Sheldon Whitehouse

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it adjourn under the previous order.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I ask unanimous consent the Senate proceed to S. Res. 503, submitted earlier today.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am honored to join my senior Senator to commemorate such an important milestone as he has described in American education. It was 40 years ago this week that President Nixon signed into law the Education Amendments Act of 1972, including a provision establishing for the first time the basic educational opportunity grant, which came to be called the Pell grant for its sponsor, Senator Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island. Over the next four decades, Pell grants would turn the dream of college education into a reality for millions of Americans. Today, more than ever, a college diploma is important to a young person's success. The unemployment rate for those 25 and older with a bachelor's degree is less than 4 percent and over 8 percent for those with only a high school diploma. The value of that college degree could not be more apparent. Higher education provides the skills and credentials that many employers require in today's economy. In the decades following World War II, the U.S. Government made college and occupational mobility a reality for more Americans than ever before. Claiborne Pell was a veteran of that war, and he saw how the GI bill enabled millions of his fellow veterans to better themselves through education. He recognized that many of his Coast Guard shipmates had as much talent as his Princeton classmates but not the privilege or resources to go to college. Given the opportunity, this Greatest Generation would not only provide a better life for their families with that access to college, but they would contribute mightily to the growth of this Nation, a growth we still enjoy today. Claiborne Pell resolved then that all Americans should have such an opportunity, and his vision would become a reality for millions through the Pell grant. In 1976, the first year the Pell grants were fully funded, a full Pell grant paid 72 percent of the cost of attendance at a typical 4-year public college. Today, a full Pell grant covers just 32 percent of those costs, but still, for many, this vital assistance can mean the difference between being able to attend college or not. As grant aid has fallen and tuition has soared, families have had to borrow to make up the difference to send their kids to college. The total amount of student loan debt carried by Americans has recently surpassed $1 trillion, more than Americans now owe on their credit cards. I have talked to students around my State and I have read many heartfelt letters. It is clear Pell grants serve as a gateway to the opportunities available with a college degree, a gate that would be shut if not for Pell grants. I received a letter from Phil in Wakefield, RI, the oldest of five children. Last year, Phil graduated from Cornell. Phil worked his way through college, including summers. His parents chipped in when they could. Phil's father is still paying off student loans, and Phil was lucky enough to earn private scholarships and receive grants from his school. He said: But there's no way my education would have been possible without Pell Grants. We just wouldn't have been able to afford it. I also heard from Anthony, who has been working as a waiter in Providence. Thanks to the Pell grant, he and his wife Jen have been able to go back to school at the University of Rhode Island for degrees in biotechnology. They say their education will enable them to build a better future together in Rhode Island's rapidly expanding biotech sector. Leann is a single mother of two from Pawtucket, already carrying student loan debt, although she has not been able to finish her undergraduate program. Last year, Leann enrolled in the School of Continuing Education at Roger Williams University, and when she graduates with a bachelor's degree next year, she plans on opening her own small business. ``None of this would be happening'' she wrote, ``if I were not receiving a Pell Grant.'' The simple fact is this: Pell grants help millions of people achieve the dream of college and improve their prospects for employment. It is a wise investment in the future of our country. Congress has, in recent years, increased the buying power of Pell Grants, increasing the maximum grant from $4,050 in academic year 2006-2007 to $5,550 in 2012- 2013. We also increased the minimum family income that automatically qualifies a student for the maximum Pell grant, a change that better reflects today's economic realities. Sadly, however, we are seeing a truly misguided assault on Pell grants. The editorial board of the Wall Street Journal marked the 40th anniversary of Pell grants this week by printing claims about the Pell grant that, simply to be polite, do not withstand scrutiny. The Journal says the Pell grant is rife with abuse, with students engaging in ``creative accounting'' to qualify by feigning financial independence. The most common way one gets deemed independent under the Pell Grant Program is by being 24 years of age or older. It is hard to imagine doing much creative accounting with one's date of birth. The other major proofs of independence are being married and having children. Maybe when they said ``creative accounting'' they meant ``procreative accounting.'' The Wall Street Journal implies that better off students can win larger grants by attending more expensive institutions. But the cost of tuition cannot increase the maximum size of a grant. The maximum Pell grant, as I said, is $5,550, regardless of the school one attends. As we all know, $5,550 is far from sufficient to cover the cost of most higher education. Perhaps the most misleading claim from the Journal is to pick out the period when Pell grant costs rose significantly, between 2008 and 2010, due largely to the enactment of a funding expansion that has since been repealed and the fact that more eligible students applied for assistance as the economy worsened in those years. What they left out is that the Congressional Budget Office projects almost no average annual growth in program costs over the next 10 years. The Republican budget in the House of Representatives slashes funding and eligibility for Pell grants and eliminates all mandatory funding for the program over the next 10 years. We all understand the need to find savings in the Federal budget. We all understand the need to make difficult choices. But of all the bad choices we could make, of all unintelligent choices we could make, failing to invest in Pell grants would be among the worst. It is, frankly, shameful that Federal financial aid has not kept pace with the rising cost of college. It is truly misguided to roll back financial aid for a generation of young Americans preparing to compete in an evermore global economy. We need a highly trained workforce. Pell grants are very often the keystone in the arch that students must build to afford college, as Phil and Anthony and Jen and Leann all showed. Rhode Island is a small State. But over the years we have had some towering and remarkable Senators. Claiborne Pell was one. Claiborne Pell believed, as he once told the Providence Journal, ``that government--and the federal government in particular--can, should, and does make a positive impact on the lives of most Americans.'' The Pell grant's positive impact is that people who cannot afford college have the chance to go to college, and it lifts off their backs a little bit of that burden of debt. That is something we want in this country, not just for the sake of the individual Pell grant recipient, not just for the sake of the next generation but for the sake of the good of our country. