. Gordon for his committee's excellent work, urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and reserve the balance of my time.

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