theater of operations and some of these other areas that director clapper highlighted in his opening testimony, you have to be very concerned about the interdependence, if you will, the interconnectedness of some of these different groups, these affiliates, these looser groups that are out there. we describe them as a.q. wannabees. and how they receive things like funding or become involved or interested in the training activities that we know are in fact occurring in places across north africa or in the sahel area of africa. we have to be concerned about how the organizations work together and how connected they are. we pay close attention to that and our insight today is far better than it was just a few years ago and our ability to

have an impact is actually pretty good. but we need to stay on top of it. especially showing we really truly understand the ideology that we face. >> general clapper gave his comments. can you give us your thoughts on the strength of that organization in syria? would that be the predominant post-assad group? >> i can go into detail in closed session on their numbers in relation to the rest of the opposition if that is what you mean. the numbers themselves are not indicative of the real influence. >> just one thing i would offer. you are working very closely with in the intelligence

community. how we would define it, to use a military term, how we define the order of battle. what is the organization's -- what are the organizations that make up this friday of -- variety of organizations, what and they look like, their composition. we are working through that in the intelligence community so we have a better idea as we move down the road with operations in syria. >> let me switch gears. can you give the american people assurance that perpetrators of the benghazi killings, that we have a full court press to find them and bring justice to them? >> that is certainly the case. we have had individuals on the ground building up relationships with counterparts in the libyan interior service.

i have been there twice myself. we are doing all we can to work with the libyan government to identify these individuals who were responsible and bring them to justice. i will say that there -- they have been responsive. the investigations are ongoing. >> so this is a law enforcement effort as opposed to our efforts against al qaeda. a more law-enforcement approach? >> i would not say any any of them are law enforcement. we are a component, but there are other agencies that are working together to make certain that the individuals are brought to justice. each of these cases we do not preclude any possible outcome. we happen to have the capability, whether it be

forensic or putting together investigations, to put the investigations together for whatever purpose whether it be prosecution or some other use. >> the department of defense is also tracking the suspects, the perpetrators. the general can speak to this in more detail in closed session. >> i just wanted an acknowledgment of the american people. thank you. mr. chairman. >> mr. thompson. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i thank you all for being here today. i'm sorry i was late. i am told you have not talked about the question i want to ask, or at least have not talked about it in the way i would like to talk about it. that is north korea.

can you give us some idea why they are -- why there is so much disparity amongst those in the intelligence community as to what is going on over there and what capabilities they have? you will hear from one individual a near crisis and the next individual uncertainty. is there any common thought on what is happening? >> well, i think maybe individuals out there have their opinions. institutionally, organizationally there is agreement. also i have to say that north korea of course is now and always has been one of the if not the toughest intelligence targets. as john brennan pointed out

earlier we do not have a big track record on the new leader. there is not much history there. he did not have the grooming. only around two or three years, unlike his father who had 10 or 15 years of grooming prior to his ascension to the senior leadership role. as far as what is happening, as we were discussing earlier the main objective here for kim jong-un is to solidify his leadership and position. a lot of what he is doing is for internal domestic consumption as well as external consumption. i think even he realizes the extreme condition north korea is in with its economy. in fact, we are seeing indications that some portions of the korean people's army, as

it is called, as they do every year, are being taken away from military duties to attend to their agricultural responsibilities. their harvest last year was six percent lower than the previous year. a lot of the donor aid of their going to get will not be forthcoming because of their belligerent rhetoric and aggressive actions they have taken. i think we can go into more detail if you would like in closed session, but we have reasonably good insight into what is going on. not to say it is perfect. we do not have good detail on kind of the inner sanctum and what is his long-term objective. i am not sure he has one other than to boost his position. >> what capabilities do they have as far as reaching strategic places where either

americans live or work? >> well, they have obviously done three nuclear underground tests. they have displayed although never tested what they claim to be an intercontinental ballistic missile. displayed it in parades. deployed launchers. the vehicles, but not the missiles themselves. so that is an area we watch very, very carefully as to what their real capability is. i think i would stop there and go into more detail in closed session. >> i would like to do that. thank you. no further questions. >> thank you, mr. chair and welcome, mr. brennan, to the committee. i thank all of you for being here.