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Reserving the right to object.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I yield to the Senator from Michigan.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, it is one thing to say things and it is another to say things that are true. Let us review some of the things that have been said on the floor of the Senate today in the context of this discussion. One of my colleagues said that this rule, which will for the first time require our powerplants to meet mercury emission standards that other industries have had to meet, and have successfully met for years, is now coming on, to use his words, ``too far and too fast.'' The Clean Air Act was passed 30 years ago and, specific to this, in the year 2000 EPA began the process that has culminated in this rule determining that it would be appropriate and necessary to have a rule on this kind of hazardous air pollution being emitted by powerplants. Here we are in 2012 and we are being told that it is too fast that utilities are obliged to comply with a program that was first announced as appropriate and necessary in the year 2000. It would seem to me that a dozen years' notice is enough, particularly where other industries have already met these standards. On that note, the same colleague said that compliance with these standards is ``nearly impossible.'' It is obviously not nearly impossible if other industries have already complied with the standard with which the electric utility industry is being asked to comply. More specifically, this rule sets the mark at a level where the highest performing 12 percent of emitters already are. They are already there. So it is not a question of compliance being nearly impossible. Compliance is actually already achieved by the good-behaving and responsible utilities that have put the technology to work to clean up their exhausts. I have a letter that I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. In this letter, 16 of my colleagues, led by myself and the distinguished Chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, Barbara Boxer, wrote to the President supporting this rule. We described, for one thing, a utility called Constellation, which has invested to add environmental controls and a new scrubber to its Brandon Shores facility in Maryland, cutting mercury emissions by 90 percent. Also, in addition, it created 1,385 jobs at peak construction, not counting the many more jobs manufacturing those clean air technologies. So this is not ``nearly impossible,'' this is being done regularly. The other remark that was made by this colleague is that the country does not support EPA on this. To the contrary, actually, public health groups and officials across the country support this: the Academy of Pediatrics, the Association of Respiratory Care, the Heart Association, the Lung Association, the American Nurses Association, the Public Health Association, the March of Dimes--it is a considerable number of public health supporters. If you want to go beyond the public health community, it is interesting to note that the faith community is very actively supporting our position, everything from the Evangelical Environmental Network to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, to the General Baptist Convention of Texas, to the National Council of Churches USA, to the Jewish Council on Public Affairs, to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and the United Methodist Church. To say that America does not support the EPA I think is to take a very constricted view of America. Perhaps the occupants of the electric utility boardrooms in America would be more precise. Some of the folks who support this, interestingly, are not just health groups, but they are the electric utilities themselves. Half of the fossil fuel electric generation in the country is controlled by electric utilities that support the EPA rule. Let me read some examples from this same letter. The chairman, president and CEO of Wisconsin Energy said, ``We really see very little impact on customer electric rates or our capital plan between now and 2015 as a result of all the new EPA regulations that have been proposed . . . . '' Very little impact. The Senior Vice President of Energy Policy at Seminole Electric Cooperative indicated, ``If the EPA adopts a mercury role as currently proposed, Seminole would already be meeting that standard.'' So much for it being almost impossible. Duke Energy's CEO noted, ``I think 3 years is doable,'' not too fast, doable as a compliance timeline. And the CEO of PSEG stated, ``We are also well-positioned to meet the anticipated requirements under EPA's . . . regulation.'' ``We believe these regulations are long overdue.'' Not coming too fast, ``long overdue.'' ``Our experience shows that it is possible to clean the air, create jobs and power the economy, all at the same time.'' Another one of my colleagues said that higher electric bills should be measured, on the one hand, against the negligible benefits on the other hand. That was a theme that a number of colleagues adopted. Another one said this was all costs, no benefits. A third said this bill fails to find the proper balance between cost and benefit. And a fourth said this rule would be ``hammering our economy, in effect a tax increase.'' What are the facts? The facts are that although the rule will cost $9.6 billion to implement, because there is better health, because there are beneficial effects of not polluting our country with all of these dangerous chemicals, the benefits are between $37 and $90 billion; $9 billion in costs, $37 to $90 billion every year in savings, in benefit to our economy. On the whole, this is a huge economic win for the country. The only place where it is a problem is, again, in the boardrooms of the electric utility companies that have not been good citizens, that have not put the scrubbers on, that are trailing the rest of the industry and do not want to be forced to catch up to where other industries, and half of their industry, now is. If you want to move off, as Senator Lautenberg so movingly did, the accounting of this $9 billion in cost versus $37 billion to $90 billion in benefits, there are the 11,000 lives that will be saved every year. You cannot put a price on a human life. This will save them. The last point is that the distinguished ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee described a relentless war, and what he was referring to is an imagined war by the Obama administration against the coal industry. I think if there is a relentless war out here, and I am speaking now as a Senator from Rhode Island, it is a relentless war of these polluting coal plants against the northeastern States in particular, my State in particular, that carries the burden of all the fallout of that exhaust and that pollution that they do not bother to treat at the source so it lands in our State. