Subject: [big campaign] Tracking Update: McCain Environmental Briefing in Santa Barbara, CA
From: "Cammie Croft" <[email-masked]>
To: "big campaign" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2008 13:38:30 -0400
List-Id: <bigcampaign.googlegroups.com>

Hello All,

Due to flight delays and cancellations, we were not able to get a tracker to
today's event.  However, we were able to track the event via online
streaming video.  Below are the notes from that viewing.

* Santa Barbara, CA: McCain Environmental Briefing *

   - Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger welcomes crowd and introduces McCain,
   says he is confidant that a McCain presidency will yield 'a sensible,
   consistent and forward looking energy policy'

*McCain's Prepared Remarks:
* LINK:
http://thepage.time.com/transcript-of-mccains-remarks-in-santa-barbara-california/

ARLINGTON, VA — U.S. Senator John McCain will deliver the following remarks
as prepared for delivery at an environmental and energy briefing in Santa
Barbara, CA, today at 9:00 a.m. PDT (12:00 p.m. EDT):

Thank you all very much. I appreciate the hospitality of the Santa Barbara
Museum of Natural History, and the warm welcome to California. I'm here to
listen about energy issues as well as to talk. So let me just start things
off with a few ideas.

We're in the middle of a great debate in this presidential campaign about
the energy security of the United States. For my part, in recent days I've
been laying out a clear agenda to protect our economy from runaway energy
costs, and to break America's dependence on foreign oil. This is going to
require the best efforts and ideas of our country, and I am confident we are
up to the task. At a time when a gallon of gas is running at more than four
dollars, our government needs to shake off years of partisan paralysis that
have prevented America from achieving energy security. Nothing is more
urgent right now than regaining our energy security — we need to get it done
and get it right.

The immediate problems of high gasoline prices and of our strategic
dependence on foreign oil are upon us. And on recent days I've been setting
forth a plan of action. When people are hurting, and struggling to afford
gasoline, food, and other necessities, common sense requires that we draw
upon America's own vast reserves of oil and natural gas. When nations across
Europe and Asia are building nuclear power plants to meet their electricity
needs, America, too, must make more use of this clean, efficient, and proven
source of power. And we must turn all the brilliance and ingenuity of
America loose in the search for alternative energy sources — from cleaner
coal and wind power to biofuels and solar.

But even as we address our present economic and strategic troubles, we face
a long-term danger we hardly even understood back when America first learned
to associate the word "energy" with "crisis." We now know that fossil fuel
emissions, by retaining heat within the atmosphere, threaten disastrous
changes in climate. No challenge of energy is to be taken lightly, and least
of all the need to avoid the consequences of global warming.

Among the compelling evidence of this danger, satellite images reveal
shrinking glaciers, Antarctic ice shelves and polar ice sheets. Our
scientists have also seen and measured reduced snowpack, with earlier
runoffs in the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere. We have seen sustained
drought in the Southwest, and across the world average temperatures that
seem to reach new records every few years. In the frozen wilds of Alaska,
the Arctic, Antarctic, and elsewhere, wildlife biologists have noted sudden
changes in animal migration patterns, a loss of their habitat, a rise in sea
levels. The facts of global warming demand our urgent attention, especially
in Washington. Good stewardship, prudence, and simple commonsense demand
that we act to meet the challenge, and act quickly.

To dramatically reduce carbon emissions, I have proposed a new system of
cap-and-trade that over time will change the dynamic of our energy economy.
We will cap emissions according to specific goals, measuring progress by
reference to past carbon emissions. By the year 2012, we will seek a return
to 2005 levels of emission, by 2020, a return to 1990 levels, and so on
until we have achieved at least a reduction of sixty percent below 1990
levels by the year 2050. In this way, we will transition into a low carbon
energy future while staying on a course of economic growth. The purpose of
this plan is to give American businesses new incentives and rewards to seek,
instead of just giving new taxes to pay and new orders to follow. My
strategy gives people time to adapt, instead of causing a jolt to your
electricity bill and widespread shutdowns of tradition coal-fired plants.