it is really an honor to be able to meet with the intelligence community all over the world, and we thank them for their work. my question is regarding iran and obtaining nuclear weapons. i would like to ask questions about that but before i would like to ask a question of director brennan. when the white house conducted armed drone strikes in north africa, particularly in eastern libya, prior to our attack on on -- the attack on our mission in benghazi, did the white house notify the state department of armed drone strikes before they were made? >> armed drone strikes in libya? i am unknowing of such and would defer to the white house to address your question. >> where there any armed drone strikes in northern africa made by the white house? >> the white house does not have a drone of responsibility whatever. >> did they have any directive toward having armed drone strikes in north africa?

>> again, i do not know what it is you are referring to but i would defer to the white house on whatever happened at that time. >> the vehicles that were flying over libya were unarmed. >> were there any armed drone strikes that were made in north africa prior to 9/11? >> in libya? >> i'm asking in north africa. were any armed drone strikes made by the united states in north africa prior to 9/11? >> i do not know what you could be referencing. >> i'm wondering if the state department was aware or the military was aware or these eia was aware. and if we are not going to talk about it we are not going to talk about it, but that is a question i would like to know.

going back to iran, what is our red line regarding the iranian nuclear program? i would ask director brennan. what is our red line? >> that is clearly a policy question. one of the things the intelligence community is trying to make sure policymakers are fully development -- informed about developments inside iran. >> but regarding the nuclear weapon program and our intelligence capabilities, again, we have a wonderful intelligence community but we were not aware of the bombing in 1993 of the world trade center tower. we were not aware before 9/11 occurred in 2001. we were not aware of a arab spring developments and were not aware of the attack on the mission in benghazi. how can we have confidence that we will know when iran has amassed the capability of developing a nuclear weapon? i ask that because the president

said last month that it would take approximately a year for iran to development a nuclear weapon -- develop a nuclear weapon once they have made the decision. last week we know the current negotiations have gone without any breakthrough or any development, and so i am very concerned about our intelligence capability of knowing with a high degree of certainty when iran has either made the decision to develop nuclear weapons or has obtained nuclear weapons. >> this is a subject much better talked about in closed session. >> i would look forward to that and appreciate that. could you comment on what is happening -- we talk a lot about uranium development with iran's nuclear development but they are also building a heavy water reactor. what is the status of their heavy water reactor? >> again, this would be a subject for closed session.

>> i look forward to that. i yield back. >> thank you very much. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you all for being here. i read last week that the last tank left europe in march. there is no doubt the threat has dramatically changed. i will talk a little bit about changes taking place. a major drawdown in afghanistan to be completed. can any of you speak to the challenges that presents to intelligence collection as a result of our drawdown in and in

2014? >> as the other components of our presence there, the military and the diplomatic, in turn affects the impact -- footprint we will have residual in afghanistan, that has not been fully decided yet. some of that will depend on the details of negotiations going on between our government and the afghan government. our intent to maintain a sustained sufficient intelligence presence there so we can certainly monitor any terrorist activity that would potentially pose a threat to the homeland. >> great. maybe we can talk in closed session. i am interested in how we will accomplish that with a much smaller footprint. to accomplish what we need to a comp list. >> we can talk about it in a closed session. i would say in general it is not going to be as robust as it is

today simply because we will not have the presence of as -- in as many locales. however it is negotiated, as we do now. >> appreciate that. changing subjects, we spent a lot of time time talking about cyber attacks. can any of you speak to the fact that we knew have -- we now have either engaged in those activities and see diminished activity in old-school intelligence and espionage efforts, trying to recruit folks to give information to the bad guys -- has that declined? >> that is something we could discuss in closed session, sure. i will make a point that quite obviously there is a substantial increase in cyber espionage across the board. that has been remarked upon and indicated a number of ways. >> thank you. last question. we talked a lot about north

korea. can you give me the intelligence community's view of what is going on in the north korean population? what do we know about how people are reacting to this more broadly? we talked about the army and what it is doing. what intelligence to we have about the impact of american policy and food aid and if that might create pressure on the regime? >> the control exerted over the korean -- north korean population is amazing. it is orwellian. there is a lot of capacity to endure hardship in north korea. there is a cult approach in north korea. there always has been, with kim jong un and kim jong-il and kim il-sung before him.

