The Senate Finance Committee advanced the Clean Energy for America Act, which incentivizes clean energy, clean transportation, and energy efficiency.
The bill passed by a vote of 14-14 and now moves to the full Senate for approval.
“Today is a momentous day. For the first time, the Senate Finance Committee has advanced comprehensive clean-energy legislation,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), chair of the committee, said. “The American people know the climate crisis is an existential threat and strongly support bold action. The Clean Energy for America Act would both put us on the path to achieve our emissions-reductions goals and help create hundreds of thousands of good-paying, clean-energy jobs. As we move forward with President Biden’s jobs and infrastructure agenda, our bill should be the linchpin of our efforts on clean energy. I look forward to working with my colleagues to finally enact clean-energy legislation to build a better future for our children, both in terms of the climate and economy.”
Wyden explained that this bill replaces a “hodgepodge” of 44 different energy tax breaks for a host of fuel sources and technologies.
“These tax breaks have stacked up over the decades like dusty old papers on the messiest desk in the office. The system is anti-competitive and anti-innovation. It puts the government in the role of picking winners and losers by giving some fuels and technologies big, permanent tax breaks while others have short-term, temporary extensions. It has survived in this form for one reason only: Congress has long found it easier to pile on so-called “tax extenders” than clean things up once and for all,” Wyden said.
The Clean Energy for America Act replaces those old rules with a bill to reduce carbon emissions, focusing on three goals — clean energy, clean transportation, and energy efficiency.
“The system on the books today is bad for competition, bad for innovation, and bad for climate. I want to take what I consider to be a classic American approach: use policy to set a big goal and then get out of the way. Let American entrepreneurs and inventors do what they do best. That’s what the Clean Energy for America Act is all about. It’s going big on the proposition that everybody will be interested in new incentives to cut carbon and create high-wage, high-skill jobs at the same time,” Wyden said.
Wyden added that the bill would put the country on a path to a zero net-emissions power sector by 2035 while creating a net gain of more than 600,000 new jobs.
“The reality is, countries around the world have no choice but to turn away from carbon. Clean energy and transportation jobs are coming, it’s just a question of where. If Congress sticks with the 44 breaks of yesteryear, those jobs will go to China, India, Germany, and elsewhere. This committee and the Senate cannot afford to pass up this opportunity,” Wyden said.