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks the resolution in support of the EPA mercury and air toxic standards for powerplants that was adopted by the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I will not read the whole thing. Let's just read the concluding paragraph: Now, therefore, be it resolved that the U.S. Conference of Mayors strongly supports the EPA's issued Mercury and Air Toxics Standards for Power Plants. There were no Federal standards for mercury until now for our powerplants. You would think we should have done this by now but--yes, we should have done it by now but at least we are here. At least we will achieve the benefits of $1 in cost for $3 to $9 in savings and in benefits to Americans. We should be celebrating this sensible and yet significant public health achievement. Instead, we are engaged in a debate that I think is confounded, on their side--their arguments are confounded by the actual facts. The benefits are staggering, in addition to the 11,000 lives saved, 4,700 fewer heart attacks, 130,000 fewer cases of children suffering asthma attacks, 5,700 fewer emergency visits each year. Let me close by mentioning one specific. Mercury is a neurotoxin. The reason that people use the phrase ``mad as a hatter'' is because hatters, making hats, used mercury and mercury poisoned them, made them mad, affected their brains. It is a neurotoxin. That affects Rhode Island quite considerably. First of all, we are a State that is downwind. Every Rhode Islander has heard, as we drive into work on a bright summer weekday morning, the radio warning: Today is a bad air day in Rhode Island; children, people with breathing difficulties, seniors should stay indoors today in their air conditioning. It is a beautiful day. People have a right to be out of doors on a beautiful day. They should be celebrating, playing, picnics, going to the beach. But, no, stay indoors because there is ozone pollution settling on us from the powerplants. In addition, the mercury comes in and that creates a different set of harms in Rhode Island. One harm is that small children should not eat any freshwater fish in Rhode Island, according to our health department. Here is a wonderful Norman Rockwell picture, sort of an emblematic American scene, grandfather is taking his grandson fishing. The excitement as the fish comes up out of the pond--that image in Rhode Island is shattered by the fact that this small child would not be allowed to eat any freshwater fish that he caught with his grandfather because of this mercury pollution that has bombarded us by these out-of-State powerplants that did not clean up their act. Furthermore, no one in Rhode Island should eat more than one serving of freshwater fish caught in our State each month, so if the grandfather caught two fish, he could eat one, for a month, but he should not eat the other because of the health effects of the mercury that has piled up in the bodies of the fish. There are some bodies of water that seem to be more in the gunsights of these polluting dirty Midwestern powerplants than others for reasons that nobody can explain. But Quidnick Reservoir, Wincheck Pond, and Yawgoog Pond in Rhode Island--no one should ever eat any of the fish caught in those three bodies of water because of the mercury poisoning. So when we talk about every dollar a utility will spend to clean up its pollution being offset by $3 to $9 in benefits, that figure doesn't take into account these intangible benefits. It doesn't take into account the intangible benefit of being able to enjoy the emblematic American pastime of taking your grandson or going with your grandfather to go fishing in a pond, to be able to catch something, bring it home, fry it up, and have it for supper. The utility polluters get to wreck that for free in this equation, but we should not forget it in this Chamber. There are many aspects of the American way of life that should not yield to the bottom line of those polluters that are not willing to meet the same rules that so many of their colleagues already do and that so many industries already do. Exhibit 1 U.S. Senate, Washington, DC, December 16, 2011. The President, The White House, Washington, DC. Dear Mr. President: Respectfully, we urge the Administration to finalize the Utility Air Toxics Rule as scheduled on December 16, 2011, and to adhere to the compliance schedule set forth in Section 112 of the Clean Air Act. Our nation has waited far too long for a federal limit on mercury and other hazardous air pollution emitted by power plants. The electric utility industry has been on notice for a decade that the EPA intended to limit its hazardous air pollution. In 2000, the EPA determined it was ``appropriate and necessary'' to set hazardous air pollution standards for power plants, based on the serious health effects of this pollution. Power plants are the biggest emitters of mercury, a neurotoxin that can stunt cognitive development in children and infants. Power plants are also significant emitters of toxic metals--for instance, they emit 62% of all such arsenic pollution in the air we breathe--and acid gases such as hydrochloric acid which can cause respiratory tract ailments and fluid buildup in the lungs. The rule is expected to save up to 17,000 lives per year by cutting this pollution. Plants in 17 states have begun to control for mercury pollution. These projects protect public health, and demonstrate that updating our energy infrastructure triggers investment in new technologies and the creation of tens of thousands of jobs. Consider: Constellation invested $885 million to add environmental controls and a new scrubber to its Brandon Shores facility in Maryland, cutting mercury emissions by 90 percent. This investment created 1,385 jobs at peak construction, and many more jobs manufacturing the clean air technologies; PSEG retrofitted two of its coal facilities and installed scrubbers, creating 1,600 construction-related jobs over two years, and 24 permanent jobs; and AEP retrofitted one of its coal facilities and created more than 1,000 construction-related jobs building a scrubber, and 40 permanent jobs in operations. AEP CEO Michael Morris said this year that when a utility retrofits a plant to comply with the Clean Air Act, ``jobs are created in the process--no question about that.'' Good environmental policy is good economic policy, as the jobs numbers--and the United States' $11 billion trade surplus in environmental technologies--demonstrate. Most electric utilities in this country are ready for this rule. Indeed, operators of half of the fossil fuel electric generation in this country have gone on record on this point. For instance: The Chair, President and CEO of Wisconsin Energy noted that, ``We really see very little impact on customer electric rates or our capital plan between now and 2015 as a result of all the new EPA regulations that have been proposed. . . .'' The Senior Vice President of Energy Policy at Seminole Electric Cooperative, Inc., indicated that ``If the EPA adopts a mercury rule as currently proposed, Seminole would already be meeting the standard.'' Duke Energy's CEO noted that ``I think three years is doable'' as a compliance timeline for the Utility Air Toxics Rule. The CEO of PSEG stated that, ``We are also well-positioned to meet the anticipated requirements under EPA's HAPs/MACT regulation, which is scheduled to be issued on December 16. We believe