one of the indicators for me personally about the state of conditions in north korea is the number of north koreans finding a way to vote with their feet, who leave north korea. when i served there as director of intelligence in korea for two years, you might see one or two defectors a year. that was a big deal. now it is a pretty steady stream of defectors. that in a regime that has tremendous control over its people's activities and movements, i think that is a tremendous indicator of the real state of affairs in north korea. >> thank you very much. i yield back. >> i will follow up on his question. mr. director, could you talk about counterintelligence threat are nationstates conducting against u.s. businesses and

interest in the united states? >> nary a week goes by that we are not finding some indication of espionage in one form or another from the principal nationstates we have problems with. that is still a substantial problem and we have substantial percentages of our national security resources allocated to counterintelligence, the more specific personal, not cyber counterintelligence. >> there are as many spies in the united states targeting the united states -- it would exceed the size of that footprint during the cold war -- is that accurate? >> i would have to look at that particular analysis.

i have not seen. the other aspect i would add is the traditional presence is, while substantial, far more effective because it can be combined with a cyber initiative as well to maximize and leverage their kid elegies -- their capabilities they did not have before. >> can you talk briefly on economic espionage cases in the past? we had great runs on stopping some huge thefts or interceding after the fact. can you give us a flavor of some of those cases? >> we had one out of hawaii where there was successful prosecution of individuals stealing substantial secrets related to the development of our defense capabilities. we had a case recently in chicago.

i would have to get you the statistics. they get publicity incident by incident and really what we should do is do a better job of rolling them up and giving the committee a full picture of the activity we have had over the last two years. >> it is important for the public to understand there is an aggressive posture against human intelligence and economic espionage being conducted in the united states. you mentioned the case in chicago. there was a case in indianapolis, in new jersey. it is fairly aggressive and the numbers of catches have gone up. >> yes. absolutely. one other aspect that is not necessarily a result of september 11, the relationships addressing this particular phenomenon have grown substantially. we work closely with the agency and others. so the threat, what leaves our shores is picked up by others in

the community instead of dropping off the radar screen. we are, i believe, far more effective than we have been in the past. >> director brennan, i was confused by your remarks. did you say iran believes it is in a different lace the north korea -- didn't you say iran believes it is in a different place than north korea or --? >> north korea has already tested and detonated nuclear devices. iran is in pursuit of the nuclear weapons capability. they see themselves at a different point than the north koreans. but clearly they have ambitions in the middle east region that go back millennia and they are trying to build upon their past. they are looking at what is going on but put themselves in a

different lace than the north koreans. >> what do you make of them putting in more sophisticated centrifuges in their public announcement? what are they trying to tell the international community when they do that? >> it just demonstrates they have not been dissuaded from continuing on this path to more sophisticated centrifuges. it is an indication of their determination but also the seriousness of the situation. >> what would be your assessment of the time between weaponization and being able to detonation and weaponization of a nuclear device? do you have any sense of that? i know the president said a year. i'm curious if the intelligence community has a different assessment. we have heard different assessments from allied partners and intelligence services.

>> i think the president's statements are anchored and intelligence analysis provided to him. they are assessments we have made that comport with the president's statements. >> assessments we see do not necessarily comport with that. they be in classified setting we can explore that. so you sense that they have not been dissuaded. do you see any mistakes that we made in the north korea march to a detonation that we could avoid in iran? something different we can do? capability-wise? >> mr. chairman, i would refer to my intelligence position, which is that i need to make sure the president and this committee and others have the best intelligence possible about what the iranians are doing. that is where intelligence is so important, to make sure the right decisions are made so we do not get past the point where we would not like to go. >> if you disagree with the

assessment on capabilities available, the timeframe you would have no problem telling the white house the the differences? >> absolutely not. whether or not it is a dash to weaponry or physical material, there are many components of that. we can clear this up in closed session. do youook forward to that. think we are in a position in syria if assad falls in the near future, what percentage do you give us to secure the weapons? only the secure not chemical weapons but also the stockpile of sophisticated, ?onventional weapons >> i'm not sure how to make a call like that -- >> a commitment to capabilities

