the president: thank you all. please be seated.thanks for coming. (applause.) thanks for such a warm welcome here in delaware. i thankyou, for those of you who stayed up for the speech last night, thanks. (laughter.) ifyou're 60 and over, it's a little late to stay up, i understand. but it's exciting alwaysto go in front of the congress. and i appreciate the good senator, tom carper, for joiningus, and thanks for bringing along martha, a dupont alumna, by the way. (applause.) and i want to thank congressman mike castle,as well, for joining me here in delaware. and thanks for paying attention last night.(laughter.) i asked castle if he stayed awake for the whole thing, and he said, well, justthe first 55 minutes. and i said, well -- (laughter.)
i'm excited to be here to talk about whati talked -- part of what i talked about last night. and i can't think of a better placeto talk about innovation technology change and a better tomorrow than dupont. the history-- (applause.) i thank chad holliday for inviting me here and introducing me to some of yourfellow workers who are really putting this country on the leading edge of technologicalchange. and i want to spend a little time talking about this energy initiative. but first i want to thank all the good folksat dupont for really leading with your brains. and as the secretary of energy, sam bodman,told me coming in -- he said, when he was -- see, he's like a graduate from mit, which-- so he's a smart guy and i'm the president.
but anyway -- (laughter.) it's the way itworks sometimes, you know. (applause.) he said, when he went to mit, they looked atdupont as a case study on how to make sure science and practical applications came together.and that's what i saw today -- i'm going to spend -- as i said, i'm going to spend a littletime talking about. and so i want to thank -- chad, thank you and the team for invitingme, and all the good employees for taking time to come and visit. i want to thank the governor. madam governor,thank you for coming. i appreciate governor minner for joining us. being governor is agreat job, and -- (laughter) -- i kind of know what i'm talking about. (laughter.) andi know you agree with me. i know carper agrees
with me, and i know castle agrees with me,as well. (laughter.) and i know pete dupont agrees with me, and i'm proud that formergovernor pete dupont has joined us here today, as well. so thank you current governor andformer governor for joining us. (applause.) speaker, thanks for being here. i'm proudto see you again. charlie copeland, thank you for coming, as well. for the statehousefolks, i appreciate you serving. for local government, thanks, as well. i'm here to talk about an interesting opportunityfor our country. i made the case last night to the american people that we have got todo something about our dependence on oil -- for two reasons. one, dependence on oil providesan economic and national security risk, a
problem that this country better start dealingwith in a serious fashion now, before it becomes acute. and second, we've got to be wise stewardsof the environment, and dependency on oil makes it harder to be wise stewards of theenvironment. and what's interesting about the debate isit's the confluence of national security and economic security concerns and environmentalconcerns that come together and can be solved at the same time by technologies. it's reallywhat's begun to evolve here in america. in other words, we can get beyond the post-kyoto-- the pre-kyoto era with a post-kyoto strategy, the center of which is new technologies. now, i said last night, and i want to spenda little time talking about it, that the american
people have got to understand that when you'redependent on oil, particularly from overseas, if demand goes up for the product in othercountries relative to supply, the price of product is going to go up here. we're in aglobal economy. and so when the chinese economy grows, or the indian economy grows -- whichwe want it to do, by the way -- when their economy grows, it provides markets for yourproducts. so it's in our interests that we trade. but we've got to understand that whenthe globe becomes interconnected economically, the demand increases in other countries cancause the price of oil to go up here, and it has an economic effect on our own economy.the more dependent we are on oil from overseas, the more likely it is that somebody else'sdemand is going to affect what you pay at
the pump for gasoline. secondly, if you're dependent on oil overseas,it means that -- and a hostile regime, a regime hostile to the united states produces thatoil, you become vulnerable to the activity of a hostile regime. in other words, somebodydoesn't like us, they produce the oil, they decide to do something about it, they canaffect us. that's -- when i talk about the national security risks, that's what i mean.in other words, you don't want your president sitting in the oval office worried about theactivities of a hostile regime that could have all kinds of impacts on our security,starting with economic security. dependence on oil, as well, means that ifa terrorist were able to destroy infrastructure