these regulations are long overdue. Our experience shows that it is possible to clean the air, create jobs and power the economy, all at the same time.'' Some utilities, however, are arguing that this rule will compromise their ability to provide reliable service. We do not believe the facts support this argument. Earlier this month, your Department of Energy released a report finding that even under the most conservative assumptions, utilities could comply with both the Transport Rule and the Utility Air Toxics Rule while providing adequate electric power in each region of the country. Meanwhile, new generation capacity is being built. Over the next four years, utilities are constructing nearly 78 GW of new capacity, including about 38 GW of natural gas. Natural gas prices are dropping rapidly, driving both the construction of new gas-fired plants and the utilization of existing gas capacity. These gas plants are starting to out- compete inefficient coal units on price alone, separate and apart from any Clean Air Act rules. If localized reliability issues emerge, or if a unit needs more time to comply with the Utility Air Toxics Rule, current law and long-standing practice provide off-ramps on a case- by-case basis. Upon request, EPA and the states may grant a unit a fourth year to comply. If the unit needs more time to install controls, or if it plans to retire but needs to stay online to ensure reliability, EPA may enter into legally binding agreements with the utility to provide that necessary time. Given that so many utilities are well-positioned to comply with the Utility Air Toxics Rule, and the flexibility afforded particular units, there is no reason for an across- the-board delay of this important public health measure. We applaud the work that EPA has undertaken to limit dangerous air pollution from power plants, and urge the Administration's approval of a final rule to be in place by December 16, 2011. Sincerely, Sheldon Whitehouse. Patrick J. Leahy. Joseph I. Lieberman. Patty Murray. Frank R. Lautenberg. Benjamin L. Cardin. Jeanne Shaheen. Kirsten E. Gillibrand. Barbara Boxer. John F. Kerry. Daniel K. Akaka. Maria Cantwell. Robert Menendez. Bernard Sanders. Jeff Merkley. Richard Blumenthal.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. It would pass with Republican votes and Democratic votes, and we could put people back to work across this country right now, doing the work that every American knows our highway system needs. This is not bridges to nowhere. This is bridges that people drive across to get to work. This is potholes and highways and places like 95 that goes through Providence on a viaduct. It is falling in so much that they have put planks underneath it to keep the pieces that fall through from landing on the Amtrak trains and the car traffic underneath. We need this work. We need these jobs. It is so disingenuous and so cynical to stop this work just because there is an election coming. What the Senator did yesterday to press on that was very important. I appreciate that. I see Senator Udall. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. They get the benefit of knocking down jobs in the runup to the election, which I think is a disgraceful way to go about the Nation's business. But we cannot move them. The irony and the tragedy here is, if Speaker Boehner would call up this bipartisan Senate transportation bill, it would pass.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. First of all, let me thank my wonderful chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee for joining me on the floor and asking me this question. The figure I have used--I have been more conservative--is in a range between $3 and $9. But there is a very significant payback. As I was pointing out, that payback actually counts in hard dollars to the public. It does not count things such as, as I mentioned in my speech, the worry of a mom spending the day in the emergency room waiting for her child's breathing to recover. It may take into account her or her employer's economic loss. It does not take into account her worry. It does not take into account the grandfather not being able to take the fish home from Yawgoog Pond because it is now poisonous because out-of-State polluters have dumped mercury into the atmosphere and into the pond for so long. Those are real costs if you have a traditional American kind of family and people go fishing together and do things such as that. You cannot do that any longer. That does not even count in the equation. The polluters get to take that away from America for free in that equation. But, as I said, what is interesting is that our friends on the other side only seem to think about, only seem to notice, only seem to talk about the $1 that the polluters have to pay to clean up their act. They do not talk about the folks who get the jobs repairing the pollution, building the scrubbers--the American jobs that creates. They just talk about their cost, and they do not talk at all about the cost on the other side--the health care costs, the job losses, the loss of education, the long-term health damage that people undertake. Surface Transportation While the Senator is on the floor, let me tell my chairman how proud I am of the job she did yesterday on our highway bill. Getting out there with those big trucks and with the big, heavy paving equipment was a wonderful way of demonstrating to the public what has happened here, which is that the most important jobs bill the Senate has passed this year is being blocked by the House to eliminate or damage the summer construction season for highway work. In my State, as I think I have told the Senator, we have more than 90 projects on the roster for this summer's highway construction season. Forty of them are falling off because of the delay from March until June that the Republicans already forced on us. As the Senator has told me, they are trying to push for another delay that is going to knock more projects off, put more people out of work. Ours was a bipartisan bill. It could not have been better and more openly and transparently run by the Senator and her ranking member, Senator Inhofe. There are 2.9 million jobs at stake. Everybody gets that our roads and highways need repair. Yet a group of Republicans in the House of Representatives will not agree to go forward. And time is running out on this summer's construction season.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Of course.