and resources to the region and our relationship with partners and others. of those factors would have to be considered and certainly our own capabilities. i'm getting into a policy realm here. towould be very situational render an assessment on how well we can secure any or all of the wmd facilities in syria. >> general flynn, the defense clandestine service has sparked some interest and some controversy. can you talk a little bit about your plans for the defense clandestine service are? and how that is integrated with the other intelligence services. >> thank you for asking the question. precepts of why we're

doing this is to move to a closer integration with our partners that are sitting at this table right here, namely the cia and the fbi. additionally, it is to enhance career paths and a skill set that we definitely have within the department of defense and the intelligence community within the department, for the officers and intelligence professionals that have been working in that career field, particularly in places like iraq and afghanistan that have gotten extraordinary experience. i would also offer that it is a conus-based 20 conus- -conus-based.

we have to be closer to the edge edge where the intelligence is better there. those are a couple of the core precepts. there are others. we can get into specifics in closed session as to exactly where we see our efforts to be in the future. godirector, we will just around the world if we can. there are open source reports of how close some minor skirmish between china and japan over their islands in that dispute. how would you assess that situation today? that is a very difficult situation. i think, it is our belief that both countries while they feel strongly about their claims also wants to do all they can diplomatically to avoid a real

clash. exactly how they're going to play out, particularly in light of the new leadership remains to be seen. but the indications from their movements and behavior are to try to avoid an active hostility. dropen the chinese certain technology around the island, they took that as an active aggression aggression. i am curious as to how that is not a more aggressive act. >> i'm not sure what you are referring to. -- i am not sure if you are referring to the lock of these aircraft. >> we will follow up in closed session. this was all through open source reporting. s fatherring under un'

when the flowers came out, there was a distinct pattern in activity where people had a sense of understanding how far he would go or where he would go. from the core files that we have seen -- the profiles we have seen, there are things that are not consistent with his father. i would like you to talk about that and how long you think it will take us to get those patterns down and if you think he has succeeded the pattern of reversal that his father demonstrated almost yearly. shares hisently father's personal aversion to the chinese. unlike his father, i think he is underestimating the chinese frustration with him and their discomfort with his behavior. i am not sure what else you had , and less you mean his

contrast with his father. >> clearly he is off pattern with his father. specialize in the reason say if you are ever going to be concerned, this is the time to be weary >> i agree with you. there is no telling how he is going to behave. he impresses me as impetuous. not as an inhibited as his takingbecame about aggressive action, the pattern of his father was to be evocative and then to back off. we have not seen that. >> how would you assess the hard-liners that he has surrounded himself with? hein his grooming period, said most of that -- he spent ,ost of that with the military so clearly they have influenced

him. i do think that his uncle and influenceo have some on him. i also found it very interesting that the minister of economics that he just appointed with someone who was purged in 2007 for apparently being to capitalist-minded. ,learly he does recognize since he spent time in the west, he went to school in switzerland, that economically north korea is and then extremist situation. it will be interesting to see , if the newys out economics minister of with another purge. >> if the chinese were to seal their southern border, north korea's northern border, from the lack market trade -- black- market trade, what kind of an impact you think that would make?

>> to the extent that anyone -- wemaining leverage have kind of used up our sanction options with the u.s. to the rest of the west -- the extent that there is leverage remaining, 65% of north korea's imports are from china. vulnerabilities there that if the chinese wanted to exert leverage, they certainly could. they have done this in the past when they had encountered, at least to burley, so they know how to exert those levers. the south china sea issues that china is aggressively pursuing at the angst of some of our other pacific rim allies, japaneseth korea,

rhetoric and what appears to be aggressive posturing, is that influencing their decision on korea at all, do you think? >> i don't think so. i think they see that as a separate thing. although, it does bear on their great sensitivity about containment. so i think they will continue to try to exert themselves, particularly with the energy claims that they exerted, which compete with some of the countries in the south china sea. at the same time, china is in a dilemma to a certain extent with respect to north korea, since north korea has always been a buffer state for them. they would like to promote temperate behavior and even reform north korea, but they don't want to go to the extent -- an pting an up evil

