Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson. H.R. 4230, the Clean Industrial Technology Act, or CITA, aims to reduce the industrial sector emissions through the establishment of a DOE research, development, and demonstration program and a Federal Advisory Committee to guide its priorities.
At the subcommittee mark up of this bill, I expressed my concerns about authorizing a new program with little consultation from stakeholders. But as I mentioned in my opening statement, I’m pleased to say that the manager’s amendment addresses those concerns and makes bipartisan changes that I believe clarify and vastly improve this bill.
In the past, I also expressed concerns that the program established in this bill has the potential to duplicate existing research. Unfortunately, I think there are still parts of this legislation that might overlap with current programs.
For instance, DOE programs like the Office of Fossil Energy, the Advanced Manufacturing Office, and the Building Technologies Office are all currently addressing different pieces of this legislation to improve efficiency and reduce emissions in power production and manufacturing.
Before establihing something new, I believe we should attempt to leverage existing government resources by providing policy direction to these programs. With that being said, I want to be clear that I applaud my colleagues for coming to the table in good faith and making their best effort to address my concerns. Because of that, I am going to recommend we move this bill out of Committee. Even when our differences can’t be fully resolved, sincere bipartisan negations can be enough to get the final product to the finish line.
I yield back the balance of my time.