Westerman Slams Sec. Buttigieg Over EV Subsidies: 'You Need To Go Back And Look At The Physics’

5 months ago

On Thursday, Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-AR) questioned Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Electric Vehicle rollouts during a House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee hearing.

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Transcript

00:00Convening the previously recessed hearing as a reminder members should limit their remarks to

00:04the allotted five minutes. With that I recognize myself for five minutes of questions and

00:14Secretary Buttigieg, I'm hearing from constituents that they are concerned about a potential port

00:19strike across the entire east and gulf coast ports if a contract agreement is not reached

00:24by September 30th. This will be devastating for Arkansas businesses that rely on the ports

00:29to move their import and exports to customers. We're 90 days out and I've learned that the

00:34negotiations have been called off. This is alarming and it's up to the Biden administration

00:40to bring the parties back to the table to avert this economic catastrophe in September.

00:45What are your plans to make sure a port strike doesn't happen? Thank you, yes this is something

00:50we are monitoring closely and our message to the parties is that it is vital that they come

00:56together and arrive at a deal that does right by port workers and allows port operations to flow.

01:04We had a similar level of intense negotiations around the west coast ports with ILWU that came

01:11to a successful conclusion. Our hope is that the same will take place with ILA and I'm in

01:16frequent discussion with the acting secretary of labor and other administration members on what we

01:21can do to urge you. You're optimistic there's not going to be a shutdown because you know people have

01:26to plan way in advance for alternate routes and things. Yeah we can't speak for the parties but

01:32of course we are urging them to get to a deal before that September 30th date. So earlier

01:38this year the federal highway administration issued a proposed rule that would waive federal

01:42regulations governing the procurement and administration of engineering and design

01:46services by local governments. I've heard serious concerns from engineering companies about the

01:52potential impact of this change which could undermine the long-standing and successful

01:58qualifications-based selection process that has been the federal standard for decades. I appreciate

02:04the department's interest in easing administrative burdens on local governments that receive federal

02:09grants but as a professional engineer and I think maybe the only one in congress I'm concerned about

02:15the potential drawbacks of this particular proposal. Studies have shown that hiring most

02:20qualified engineering companies saves time and money and results in better projects and more

02:24satisfied owners. The QBS method also gives small and minority-owned firms an even playing field to

02:31compete based on their specific proficiencies. You know it's my understanding that more than 740

02:38public comments were filed in nearly unanimous opposition to the FHWA proposal. Can you please

02:43ensure that the administration will carefully consider the views of the engineering community

02:48and the potential negative impact of the proposed rule on public safety and project cost? Yes I'll

02:54take care to look into that and we want to make sure that anything we do that affects the

02:58relationships with the engineering community is responsible and conducive to good effective safe

03:04project delivery. And I want to shift gears a little bit and talk about

03:10carbon emissions, carbon reductions. I know that's something that that you care about and

03:17can you tell us what percentage of the world's carbon emissions does the U.S. produce? I think

03:23it's less than a fifth depending how you count it of which the single biggest

03:28economic sector is transportation. Right so the government data says 13.49, 13.5 percent

03:37is from the U.S. and like you said the biggest sector is transportation. What's the percentage

03:45of that? I don't have that off the top of my head. 29 percent. So if we take 29 percent of 13.5 percent

03:56that gets us down to between three and four percent of global emissions come from U.S.

04:01transportation. What percentage of that is passenger cars and lot duty vehicles? So I know

04:08it's one of the single largest categories. About 57 percent of that. So if we take 57 percent

04:15of that second number we're down around two percent. So if every internal combustion engine

04:25vehicle in the United States was magically converted to an EV overnight what would that

04:32say the potential to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions would be? By that logic congressman none

04:38of us should ever vote. We are all doing our part to do something about a global change and I believe

04:44America should lead the world. I disagree with you on that. We should vote smartly. We should put

04:51smart policy in place and last count we tried to find the number over 120 some odd billion

04:59taxpayer dollars have been put in subsidies for EVs. Now that's if all the fuel going into these

05:07EVs came from non-carbon emitting sources. Do you know how much electricity in the United States

05:12comes from non-carbon emitting sources? Even if all of that electricity came from fossil sources

05:17it would still be cleaner because EV engines are more efficient. I think you need to go back and

05:22look at physics a little bit. Okay the physics congressmen are that an EV engine is 90 percent

05:27efficient where even the best ice engines are lucky to get to 40. But the the plant that made

05:32the energy is not 90 percent efficient and internal combustion engines are 25 to 30 percent efficient

05:41but you've got the efficiency of the generating plant plus the losses in transmission and don't

05:47try to make the efficiency argument. The bottom line is well I'm definitely going to try to make

05:52the efficiency argument because I think it's important. Well use good data if you're going

05:55to do that. Sure well the good data is that between the regenerative braking and the 77 percent

06:01you're talking about once the energy's in the 90 percent once the energy's in the EV.

06:06The bottom line is only 40 percent of energy in the United States comes from non-carbon emitting

06:10sources. So that two percent if you can make every vehicle in the United States an EV overnight

06:16you would be less than 0.9 percent of world's global greenhouse gas emissions. We're creating

06:22great turmoil and and change in our country with taxpayer dollars are being spent inefficiently.

06:30I'm all for EVs but let the technology catch up and don't try to ban internal combustion

06:36engines at the rate that you're doing. I'm out of time and I yield back and

06:42recognize the gentleman from California Mr. Garamendi for five.

Westerman Slams Sec. Buttigieg Over EV Subsidies: 'You Need To Go Back And Look At The Physics’

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