to facilitate a unification of north and south korea, which, of course, would put the republic of korea, if it went that way, right on its border. politically, china is very sensitive about having that buffer state in north korea. thank you very much. thatnk we can all agree one of the most serious threats facing our country now other than weapons of distraction are cyber attacks. we are having thousands of cyber attacks. it has been said by cyber command that they estimate in the last two years that we have lost over $400 billion in american money and american trade secrets, the loss of jobs, even to the extent that china

fertilizerttacked companies because they are in competition with our fertilizer companies. i think right now, we have different types of attacks, economic attacks. we are concerned about destructive attacks. it has been reported that iran , andn attack on aramco they took out over 30,000 of their computers in one attack. even if they're not as sophisticated sophisticated as other countries, iran could really have a successful attack in our banking system, our greatest systems, our stark market -- our stock market, whatever. i'm asking the question first of general clapper. when it comes to cyber, do you consider our economic security a critical part of national security? >> absolutely. >> that is good to hear. director mueller, the last

hearing we had, i asked the question, what do you feel are the most severe threats to our country at this time and in the future, and i think your comment was you felt that weapons of mass destruction and cyber attacks were some of the most serious issues facing our country's national security. do you still feel that way today? >> i do. i would say towner terrorism remains a number one priority given what is happening in the going through the arab spring. in other countries in transition. right now, cyber is quickly coming aside counterterrorism. -- gettingay this

back to the cyber issue again. isn't there a good possibility that terrorists can hire people or try to cyber attack us as one of the weapons against the united states for terrorism? >> yes. >> can you give an example? >> there is an information about efforts of terrorist groups to enlist the individuals that go out and recruit, individuals have the cyber skills with the hopes and expectations of being able to use those cyber skills for a terrorist attack. can be more specific in closed session, but there are terrorist groups who have gone so far as to attempt to go into systems to the point where they know that they can lie there for a.

of time and at some point of time in the future, launch a cyber attack when it will be most beneficial. --re has not been >> we've seen indications, intelligence of this. i do not believe at this point in time we have any particular group that is in possession of that capability at this juncture. >> they could be purchased, though, could it not? today,s testimony here we talked about the issues, different threats that were out there, nation states such as china, russia, individuals like that, countries like that. analyze very quickly what the mandy at reports said? overe report accumulated

of time over a building in china. a group of individuals on -- had undertaken systematic infiltration over a variety of materials, the defense of the united states, among other things. the unique aspect of the report is the fact that it identified a particular place and individuals associated with that place. when of the things we tend to forget is that behind every computer intrusion there is a person sitting at a keyboard. objective toimate identify that person and stop their behavior. it is not sufficient to protect our databases because whatever protections you have today will fall tomorrow. so we also have to focus on identifying the person behind the keyboard and make certain that we have a policy and

capabilities to deter that person. what the report it was publicized the basis behind the attacks. >> it is my understanding that they had 141 clients that had been cyber attacked. they show the it -- the connection between those individuals in china and those attacks. it is also my understanding that the report said that those individuals behind -- that were attacking our different companies, were connected to the chinese military. do you recall that being in the report? >> yes. >> so the connection between the chinese military and those attacks on a clients -- one of the clients, by the way, was the "new york times." that is what the report said. we can thank them for letting the public know how serious this

is. the fact that they put that out -- we need to let the public know how serious these cyber attacks are. unfortunately, we have a long way to go for the average person to realize how serious that is correct -- that is. i want to say this while you are you are retiring in september, and i just want to say that you are one of the most professional individuals working in the community. -- youe a great job have done a great job, you have a high level of integrity. , in i came on the committee was concerned about where the the fbi isd i think one of the most improved issues in cyber. you get credit as a leader, but you have a great team. we really appreciate working with the rest of the intelligence to many because it is vague team effort and you have come a long way.