For the market to do more, government must do more by opening new paths of
invention and ingenuity. So I have proposed a permanent research and
development tax credit, to open the door to a new generation of
environmental entrepreneurs. I am committed to investing two billion dollars
every year for the next 15 years on clean coal technologies — to unlock the
potential of America's oldest and most abundant resource. And we will issue
a Clean Car Challenge to automakers, in the form of a tax credit to the
American people: For every automaker who can sell a zero-emissions or very
close to zero-emissions car, we will commit up to a 5,000 dollar tax credit
to each and every customer who buys that car. In the quest for alternatives
to oil, our government has thrown around enough money subsidizing special
interests and excusing failure. From now on, we will encourage heroic
efforts in engineering, and we will reward the grea test success.

This is why I further propose we inspire the ingenuity and resolve of the
American people by offering a $300 million prize for the development of a
battery package that has the size, capacity, cost and power to leapfrog the
commercially available plug-in hybrids or electric cars. This is one dollar
for every man, woman and child in the U.S. — a small price to pay for
helping to break the back of our oil dependency — and should deliver a power
source at 30 percent of the current costs.

Energy efficiency is no longer just a moral luxury or a personal virtue. A
smarter use of energy is part of a critical national effort to regain
control of our own energy future. And in this effort, practical ideas are
worth a lot more than uplifting lectures. It's not always a matter of making
due with less energy. It's a matter of using energy in smarter ways.
Business owners who invest in green buildings can cut their energy costs by
as much as a third. Homeowners can save hundreds or even thousands of
dollars a year with better light bulbs, appliances, windows, and insulation.
Many Californians have understood the benefits of green technology for a
while now and your governor sure understands them. Now we need to bring that
smart ethic of environmental care to Washington.

Our federal government is never shy about instructing the American people in
good environmental practice. But energy efficiency, like charity, should
begin at home. So I propose to put the purchasing power of the United States
government on the side of green technology. Every year the federal
government buys upwards of 60,000 cars and other vehicles, not including
military or law-enforcement vehicles. From now on, we're going to make those
civilian vehicles flex-fuel capable, plug-in hybrid, or cars fueled by clean
natural gas. If our great goal is to move American transportation toward
lower carbon emissions, then it should start with the federal fleet.

Across our country and abroad, there are 3.3 billion square feet of federal
office space, all but roughly ten percent of it owned by the public. Add it
all up and that makes the federal government the single largest consumer of
electricity in the world. This presents another enormous opportunity that my
administration will take. By retrofitting where possible, and by applying a
higher efficiency standard to new buildings leased or purchased, we can save
taxpayers billions of dollars in energy costs, and move the market in the
direction of green technology.

We must also redesign our national electric grid in a smarter, more
efficient way. In some cases, our national power transmission system has not
been built to match supply and demand. And the result is an excess of power
where it's not needed, and a shortage of power where it is needed. In the
long term, this will require a serious investment to upgrade our national
grid to meet the demands of the 21st century — which will include a capacity
to charge the electric cars that will one day fill the roads and highways of
America. And to save both money and electrical power for our people and
businesses, we will also need to deploy SmartMeter technologies. These new
meters give customers a more precise picture of their overall energy
consumption, and over time will encourage a more cost-efficient use of
power.

In these and other ways, we can meet the challenge of global warming with
all the resources of human ingenuity at our disposal. Like other
environmental challenges — only more so — climate change presents a test of
foresight, of political courage, and of the unselfish concern that one
generation owes to the next. We Americans like to say that there is no
problem we can't solve, however complicated, and no obstacle we cannot
overcome if we meet it together. I believe this about our country. I know
this about our country. And now it is time for us to show those qualities
once again. I thank you all for the kind attention, and now let me turn you
over to my friends on the panel.
 *Roundtable Panelists: **
*- Sen. John McCain
- California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Former Director of the CIA, Jim Woolsey
- Land Trust for Santa Barbara County Executive Director, Michael Feeney
- Dean of the School of Engineering at UC Santa Barbara, Matthew Tirrell

*Roundtable Highlights:
*JIM WOOLSEY
- The proposals John McCain has made are major steps toward cleaning up what
we're doing with driving.
- Cleaner- yes, these proposals move in that direction
- In terms of security -- McCain's proposals are an 'extraordinary plus.'
- Affordability - it would be a huge step in what Americans have to pay for
transportation, making it cheaper