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, last December, the Environmental Protection Agency finalized a rule called the Mercury Air Toxics Standard for powerplants. This rule is important, and it was long overdue. Many Americans might not realize that before last December, there were no Federal standards for mercury or the other toxic air pollution pouring out of our Nation's powerplants. Thirty-two years ago, Congress directed EPA to limit toxic air pollution from all big polluting industries. In response, EPA set standards for nearly 100 industries across our Nation. However, until December, there were no such standards for the utility industry--the biggest source of mercury, arsenic, and other toxic air pollution in the country. Now there are standards in place, estimated to provide $3 to $9 of health and economic benefits for every $1 invested in pollution controls. We should be celebrating this sensible yet significant public health achievement. Yet from the other side of the aisle we only hear about the $1 that the polluters have to spend to clean up. We never hear about the $3 to $9 the rest of the public saves as a result of the pollution being cleaned up. We hear about the cost to the polluter all the time. We never hear about the cost, for example, of an asthma attack caused by soot and ozone. We never hear about the public health cost to all of us of the child having to go to the emergency room for an asthma attack. We never hear about the cost to the business of the mom who is not at work that day because she is off on a sick day taking care of that child in the emergency room or, if she is working on a regular wage, maybe it is on her. Maybe she does not get paid for that day because she is in the emergency room with her child. We never hear about that cost. How about the simple cost of a mother stuck in an emergency room with a child having a pollution-provoked asthma attack, waiting anxiously-- waiting for the nebulizer to kick in, waiting for that little oxygen meter on the child's finger to show that the oxygen levels are back where they should be? That is not even counted--the worry of a mom for her child having a pollution-caused asthma incident. We never hear about that. We never hear about the dollar side. All they talk about, all we hear about from them is the $1 the polluter has to pay to clean up their pollution--never, in this case, the $3 to $9; in other cases it is $35 to $1, over $100 to $1. Instead, we have colleagues on the other side who want to halt this progress--notwithstanding the savings for virtually every American-- with a resolution we are facing now that would void these new standards--standards that have just emerged after 32 years for the first time regulating toxic pollution out of utility plants. This resolution would not only void the new standard, but it would bar EPA from ever setting similar limits on powerplants in the future. In speeches against these public health standards, one of my colleagues appears somewhat confused about the mercury air toxic standards. I wish to set the record straight on two points. One, this colleague has complained that the technology does not exist to meet these standards. That is the complaint: the technology does not exist to meet these standards. But if you look at the Clean Air Act, it directs the EPA--as EPA did--to set these standards based upon the performance of the top 12 percent in the industry--the actual performance of the top 12 percent in the industry. In other words, at least one out of every eight powerplant units must already be meeting each of the standards that is set. This is not a case in which the technology does not exist. This is a situation in which one out of every eight plants is already meeting it. The technology assuredly exists, demonstrably exists. What EPA is doing is leveling the field so that utilities do not get a competitive advantage by running dirtier powerplants than their fellow utilities. This colleague has also complained that the rule establishes standards for toxic air pollution other than mercury. Well, limiting all toxic air pollution at once is more efficient for the utilities than tackling each pollutant separately. Frankly, if we are going at mercury once, and then later arsenic--and over and over the utilities had to go back and recalibrate--we would be hearing complaints that was the wrong way to do it. So if you do it all at once, they complain; if you do it separately, they would complain. The bottom line is, any time polluters are asked to clean up their act, some people are going to complain. In section 112(d) of the Clean Air Act, Congress told the EPA that they shall establish emission standards for each category of major sources of the toxic air pollutants listed in section 112(c). Congress provided a list of 180 pollutants, which EPA used as the basis for the powerplant standards. You cannot fault EPA for that. Moreover, the staggering health benefits of this rule--4,700 fewer anticipated heart attacks, 130,000 fewer cases of child asthma symptoms, 5,700 fewer emergency room visits each year--flow from limiting all toxic air pollution from powerplants--not eliminating, limiting all toxic air pollution from powerplants rather than just mercury. In pointing out that EPA correctly sought to limit all toxic air pollution from powerplants, I do not want to gloss over the importance of setting those Federal mercury standards. As I indicated earlier, powerplants are the largest source of airborne mercury pollution in the United States. Mercury, as everybody knows, is a neurotoxin that can be most devastating to developing nervous systems. The reason we have the phrase ``mad as a hatter'' is because hatters used mercury in their work and it affected their brains. It is a neurotoxin. Exposure to mercury in utero, or as a child, can permanently reduce a person's ability to think and learn. For this reason, women of childbearing age, infants, and children must avoid mercury exposure. What does this mean for Rhode Island? Many of you have heard me talk about the out-of-State air pollution that plagues my State. Most air pollution in Rhode Island is not generated from within our borders. It is sent from sources hundreds, even thousands of miles away. It is sent by powerplants out of State in significant measure. On a clear summer day in Rhode Island, we will be commuting in to work, and we will hear on the drive-time radio: Today is a bad air day in Rhode Island. Infants, seniors, and people with respiratory difficulties should stay indoors today; otherwise, it is a beautiful day--a summer day when kids should be out playing. But if they have asthma, if they have a respiratory ailment, no, they are condemned to stay indoors--not because of anything that happened in Rhode Island but because of out-of-State pollution, mostly from these powerplants. So the same sources that create those bad air days for Rhode Island-- that force seniors and infants and children, people with respiratory difficulties to stay indoors on an otherwise fine summer day--also send us mercury pollution, which is why, although Rhode Island does not have a single coal-fired generating unit within its borders, our health department has to issue fish advisories. If there is one emblematic image of American families doing something in the out-of-doors, it is the parent or grandparent taking their child--their son or their daughter--or their grandchild fishing. Norman Rockwell has captured this image. Many of us have similar images stored away in our childhood memories. Yet today if a child goes fishing with her grandfather in Rhode Island, she cannot eat the fish she caught. The Rhode Island Department of Health warns that pregnant women, women thinking of becoming pregnant, and small children should not eat any freshwater fish in Rhode Island. The health department also warns these populations not to eat some saltwater fish, such as shark and swordfish, because they have high levels of mercury stored in their fat. The health department suggests that no one in Rhode Island should eat more than one serving of freshwater fish--not just children, women who are pregnant, and women thinking of becoming pregnant--no one in Rhode Island should eat more than one serving of freshwater fish caught in our State each month in order to protect against mercury poisoning. Finally, the health department warns that no one should ever eat any of the fish caught in three bodies of water in Rhode Island: The Quidnick Reservoir, Wincheck Pond, and Yawgoog Pond. For those of us who remember fishing as kids and eating what we caught, this is a sad state of affairs, and this is a state of affairs caused by polluters. This cost of a family not being able to go to Quidnick Reservoir, to Wincheck Pond to catch a fish, to take it home, to fry it up, to eat it--to do things that are as American as apple pie, in some respects-- is because of the polluters.