At yesterday\’s House Energy Independence and Global Warming committee hearing, oil executives railed against proposals to invest in renewable energy. In particular, ExxonMobil executive J. Stephen Simon said, \”government mandates and subsidies distort market forces and impede technological innovation.\”
So Steve, you\’ll be giving us back those billions in tax subsidies then?
Big Oil companies continue the peddle the fiction that they are operating in the mythical \”free market,\” when in reality, they would not exist without government policies facilitating their access to natural resources.
Right now, our energy policy is subsidizing the disease and starving the cure.
We need to ramp up production of renewable energy and maximize energy-efficiency if we are to resolve the climate crisis and achieve energy security. Yet our policies continue to prop up hugely profitable oil companies and fail to invest in making renewable energy affordable and accessible.
One proposal is to repeal the $18 billion in giveaways to oil and gas industries, then invest the revenue in renewable energy and energy-efficiency. That is nothing but a shift in our government policies, unleashing the technological innovation that the addiction to oil — perpetuated by conservative policies — has long impeded.
It\’s our money, not Exxon\’s. And we can decide where to invest it.
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