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN
- We'll talk about where we are in developing this technology
- Yesterday, we saw cars that are hybrids, good news is that they look
great, the bad news is that they cost $100K, but the next round will cost
$60K
- Just like cell phones, the cost will come down

MICHAEL FEENEY
- I'm not an energy expert, my profession is land trust issues
- I appreciate the Senator's general approach
- I'm a little less optimistic in technology and the government's ability to
embrace the changes that are needed to really turn things around
- There's no solution as to the where to store the radioactive waste of
nuclear energy -- that's a huge issue for me
- I'm nervous that we are backsliding on our environmental standards
- I appreciate the spirit that you are trying to promote -- but I believe we
have to be very cautious about how we approach these things without rolling
back our environmental standards
- People need to realize all of us have to change and it's going to be more
expensive -- too rosy of a picture has been painted

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN
- Thank you.
- Spent nuclear fuel -- the technology is there, the Europeans are doing it;
80% of France's electricity comes from nuclear energy; it's going great!  You
should visit there
- I look forward to discussing that issue more
- U.S. Navy has used nuclear energy for many years and there's never been a
problem

MICHAEL FEENEY
- I appreciate your points
- I don't know how they are doing it in Europe, but I know that we're not
working with nuclear waste well in the U.S.

MATTHEW TIRRELL
- Cutting demand for energy is the fastest, cheapest way to go about this
- However, demand is growing
- We need to talk about energy productivity -- how much we are getting out
of the energy we're using
- There's a concern for supply -- but my opinion is that we'll run out of
space before we run out of oil
- I'm more optimistic than Michael when it comes to the improvements that we
seek in technology, I think there is a lot there
- The idea of a RND tax credit is a good one -- and I argue that it should
be readily available to new energy sources
- In the short-term, decreasing our demand is something we should do

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN:
- How does the avg. citizen make their home more energy efficient?

MATTHEW TIRRELL:
- The utility companies can have a lot to do with this and work with the
consumers
- Adoption of solar energy is one way

JIM WOOLSEY
- Solar energy use in California is a good example -- it should serve as a
model

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN
- You have these solar panels that are now paper thin -- unlike what we had
years ago, these heavy big things

GOV. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER
- We started this million solar roof initiative to expand our use of solar
energy
- We've worked and tried out a lot of things -- and it'd be great if it was
done on a national level
- We in CA are shooting for 20% renewables by 2020 -- nationally we are 1-2%
-- European countries are already at 20%
- McCain will change this when President

MATTHEW TIRRELL
- Getting over the transportation barriers is important -- and your tax
credit initiative is in that direction
- Lighting is also a big thing

MICHAEL FEENEY
- I think this is all good
- The more we can do to create the right price signals to consumers is good
- Make it more economical for renters and home-owners to use green
technology

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN
- If you go to certain parts of the state you see wind farms
- But what about tide?

JIM WOOSLEY
- Tide technology is a bit behind of where we are with solar and wind energy
- Expansion of the notion of geo-thermal is really promising -- people are
starting to realize that even slightly different temperatures can work
- There's a lot coming -- perhaps in tidal, definitely in geo-thermal as
well as solar and wind in technological developments

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN
- Americans may not be as appreciative as maybe we are of what our energy
needs are over the next 20 years
- We have energy needs that are going to need to be met -- with solar, wind,
nuclear, etc
- We are not in a static situation -- we're in a dynamic one
- Matthew, maybe you can give us assessment of our energy needs?

MATTHEW TIRRELL
- Over the next 20 years -- our energy needs are expected to double,
worldwide
- It's a HUGE growth
- As voracious our need is now, it's expected to double -- especially
worldwide as third world nations develop
- There's a near perfect correlation between energy consumption and quality
of life
- We're not going to be able to tell the rest of the world you can't have
our quality of life

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN
- We have to stop the gridlock in Washington
- As president I will do that and reach across the aisle to get things done
- One of the reasons why Gov. Schwarzenegger enjoys the approval ratings he
does is because he reaches across the aisle
- I will put our country first and my party second.

-- 
Cammie L. Croft
Tracking/Media Monitoring Director
Progressive Media USA
[email-masked]
202-609-7679 (office)
206-999-3064 (cell)

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