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I come to the floor of the Senate today to speak about a number, a number that has a particular significance for us here, and that number is 400. Why is 400 an important number at this point in our history? What is important about 400 is that it is the number of parts per million of carbon dioxide that has been measured this spring in the Arctic. This is a first. We have never hit 400 before. For 8,000 centuries mankind has inhabited this planet within an atmospheric carbon dioxide range of 190 to 300 parts per million. That is the range, the bandwidth, within which we have lived. How long is 800,000 years? It is a pretty darn long time. I don't think there are any human remains or artifacts that go back further than 200,000 years. If we go back more than 10,000 years, we are only seeing the very beginnings of agriculture, where people are beginning to scratch the soil and plant things. For longer than our species has effectively inhabited this Earth, we have been in this happy bandwidth that has supported our lives, supported congenial climate for human development. We are out of that now for the first time in that period--800,000 years--and we are not just a little bit out of it. We didn't go to 302 or to 350. We have now crossed 400, and we are still going. We are still going, and there is no end in sight. We continue to dump gigatons of carbon dioxide into our atmosphere every single year, and we continue to subsidize the people who do the dumping. At least in this building, and probably in the boardrooms of ExxonMobil and a few other places, we studiously ignore the facts that are right before our faces. Here are just a few stories from the past week or so: A June 4 story in the New York Times reported that ``climate change threatens power output.'' Why would a warming climate change threaten power output? It is because warmer waters, when they are pumped through powerplants, don't provide the same cooling capacity. So if we are going to keep plants from overheating, we have to dial back the power output. For places such as the heavily developed U.S. Northeast, we can be pretty close to our margins from time to time, particularly when air-conditioning loads are high in the summer, and those hot days increase the risk of power cutbacks or conceivably even power outages. A June 5 story in the U.S. News and World Report described a recently published article in which several European public health experts wrote that climate change could alter patterns of food availability and change disease distribution, all in ways that could harm human health. If we want an example of how the change in climate changes the way things move around on this Earth, we have to look no further than the pine beetle, which is decimating our traditional western forests because the winters are no longer cold enough to kill off the larvae. As the warmth moves ever northward, so do the larvae, and we can fly over mountains and look down and see the brown wasteland of trees that used to be green pine forests. NOAA reported that the lower 48 States just experienced the warmest May on record. The national average temperature for this spring--March through May--was 5.2 degrees above the 20th century's long-term average, surpassing the previous warmest spring ever, in 1910, by 2 full degrees. Some States are warming faster than others, and Rhode Island, unfortunately for us, is at the top of the list. Climate Central, a research organization, crunched averages of the daily high and low temperatures from the National Climatic Data Center's U.S. Historical Climatology Network of weather stations. Their recently published report determined that over the past 100 years, Rhode Island has actually warmed the fastest of any State. This has terrible consequences for us, from shifting our growing season to harming the cold-water fish we catch in our warming Narragansett Bay. As an aside, when my wife was doing her graduate research out in Narragansett Bay, she was studying the interaction between winter flounder and a shrimp that lives in the bay called Crangon septemspinosa. The reason that was important then was because winter flounder was a huge cash crop for our Rhode Island fishermen. It hasn't been that long since she did her graduate research, and winter flounder has fallen off as a cash crop for our fishermen. Narragansett Bay has warmed. The water temperature is up nearly 4 degrees, which may not seem much to terrestrial beings like us when we jump in the water and it is 64 degrees instead of 60 degrees. Does that really make a difference to us? No. But for the fish for whom that is their entire ecosystem, that has shifted and has demolished the winter flounder fisheries, which are down something like 10 times. Many people understand that there is a connection between carbon pollution in our atmosphere and these warming temperatures. But it is becoming incontrovertible that these things are happening. The science behind this is rock solid. People say there are questions about the theory. No. No, there are not. There are questions about some of the complicated modeling that people go through. But the theory has been clear since the time of the American Civil War. The scientist, John Tyndall, determined that increasing moisture and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere had a blanketing effect that kept heat in, trapped heat on our planet. That has been basic textbook science for a century. It has never been controverted. It is a law, essentially, of science. Yet there are special interests who try to deny that. Set against those special interests is about as unanimous a coalition from science as has ever been assembled. Virtually every prestigious scientific and academic institution has stated that climate change is happening, and human activities--specifically our reckless release of carbon pollution--are the driving cause of this change. In 2009, there was a very clear letter, signed by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Chemical Society, American Geophysical Union, American Institute of Biological Sciences, American Meteorological Society, American Society of Agronomy, American Society of Plant Biologists, American Statistical Association, Association of Ecosystem Research Centers, Botanical Society of America, and on and on. Here is what they said in pretty darn hard- hitting words for scientists: Observations throughout the world make it clear-- ``Clear'' is the word they used-- that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver. Not observations throughout the world make it ``likely'' that it is occurring, and not ``potentially'' indicates, and not the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities ``might be'' the primary driver. It is ``clear'' it has