5:30 eastern. more work later in the week. they plan to work on a bill authorizing $35 billion for drinking water and wastewater treatment projects. no votes are scheduled for the house until next month. you can watch the senate live, today, starting at 3:00 p.m. eastern. >> he led the transition team for former president trump, served as -- remind us what your mission is, especially on this issue of the changing climate. >> a fairly small public policy institute that specializes in regulations. not just energy and environment.

>> how long have you been around? >> he started it on his kitchen table with his wife. >> what about the center for energy and environment there? >> we have a very small team. $7 million a year. we have maybe a quarter or two. we have a small team, but we tried to hit the highlights on every type of policy. plastics, climate, energy, transportation and all kinds of federal land and property right. the endangered species act.

quest joining us as day two gets underway. president biden announced a goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030. is that achievable? what would it take to reach that goal? >> it would be achievable if we had a command-and-control economy. people were just told what to do. the fact is that we have a huge energy system, and we had huge energy resources. when you want to change things, it is hard to do anything, except incrementally. over 300 million people use a lot of electricity. the idea that we can cut the greenhouse gas emissions in nine years is preposterous, unless you want to devastate the

economy and especially make poor people poor. people on the lower income bracket have a much higher percentage of their income. if you want to really devastate the economy, you could do it, but given the current situation, it is just preposterous. >> this is his pitch on doing it and how to do it. >> i see the engineers and construction workers building new hydrogen plants. producing clean power. i see farmers deploying cutting-edge tools. the next frontier of carbon into

-- by putting these people to work, the u.s. sets out on the road to cut greenhouse gases in half by the end of this decade. that is where we are headed as a nation, and that is what we can do if we take action to build an economy that is prosperous, fair and clean for the entire planet. these steps will set america on a path for no emissions economy by 2050. >> an economy that is more prosperous, favor and cleaner. >> you cannot create a sort of fantasy economy this way. this is going to destroy huge massive economic activity because energy prices are going to go up. when energy prices go up, the price of everything goes up.

the whole biden package, when you look at it, every piece of it will take economic activity out of the economy. it creates a lot of jobs when you build a wind factory or solar factory, but it also destroys a lot of jobs from the plants closing prematurely, that have a big investment that is stranded. it will create huge economic devastation, and the idea -- president biden, i'm sorry to say, his understanding of economics is at a fairly low level. it's about the same level as trump's understanding of science . this attempt to paint a rosy picture will soon come to grief. let me give you one practical reason. it takes years and years to build these plants. one of the reasons is because of

our regulatory process of permitting them. it allows for long delays in getting the permit done, and long delays from litigation, because people will file lawsuits. so the empire state building back in the 1920's was built in a little over a year. today, to build anything takes five to 215 -- five to 15 years and they are taking? -- talking nine years we will be emission cut -- talking nine years we will be emission cut? host: folks already calling in. one of the first actions that president biden took was rejoining the paris climate agreement. to these big, global agreements work in getting worldwide emissions lower?

guest: the underlying treaty, the u.n. framework convention on climate change, was signed by president bush, the elder, in 1992 and ratified by the senate. so we have almost had almost 30 years of -- so we have had almost 30 years of climate action. on climate change, conferences have been held around around the world. i have been able to go to some of those. if you look at the graph of greenhouse gas emissions, we have done nothing to bend the curve down. emissions keep going up, and that is because the world is not energy rich. it is energy poor. china is the big actor here, going from going way behind the united states and energy used to being way ahead, so china now

has emissions from their mostly coal-fired power plants. there emissions are now longer -- larger than the united states and europe combined. india is starting down that road area you see at the summit yesterday, the chinese communist leaders, be -- xi jinping saying they will continue to go up. they are really playing us for fools. i think a lot of people in the media go along with that, it is like they are part of the team, they are a party to the paris climate treaty, so they are doing their part. there emissions keep going up and economy goes rooming and we are putting off on our economy by making these promises. host: if you charge on the new york times demonstrating what you're talking about, emissions by country in the united states

here on the left. declining emissions as you can see. european union is the same. then there is india, and on the far right and large increase there is china. during his remarks in the climate summit yesterday, president xi jinping of china had this to say about emissions. >> we will continue to prioritize clout -- economical -- china will strive to peak carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. china has committed to move from carbon peak to carbon neutrality in a much shorter time span than what's might take many developed countries, and that requires hard effort from china. support has been given to encourage peeking pioneers from localities, sectors, and companies. we will strict lick control coffaro -- coal-fired power generation projects.

we will limit the increase in coal consumption over the land. and face it down in the 15 five year. -- five-year period. host: for those that don't spend their days understanding this, what did that mean? >> he is making big promises. this is quite a ways into the future. i forget who wrote this one in the newspaper a few weeks ago, china will have to close 600 coal power power plants. they have invested hundreds of billions of dollars in these, so there's not -- these are not old plants, these are new plants. we know a lot of coal plants that can be closed down because there at the end of their life expectancy. china put huge bouts of money into these power plants because it is the cheapest form of electricity. that is what powers their economy. india is doing the same thing.

i think they play us for fools, and they make these big promises that they don't do anything. it's the promises in the future, americans will have a new president by then, the european union will have a bunch of new prime minister's, so our leaders come and go and there's tend to stay around for a long time. they play the long game, so i would not put much faith in any promise from the chinese communist leader. host: china commissioned 38.5 gigawatts of power plants in 2020, more than three times the nearly 12 gigawatts commissioned by the rest of the world according to a report from the global energy monitor and senator for research on energy and clean air. myron evils --myron ebell is our guest. plenty of calls for you. we start in ohio, line for democrats. in morning. caller: good morning -- good morning. caller: good morning.

i wonder what his plan would be and how he wants to move into the future, how he would like to make things different and better, have a better economy. guest: yes, i believe societies are very able to handle challenges when they have good institutions, political institutions, premarket technological capability well. and a lot of energy. when i look at the future, i see a prosperous, resilient america that uses all kinds of energy and has an abundance of it that is not put on an energy poverty diet. the idea is that global warming is an existential crisis or threat, or emergency is blind by the fact.

the fact is, and i should say this, the global warming debate is run by the modelers. if you look at the data, we have a modest rate of warming far below the model projections, and we have impacts that are mild and mostly, on average, beneficial. so yes, there may be challenges in the distant future, but we should not hamstring ourselves and make ourselves poorer and less able to handle environmental challenges, less resilient, by putting ourselves on an energy poverty diet. host: he say climate change impacts our total un-beneficial. what are you referring to? guest: >> we will leave this year as the house is about to start a pro forma session. bringing you gavel-to-gavel coverage. live coverage of the house, here on c-span.

the speaker: the house will be in order. the prayer will be offered by our guest chaplain, reverend michael wilker, lutheran church of the reformation, washington, d.c. the chaplain: creator, shepherd, sustainer of life, thank you for the gifts of this day, of ease our bodies, of this our government, and of your good earth. for our waking breath and final heartbeat, for our eyes and ears, all limbs and senses. for honest and trustworthy officials, for the people of every state, territory, and tribe, for the spring sun and full moon