>> the praise goes to the agency and the personnel who do a remarkable job. >> you are retiring in september? in september.s i do not use the word retirement. to aid us ine done bringing to justice because of the report where we have china isthat conducting the us -- this espionage? >> there are a number of things that can be done, some in the classified realm, some otherwise. recently the state department called out china for its activities. in the just about anyone administration that travels to

china -- one of the things amongst the talking points is to highlight the fact that our relationship is tremendously undercut by their continuously supporting of these types of attacks. there are things that can be arena inhe criminal terms of charges, but the fact is, these verses are in another country, -- persons are in another country. i think we can go into some of those activities that we have undertaken to date in a closed session. that int people to know the exterior and the outward space toward china, there are a number of things that have been accomplished, but also in the more classified realm, we have taken actions and activity. >> another thing i want to ask -- we seem to be more , inessive, we need to be

dealing with these cyber threats. it is very serious. we have to be a lot more aggressive. as we just pass a bill out of our committee yesterday, our information sharing bill, that we hope will be able to pass on the floor and make it to the senate it, and then he senate will hopefully be able to pass the information sharing bill and then go to the president. it is very important that we all, the senate, the house, the president all work together against this cyber threat. at this point, a think a lot of us feel that we are being attacked on a regular basis and we are not in a position now to protect our country, our businesses, and our individuals from these cyber threats. i am very concerned about a destructive threat in our country. i understand that you and secretary napolitano and joe alexander went to a briefing national security. in everything, it was stated --

i am not sure it was you or secretary napolitano, that said basically that the most toortant thing we can do protect our country now is to have legislation that would allow information sharing between the government and between the private sector. the reason for that is what people might not understand is that 80% of our network is controlled by the private sector. if we are to protect the country, there has to be a partnership, and we have to make sure we have information sharing and also protect the privacy rights of our individuals. we go along way to make sure we protect those privacy rights. do you believe that information sharing is the first step and the most important step right right now to protect our country and our citizens from this right? >> i would say as a key goal, absolutely. to be successful in addressing these threats. >> those of us who deal in this arena, trying to do what is right for america and protect their privacy rights, if you were a meteorologist and you had -- hurricane sandy was

coming up the east coast, yet you were not able to warn your citizens, that is a frustration that a lot of us have right now. it is so important to pass an hour bill. comenk that we can together, the senate, the house, and the menstruation, to make sure that we deal with this threat in the proper way and move forward. for beingu all involved in this bill. we can go forward with respect to that. the other thing i want to bring up now, general clapper, is the issue of space. our country, like fiber, is not aware of how important spaces to our national security, how space affects everybody's lives every day. most people don't understand that. when we went to the moon, people knew all of the astronauts are.

people might know who the nfl quarterbacks are, especially joe butk oh -- joe flacco, space is expensive. a group of leaders in space just last week, and we talked about the issue of cost and performance in those issues. one of those major issues that came up with the issue of commercial applications in space. we are not going to go to the moon from a commercial point of view. general clapper, do you have a position of where we need to be from a commercial point of view with respect to the space industry? >> we discussed many times the need for more players in the

launch business. space x, i am very impressed with what they are doing, and i think there is an agreement now in our own air force on a certification process. i'm all for that. i am also very mindful of the budget that we are going through. -- i haveke to the already spoke to the impact of the sequestration. we are going to have challenges on availing ourselves of these capabilities. one other dimensions to space, which perhaps we can discuss in closed session, if space protection.

dimension ofer this that we also have to attend to. >> i agree with those comments. you look at why this is one of the reasons we are a great country is that we have educated very smart people into that arena. that is the also very important. if you look at innovation and competition, it helps the competition, it helps the government make sure that they are not competing with the commercial side, and then it will bring costs down. i hope that will occur. thank you all for being here today. i guess we are going into closed session right now. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i know we are winding down the closed session right now, so i will hold my questions for the closed session. but i would like to think what this is for, particularly director brendan, your -- director brendanan.

i want to congratulate you on your new role as director. thank you for your service. you areu for the work doing in cyber. i will have questions in that field in closed session. thank you. >> i want to say and i acknowledge that director and i want toice, a congressman who is had a lot of expertise and has been working on on the fiber issue since the beginning -- cy ber issue since the beginning. >> thank you very much. inwe will reconvene at 12:25 the classified spaces for filling out and rounding out the classified discussion on issues of importance to the intelligence committee, national security of united states.

the meeting is adjourned until 12:25. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> we will hear more about global affairs this morning. a long-term advisor to hillary clinton will be speaking to washington. live coverage begins at 8:30 eastern on c-span three and c- span.org. >> student cam three -- third prize winner asked the president to consider in renewable alternative energy sources.