demonstrated that they are the primary drivers. They go on: These conclusions are based on multiple independent lines of evidence-- Here is what we might call the sockdolager-- and contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment of the vast body of peer-reviewed science. In a nutshell, if you are looking at the actual peer-reviewed science and being objective--if you are not putting your thumb on the scale-- contrary assertions are inconsistent with that. You are basically making it up. So that is a pretty powerful statement. The argument that the jury is still out on climate change is a false and bogus argument. The jury is not out. In fact, the verdict is in. The effects are obvious. They surround us every day, and we need to take action. I have been on the Senate floor with Senator Franken before, and we have talked about this. He makes a wonderful point, which is that 97 percent of the climate scientists agree that this is happening, it is happening because of our carbon pollution, and we need to do something urgent about it. Three percent question it. That is 97-to-3 odds. We are asked to avoid taking any action, not to worry about it because there is doubt and debate. Translate that to real, ordinary human life, not this peculiar political world we are in here. Let's say someone has a child, and the child appears to be sick. They go in to see the doctor, and he says: Yes, your child is sick, and she is going to need treatment. They say: Yes, but treatment is expensive, and it might be unpleasant. I will tell you what, I am going to get a second opinion. So then they go to another doctor, and he says the same thing--that their child is sick and will need treatment. They say: Well, two opinions are kind of a lot, but let's just be sure and get a third opinion. That doctor says the same thing too. What would we think of the parents who did that 100 times, who were told by 97 out of 100 doctors that the child was sick and needed treatment, and they said: You know what, there is doubt about this. I am not sure, so I am not going to give my child the treatment they need. It is a preposterous example, isn't it? It is an absolutely ridiculous point of view for the parent to hold. Yet that is exactly the point of view we are being asked to hold to deny and delay the steps we have to take to protect us, our children, and our country from the damage that is being done, frankly, by ourselves--the polluting interests that we don't take adequate steps to put on the right track toward a successful and clean energy future. The last thing I will say is on that exact point. The more we depend on fossil fuels, the more we depend on a diminishing resource that pollutes our country. It is a diminishing force that goes up under the laws of supply and demand, and in practice, and right now, forces us to engage with foreign oil-producing countries that do not have our best interests at heart. We send our dollars--hundreds of millions of them-- into their treasuries so that money can filter out into organizations that actually wish to do us harm. That is not a great state of affairs. The alternative is a clean energy future where American homes are more efficient. We have replaced windows and added insulation and improved boilers. We have created innumerable jobs through all that work, and we have paid for it with reduced energy costs. It pays for itself. Sometimes it pays for itself in 1 year, sometimes in 2 years, sometimes in 5 years, but it pays for itself and it creates work. We are in a battle right now for clean energy technologies. It is an international competition. It is us against China, us against India, us against the European Union. Every single one of the other countries gets it, and they are trying to push resources onto their clean energy industries so they can lap us in this race, so they can get so far ahead of us that we become the world's biggest global consumer of clean energy, not its biggest manufacturer. We invented the solar cell. Fifteen years ago, we made 40 percent of all the solar cells in the world. I think we are down to 7 percent now. The top 10 wind turbine companies in the world include one American company--one. And by knocking down the production tax credits, by eliminating the 1603 Program, by subsidizing Big Oil like crazy, people in this building are doing their very best not to help us in the race against foreign competition but to put weights in the pockets of American companies, to tie their shoelaces together, to interfere with their ability to compete. They do not see it yet as international competition. They are so tied to the fossil fuel industry that they only see it as competition between fossil fuels and clean energy, and in that battle they want to be with the fossil fuel energy. They do not see the future. They do not see how important these technologies are going to be in batteries, in wind, in clean energy, and in all these areas where we can not only command our energy future by building and creating the power we use and unhinge ourselves from these foreign dictatorships that run off oil economies, but we can improve the future and the safety of our planet by dialing down the pollution. My State pays a particular price. We are downwind of the midwestern polluters--the big utility companies, the big manufacturing companies, the ones that have built thousand-foot-high smokestacks for the specific purpose of shoving as much of their pollution as high in the atmosphere as they can so that it doesn't rain down on their States-- not on Missouri, Ohio, or Pennsylvania--but that it rains down on Rhode Island, on Massachusetts, on Vermont, and on other States. I was here earlier this morning talking about the mercury rule. We have ponds and lakes and reservoirs in Rhode Island where it is unsafe to eat the fish you catch because of mercury poisoning. It is unsafe everywhere in Rhode Island to eat the fish you catch if you are a child or an expectant mother. Nobody can safely eat the fish you catch in these ponds because there is so much mercury in them. How did the mercury get there? How did the mercury get there? From pollution out of the smokestacks dumped down on our State. And there is nothing we can do to prevent it other than to support the EPA in these mercury-limit rules. There is a real cost to continuing down this fossil fuel path. My home State pays it all the time. And when it comes time to reap the whirlwind of storm activity, of sea level rise, coastal States such as Rhode Island will pay a particularly high price. I am going to continue to come to the Senate floor. This is not a popular topic. The Presiding Officer, Senator Sanders of Vermont, is eloquent, articulate, and a constant ally on these subjects. There are a handful of us who are regulars on this subject, but I think a great many of my colleagues and virtually everybody on the other side of the aisle would just as soon wash their hands of it, forget about it, pretend it is not happening, and continue to sleepwalk toward disaster. So I will keep doing this. It is important to my State. I believe it is important for our country. I appreciate the attention of the Presiding Officer and those who have the attention of the floor. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 13, 2012, at 10 a.m. to conduct a committee hearing entitled ``A Breakdown in Risk Management: What Went Wrong at JPMorgan Chase?''