somewhere else in the world, it's going toaffect what you pay for at the gasoline pump. in other words, as we learned, the terroristsattacked us in brutal ways; they attacked us by flying airplanes into our buildings.but we're also vulnerable to attacks through infrastructure around the world that couldcause your price, the price you pay, to go up. and so we've got to do something about it.in other words, government has got to be more than just talkers, we got to be problem-solvers.that's what the american people expect us to do. that's why i said last night, it doesn'tmatter what side of the aisle we sit on; what the american people expect is for people onboth sides of the aisle to come together and
solve problems. and this is a problem. andi'm going to work with congress to get it solved. now, the good news is, is that we're on theverge of some unbelievable technological breakthroughs. at this company you've got 2,500 scientists;some of the smartest people in our country work here, all trying to develop new technologies-- this isn't anything new for dupont, by the way, this is like what you've been doingfor a long time -- but trying to develop new technologies to help us solve this problem.and that's why i've come here. you're employing the best minds possible to address the problemof economic and national security and environmental issues, because we're dependent on oil. andthe american people have got to know that
you're making progress. as an aside, when i talked about the immigrationbill last night, i also want you to know i understand that we need to make sure thatwhen a smart person from overseas wants to come and work in dupont, it's in our intereststo allow him or her to do so. we've got to expand what's called h1b visas. i know thesenator and the congressman understand that. i'm looking forward with congress to do justthat. it makes no sense, by the way -- i know, i'm getting off topic here -- (laughter) -- buti feel strongly about what i'm telling you. it makes no sense to say to a young scientistfrom india, you can't come to america to help this company develop technologies that helpus deal with our problems. so we've got to
change that, as well, change that mind setin washington, d.c. i know we can work together on that. so we're spending a lot of money, by the way-- your money -- on developing -- on helping to develop new technologies. i think it'san appropriate use of taxpayers' money to spend on developing new technologies to helpus deal with problems that affect today and the future for your children. we spent about$10 billion so far on the technologies that are -- i think are going to help change americaand our habits. and we're going to spend more. part of my request to congress is going tobe, we want to put $2.7 billion of your money to help concerns and smart people developnew ways of powering our homes and powering
our automobiles. we're making some progress.let me just share a couple of things that we're doing. one, we're spending a lot ofyour money on clean coal technology. the reason why is we've got a lot of coal. if you wantto be less dependent on oil from overseas -- and by the way, we import about 60 percentof our oil today. in 1985, it was 27 percent of our oil. so we're becoming exponentiallymore dependent. and we've got a lot of coal. and the fundamentalquestion is, can we burn that coal to heat your homes in a way that doesn't endangerthe environment. and so we're spending a lot of money to do that. it's called clean coaltechnology. we're spending billions. the dream one day is for -- for us to be able to say,here's a coal-fired plant that has zero emissions.
and it's possible. it's likely, as a matterof fact. and so we're spending time -- money doing that. we're also spending money on wind and solar.as a matter of fact, i saw your solar panel expert. and we spent a little time on -- here'sthe dream. the dream is, some day the technology will be such that you'll be -- your housewill become a little power generator. and if you use -- if you got excess electricitygenerated by solar, you'll be able to feed it back into your grid. is that possible?yes, it's possible. as a matter of fact, the advance in solar technology has been quitedramatic. there's more advance still to be done, which requires your money being spentto help concerns develop new solar energy.
we got a lot of wind -- particularly in washington.(laughter and applause.) that's what castle was saying last night, after 55 minutes. (laughter.)wind energy is an interesting alternative. i strongly believe that if we're that interestedin greenhouse gases and renewable fuels, this country has got to be aggressive about establishingsafe nuclear power. if that is -- one of our objectives is to be serious about dealingwith the environment, there's no cleaner source of energy than nuclear power. and so we're spending money and research tomake sure that the next generation power plant is safe. but also we're spending money, interestinglyenough, on how to process spent fuels better. and believe it or not, actually, we're beginningto permit nuclear power plants here in america.