>> the most important thing we can do is to make sure we control our own energy. that is why we doubled clean industry production. all of these things have contributed to us lowering our oil imports to the lowest in 15 years. >> mr. obama, i am green with you. select catch a wave former noble energy. you say you want a revolution, well, we all know, we all want to change the world ♪ >> all energy is derived from the sun. mankind only knows how to use of the sun energy on earth.

mankind must develop the technology in order to take advantage of this wonderful resource. ?o what is renewable energy >> or noble energy to me is different type of energy that can be harnessed from natural harnessedwhich can be over and over again. it is not a one-shot deal. >> what are the main types of renewable energy? >> the primary types are nuclear, solar, wind, and wave energy. >> which source seems to be the best? >> in my view, wave energy. it has fewer downsides than the others. solar, obviously, is dependence on cloudiness, the son, wind energy is valuable, but it also leaves a significant footprint on the environment. there are also issues related to

birds deaths coming from wind energy. in terms of nuclear energy, we still have not found a solution in terms of a byproduct waste that is produced. wave energy does not generally have those drawbacks. >> if this great resource exists, why haven't we used it? >> air travel was 100 years ago. brothers weret working in north carolina to get the first plane off the ground, people feared traveling in the air. 100 years from now, our ancestors will look at wave energy just as we look at air , as a necessary commodity, particularly at a time when we have low energy. >> today, i got an exclusive offer to tag along with brian cunningham and his team to test out a prototype at the united states naval academy.

the barge is simple, robust, and can submerge and hover at 60 feet below the surface. turbulence is substantially reduced. to brian cunningham and his team, the results were better than they had hoped. so how does wave energy work? wave energy is the result of the up-and-down motion of the ocean water along up-and-down stretches of the beat. createsillation electricity between the coils. the barges are anchored at approximately 150 feet of water to harness energy, which can propel the barges. one of the baddest -- what are the bad things about using wave energy? comee only downside i've

up with is a slight impediment to navigation. that will be easily overcome by radar detection or lights. >> the amount of infrastructure it would take to build and capture that energy would be a very significant cost. the payback in terms of recouping your benefits could be very long. initially, wave energy obviously relies on the ocean. -- large lights section of the country without any oceanfront. the cost to transmit that our from the coast and build the infrastructure to transmit it is not insignificant. so those costs are the primary shortcomings of wave energy. >> i rise today in strong gas drilling of the oregon coast. i question why we would risk in strong opposition of

gas drilling. why would we risk our pristine coast. why we would subject our fisheries and visitor base to this dangerous, bp style disaster in oregon waters. we should focus in generating local jobs. we can create these local jobs by investing in the energy industries of the next century that are uniquely suited to the energy andt -- wave next-generation offshore wind. oregon can be the saudi arabia of renewable wave energy. wave energy depends on two things -- big waves and consorts suited to export those waves. oregon has both. organ is the best place in the world where these two factors come together. that we should consider using wave energy as an alternative for koppelman to solar or wind energy is that wave energy is eight times that of solar energy and 14 times

that of wind. it is also more consistent than solar or wind. in short -- more bang for the buck. the benefits of wave energy is that it is more cost effective, creates jobs, and is more consistent than wind or solar. the oceans of the world are reported to store 2 trillion watts of or noble energy. this means that if you were to assign the actual u.s. consumer average in 2009 to this energy collected, it could be valued at $225 million per hour or billions of dollars worldwide. build an urgent, proper commitment to take advantage of this underutilized resource. thiser we choose to use abundant resource, that is the

decision for the government to make. i strongly believe that president obama should consider taking advantage of this resource and a 2013 because it an abundance that we are not recognizing. >> congratulations to all of the winners in this year's student cam competitions. to see more winning videos, go to studentcam.org. >> on c-span today, "washington journal" is next, live with your phone calls, then live coverage of the house. in about a half-hour, ed o'keefe will discuss gun legislation in congress. then ken burns discusses his new pbs program about a group of harlem teenagers, one convicted of raping a jogger in 1989.