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 13, 2012, at 2:45 p.m.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Special Committee on Aging be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 13, 2012, at 2 p.m. in room 562 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building to conduct a hearing entitled ``Empowering Patients and Honoring Individual's Choices: Lessions in Improving Care for Individuals with Advanced Illness.''

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Veterans' Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 13, 2012. The Committee will meet in room 418 of the Senate Russell Office Building, beginning at 10 a.m.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 13, 2012.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Environment and Public Works be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 13, 2012, at 10 a.m. in Dirksen 406 to conduct a hearing entitled ``Hearing on the nomination of Allison Macfarlane and re-nomination of Kristine L. Svinicki to be Members of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.''

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I thank the Senators on our side who have come here today during the majority time block to express their support for moving forward on the highway transportation bill. Not all of them have had the chance to speak because time was short, but I wish to have the Record reflect that in addition to Senators Klobuchar, Shaheen, Begich, Cardin, and Franken, who did speak, and myself of course, Senator Gillibrand is also here but presiding. Senator Stabenow was here but could not wait. Senator Mark Udall is here. Senator Conrad was here. We are all here because we are very concerned about what is going on with the highway bill. We had a March 31 deadline in order to get things done by the summer construction season that we have heard so much about. We made the deadline. Not only did we make the deadline, we made the deadline with a bipartisan bill, one that was unanimous among both parties in the Environment and Public Works Committee and we brought it to the floor and we got it passed, 75 or more Senators supporting it. The House did not do its job. It did not have a bill. It could not pass a highway bill. For folks who have been around here longer than I have, the failure to pass the highway bill is telling. This is not like getting an A on a chemistry test. This is like showing up for class, and they failed at that very simple task. So they asked for an extension. We probably should not have given it. We probably should have forced the vote then. But we did. We gave them an extension on the theory that, in good faith, they would come through. We knew the extension would cost jobs. The extension has cost jobs. Out of over 90 projects slated for this construction season in Rhode Island, about 40 are going to fall off because of the delay. Those are real jobs in Rhode Island, a State that needs them, and that is true across the rest of the country. Wherever winter falls, this predicament exists. So that is why so many of my colleagues were here. Now we are closing in on the end of the extension we gave them. It will end June 30. I am here to urge that we give no further extensions. It is either govern or get out of the way to the House of Representatives. If they can't pass a highway bill of their own, let the Senate bill come up for a vote. It is bipartisan. It is supported by manufacturers. It is supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. It is supported by road builders. It is supported by environmentalists. It is supported by labor. It is a good bill. It had a great process, wide open, on the Senate floor. There is no excuse for not taking up that bill. I agree with Senator Begich. If that bill comes up, Democrats and Republicans together will give it a massive majority in the House, and people will be put to work. One place where I think we all ought to be able to agree on both sides of the aisle is that Federal spending is actually helpful and does create jobs in building our roads and bridges. We don't expect Americans to repair the road in front of their house. We don't expect Americans to go and build bridges for themselves. It is a government job to build roads and bridges. The jam-up Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader Cantor have created on this is costing probably hundreds of thousands of jobs right now in this country. Why they are doing it, their motive, that is not for me to say. But the practical effect is that jobs are being lost by unnecessary delay, created by Republicans in the House, which they could get rid of by simply calling up the bipartisan Senate bill and giving a free vote on it, letting it pass, and putting Americans to work. I yield the floor. I thank the distinguished Senator from Utah for being patient as I went over my time a little bit.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, we have six Senators, including the occupant of the chair, the Senator from New York, on the floor today in the majority time to discuss the jammed bipartisan Senate highway bill. I heard my colleague from Georgia talk about how we are doing nothing and America is languishing. One of the things we are doing nothing on is passing a highway bill that should not be complicated. But it is jammed up by the House Republicans and, as a result, people in Rhode Island and elsewhere are suffering. I will be here throughout our majority period. I think the Senator from Minnesota and the Senator from New Hampshire were here first, so I yield to them.