and that's going to be good for your children.it's going to make us less dependent on natural gas from overseas, and it's going to makeus better stewards of the environment. but the big gains to be made is -- for oil,if we're trying to become less dependent on oil for economic and national security reasons,is going to be made in our automobiles and the power we use in our automobiles. that'sreally where we're going to make significant strides. just a couple of things that are happeningthat are interesting: one, we began a hydrogen initiative that -- where a lot of smart folksare beginning to research whether or not we can power automobiles by hydrogen. we thinkit's possible. but it's not going to be possible
until i'm 75, which is probably 15 years fromnow. your children may very well likely be driving in automobiles powered by hydrogen-- the waste product which is water, by the way. but something has got to happen in theinterim. i mean, we can't wait, for economic reasons or national security reasons, forhydrogen to kick in. in other words, it's still a dream. and so we're pushing two interesting typesof technologies: one, battery technologies -- lithium ionic batteries. for all you historymajors out there, let me put it to you this way -- (laughter) -- one of these days you'regoing to plug your car into your garage, and you're going to be able to drive the first20 miles on electricity, and your car is not
going to have to look like a golf cart. (laughter.)and that technology is coming. and we're spending money to encourage that kind of technology. american automobile companies, as well asforeign automobile companies competing for market share here in the united states, understandthat's where the consumer mentality is evolving. and they're beginning to spend their own money,as well as help from the federal government, to develop new batteries. it's going to bean exciting time, really, when you think about it, when you're able to drive the first 20miles in a plug-in hybrid vehicle without one drop of gasoline, which makes the countryless dependent on oil. secondly, we're spending a lot of money ondifferent kinds of fuels -- ethanol. i don't
know if you know, but we're now up to a littleover 5 billion gallons a year of ethanol usage. that's a threefold increase in five years'time. but what's interesting about technological advances, as you know better than me, is thatas technology becomes more widely used and the markets begin to evolve, that kind ofusage is going to accelerate quite dramatically. so the first five years may be relativelyslow, but the next five years is going to be quite dramatic in the amount of ethanolproduced. however, there is a constraint, and that is,the ethanol use today comes from corn, and we've got hog growers and chicken growersthat need corn to feed their animals. and therefore, it's going to be kind of a strain,at some point in time, on the capacity for
us to have enough ethanol to be able to makeus less dependent on oil. so what you're doing at dupont becomes vital, and that is cellulosicresearch. and we spent time with some of your scientiststhat are very bright people -- and not only bright people, but optimistic people, aboutthe arrival of the day where we're going to be able to make ethanol, which will poweryour automobiles not just from corn, but from wood chips, or switch grass, or waste fromcorn itself, from the stalks. there's all kinds of opportunities to make energy to poweryour automobiles from that which had been discarded as waste in the past. and righthere at dupont, you're on the leading edge of change.
i came wondering whether or not cellulosicethanol was one of these things down the road that may be happening, may not, could endup being science or science fiction. it's going to be science. it's working. as a matterof fact, when i looked at those scientists that you employ here and heard them say, thisis a reality, mr. president, this is going to be something that we can live by -- really,i got to tell you, i'm incredibly encouraged by what i saw. and you need to be, too. andwe need to be thankful as a nation for companies like dupont who are spending shareholders'money to make sure this country becomes less dependent on oil and better stewards of theenvironment. (applause.) as i said, i do believe, strongly believe,there's a role for government; one, spending
money directly. i mentioned $2.7 billion forour '08 request from congress -- monies which, by the way, get joint-ventured with initiatives,for example, that take place here in dupont. secondly, i strongly believe that -- and,by the way, in the farm bill, request in the farm bill, we're going to put $1.6 billionover 10 years to continue this kind of research, as well. but i also strongly believe in theresearch and development tax credit. i believe the tax code should provide incentives. andone incentive that makes a lot of sense for this country is to incent you to continueto invest your money on research and development. and congress really needs to make the researchand development tax credit permanent -- see, it lays out for a year. so it's good for nextyear and -- (applause.)
the reason i say that, there's got to be certaintyin planning. i mean, your financial people are sitting around saying, well, i wonderif they're going to renew it next year -- which actually does affect investment around thecountry. and so to the extent that we can make this a permanent part of the tax code,it will add certainty to planners, and when you have certainty in planners it means it'smore likely we're going to get better research and more money into the experiments that thesegood scientists are doing here at dupont. and so,last night, based upon what i justtold you -- based upon optimism, new science, progress that we have made -- i announceda goal for the country which is to reduce gasoline consumption by 20 percent over thenext 10 years. if we are -- when we do that,
it will mean that we have reduced the amountof imported oil from the middle east -- or the equivalent of the imported oil from themiddle east by about three-quarters. and that's important. it's really going to be importantfor your children that this country has become able to -- be able to say to the hostile regime,leave us alone, you can't affect us, we'll protect ourselves in all kinds of ways fromyou. and so i put out a mandatory fuel standard.this is a government mandate that says we'll be using 35 billion gallons of alternativefuels by 2017. this is a firm statement. you know, i signed an energy bill that had renewablefuel standards of seven billion gallons. and so this is five times larger than that. ibase it on -- and this is a practical declaration
-- and i base it on the fact of how much we'veincreased ethanol, but i've also based it on the fact that we're going to have breakthroughsin cellulosic ethanol, as well. and to couple that in order to make sure we're20 percent less dependent in 10 years, i also proposed to congress that we change the fuelefficiency standards in our automobiles. something that the american people don't know aboutis that during my administration, we changed the cafe standard for trucks. and basically,we said we're going to take the weight of each type of truck and set a fuel standardspecific to weight. it's a little hard to explain, except for it has achieved a lotof conservation efficiencies. we need to do the same thing for cars.
