Remarks at the Safe Harbor Water Power Corporation in Conestoga, Pennsylvania

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, May 21, 2001

And this is an administration that's committed-committed--to putting the people ahead of politics and talking about dialog. And discussing important issues in a way that will bring honor to the process. So that when youngsters look up at our Nation's Capitol, they're proud of what they see.

And we laid out a plan, and I hope there's good, honorable debate about the plan, because it's based upon common sense and it's based upon hope and it's based upon new technologies.

I think it's very important for our country to realize what Spence talked about, and that is the need to make sure we diversify our energy supplies. It's important to do so for national security reasons, for starters. As I mentioned yesterday in Iowa-we went to a place that was doing research on biomass and value-added processing-and I said to the folks there, I said, "I would much rather have our economy powered by crops grown in Iowa than barrels of oil coming out of Iraq." It's in our Nation's interest that we diversify. It's in our Nation's interest that we become less dependent upon nations, some of which really don't care for what we believe in. And I believe we can do so.

Now, that's going to mean we've got to understand the power and promise of nuclear energy, that we've got to be willing to discuss nuclear energy and recognize that nuclear power is much safer than it's ever been and, at the same time, use sound science to help us find the right place to store the product of nuclear power.

It means we've got to understand the hope and promise of natural gas and be willing to explore for natural gas in places that heretofore have been off limits, such as remote areas of Alaska.

I want you all to understand that the debate about ANWR is one that is not based as far as I'm concerned--based upon sound fact. You see, first of all, ANWR--what we're talking about is 2,000 acres amongst, I believe it's 19 million acres; secondly, the technology has changed so that one is able to have a single drill site and explore for reservoir miles away from the drill site; thirdly, the explorationists are willing to only move equipment during the winter, which means they'll be on ice roads, and remove the equipment as the ice begins to melt, so that the fragile tundra is protected.

People have got to understand that it's possible that we could find, and likely find, 600,000 barrels of oil a day out of ANWR. That's what we import from Saudi--I mean, from Iraq. It makes sense, folks, for us to have an environmentally sensitive exploration plan in America in order to diversify supply, not only for national security reasons but for international reasons, as well.

We need more natural gas in America. Natural gas is a clean burning fuel. There's a lot of it. But in order to find it, we're going to have to move it by pipeline. And we need more pipeline, and we need safer pipelines, and technology allows us to do so.

There's a lot of discussion about alternative sources of energy. Hydroelectric power is one, and our Nation must welcome hydroelectric power as a renewable resource. They talk about solar energy. We're very much in support of the alternative forms of energy. I hope some day that these renewables will be the dominant source of energy in America. I'm not so sure how realistic that is, but nevertheless, they'll play an integral part of the energy mix in America. And my administration, through incentives and research, will encourage them to be.