Boehner says country can be energy independent in 5 years

Apr 25 - Michael D. Pitman Journal-News, Hamilton, Ohio

 

Speaker of the House John Boehner told a group at the Middletown Rotary Club on Thursday that the United States could be energy independent in as early as five years.

And Butler County's two largest cities -- Middletown and Hamilton -- are at the forefront of what Boehner called an "energy boom."

The West Chester Twp. Republican said the country is importing less oil today than in the last 40 years, and being energy independent in a few years means fewer U.S. dollars going overseas and more American jobs.

"There's an energy boom going on in America. It's not happening on public lands; it's happening on private lands. It's out in West Texas, it's out in South Texas, it's in North Dakota, it's in Northeast Ohio, it's in Pennsylvania and elsewhere as the technology to extract more oil and gas continues to get perfected," Boehner said. "That's going to mean lower energy costs for Americans."

Boehner continued his swing through the district Thursday, first taking a brief tour of Kaivac Cleaning Supplies on Zimmerman Avenue in Hamilton, then speaking to a capacity crowd at the Middletown Rotary Club's luncheon at Brown's Run Country Club in Madison Twp.

Earlier this week Boehner paid visits to businesses in Eaton and Piqua and spoke to members of the Darke County Chamber of Commerce at a breakfast to "get an idea of what's on people's minds."

Boehner is less than two weeks from Ohio's May 6 partisan primary where he faces three opponents -- Eric Gurr and Matthew Ashworth, both of Liberty Twp., and J.D. Winteregg, of Troy -- for his seat as the 8th Ohio Congressional District representative in Washington, D.C. The winner will run in November against James Condit Jr., of the Constitution Party, and one of two Democrats -- either Tom Poetter, of Oxford, or Matthew Guyette, of Greenville.

This is Boehner's first tour of a Butler County company since February when he visited Republic Wire in West Chester Twp. and sat down in exclusive interview with the Journal-News.

While Boehner didn't specifically mention Middletown or Hamilton in his speech to the Rotary Club, those two cities are involved in the goal of energy independence.

Hamilton, the majority investor of the Meldahl hydroelectric power plant on the Ohio River near Foster, Ky., is nearing the end of construction of the 10-year, $500 million project. The plant could produce enough electricity to nearly power the city of Hamilton with 558,000 megawatt hours of energy will be generated a year.

Hamilton's co-investor is American Municipal Power, Inc.

Plans for a natural gas-fired power plant in Middletown, also a $500 million project, are progressing. The Middletown Energy Center, which will be owned and operated by Florida-based NTE Energy LLC, would be able to produce 540 megawatts of electric power a year.

"Speaker Boehner is right on target with the energy independence policy," said Middletown City Manager Judy Gilleland, who attended the Rotary luncheon. "Our efforts in Middletown to attract NTE-Middletown Energy Center mirror this policy. NTE will provide an investment of $500 million into our local economy and bring jobs to Middletown residents."

Kate Slusark Kiely, spokeswoman for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the key to shore up energy independence "is to capture the full potential of clean, homegrown renewable power and energy efficiency."

"These are energy sources that provide clean, healthier alternatives to fossil fuel power sources that turbocharge our weather, pollute our air and put our safe drinking water at risk," she said.

Boehner said Americans pays 30 percent less for electricity than the rest of the world, and about 50 percent less than the country's largest rivals -- and that cost disparity will continue to grow to America's benefit by landing worldwide manufacturers. Energy-intensive companies, he said, "will have no other choice but to come here."

"You can't produce anything without electricity," Boehner said. "It's integral to our economy, and the fact that we pay 30 percent less than the rest of the world has always given us a bit of an edge, allow us to have a higher standard of living and still allow us to compete in a worldwide economy."

In order to take "full advantage of this energy boom that is coming," he outlined five items:

--Reduce over-regulation

--Simplify and "fix" the tax code

--Education for more children

--Tort reform

--Fix the country's long-term "spending problem"

Gurr said that Boehner's list "misses one critical piece of the puzzle."

"Although I agree with all five, they could turn out to be largely meaningless if we don't fix the Federal Reserve Bank," he said. "Over the last six or seven years, the Fed has created trillions of dollars and much of it is unaccounted for. Because of this, we have a real possibility that tens of trillions of dollars could at some point flood the American and world economy. If that happens, we will have a currency collapse, and we will be in worse shape with exceedingly high inflation."

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