if you have an overall fleet cafe standard,what ends up happening is, is that the bigger cars have lower gas mileages than they couldotherwise, and the little cars have high gas mileages, which reduces the safety in theautomobiles. and so we believe that if you make -- set cafe standards based upon weight,it will help meet consumer demand and makes better science. as a matter of fact, thisis an idea we got from the national academy of science. and so congress, i'm hopeful, recognizes thegreat potential in new technologies, that we're able to have a new mandatory fuel standardand new cafe standards for our automobiles, all aiming to make us less dependent on oil,and thereby, making us more secure nationally
and be able to say we're better stewards ofthe environment. i said two things last night i want to followup on; one, i don't know if you know this, but technology for the exploration for hydrocarbonsis unbelievably advanced these days. and i'm confident that -- i know we're going to need,if we want to be less dependent on foreign oil, we need to be exploring here at home.and there's some unbelievably great deep-water gas potential in the gulf of mexico, for example,and we can explore for those hydrocarbons in environmentally friendly ways. and we needto continue to do so. in other words, it's going to take a while to get to a world wherewe're much less dependent on foreign oil, and we need to be exploring in environmentallyfriendly ways -- and we can.
and if a terrorist threat -- if terrorismis a threat to the supply of -- our energy supply, then i believe it makes sense to addressthat terrorist threat by doubling the size of the strategic petroleum reserve, so that,rather than 750 million gallons of crude oil in storage in case there's a disruption basedupon a terrorist threat, there's a billion-five. in other words, if we're saying dependenceon oil creates a terrorist threat, let's do something about it now. let's say that ifthe threat does come, there's enough crude oil in storage to be able to deal with theshort-term economic consequences of an attack. so that's why i said what i said the othernight. it's really a comprehensive plan. i hope i can leave you with the impression that-- a couple of things -- one, an approach
to energy security that's aggressive alsois a good approach to environmental quality; and secondly, that such an approach requiresa multiplicity of research projects. in other words, it's not going to be one cure to dependenceon oil, it's going to be a variety of new technologies that are coming forth to do so. today i signed an executive order that sayswe're going to commit the government to the following things: that we're going to purchasemore hybrid and flexible-fuel vehicles that run on ethanol -- because we own a lot ofcars, and therefore, it's one thing to say, this is the goal; it's another thing to actuallyparticipate in achieving that goal, and that's what we're going to do.
secondly, we're going to purchase plug-inhybrid vehicles as soon as they hit the market. i think that will give some surety to thosewho have invested in new technologies to know that the federal government is going to bea purchaser, when commercially available. in other words, we're not going to waste yourtaxpayers' money, but we're going to participate in a new market. i don't think you want usbuying above market. i think you want us to be wise about how we spend it. (laughter.) we're going to purchase -- increase our purchasesof renewable power from new sources. we're going to reduce the gas consumption in thefederal fleet by 20 percent over 10 years. we're going to be joining with america -- weset the goal; it doesn't make much sense for
the federal government to set the goal andthen not participate, and we will. and so the executive order commits this governmentto doing what i know is going to happen. i love being around entrepreneurs and peoplethat dream big dreams. and today i understand some are out there scratching their heads,saying, you expect me to believe, president, that i'm going to be driving a car, the fuelfrom which has been derived from switch grass? and my answer is, yes, i do. that's what ibelieve. you know why i feel that way? because the people here at dupont feel that way. thepeople here at dupont have always dreamed big dreams. and if you look at the history,they have followed through. there have been unbelievable new technologies that have comefrom the minds of the folks who work here.
and the same thing is happening on energy.it's coming. it's coming. and the role of the federal government is to set high goals-- and in this case, mandatory fuel standards -- to say, we're dedicated, committed, andwe're going to achieve the goal. and that way, when it's all said and done, when we'vedone our duty to serving the american people, we can look back and say to this next generation,we tried to leave you a little better world. and so i want to thank you for giving me achance to come and talk about that better world. it's on the way. and i'm excited tobe a part of it, and i know you are, as well. god bless. (applause.)
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