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Pollution is nothing but the resources we are not harvesting. We allow them to disperse because we've been ignorant of their value.

I see a future where getting to work or to school or to the store does not have to cause pollution.

It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it.

Indeed, our particular concept of private property, which deters us from exhausting the positive resources of the earth, favors pollution.

Everyone wants clean air and clean water, but my hope is that we will not regulate it to the point where we drive businesses and industries out of this country, to the point where entrepreneurs cannot start or expand their businesses because they simply can't afford to do so.

Cap-and-trade is a dangerous policy fraught with the potential for significant corruption, and it would hurt my constituents and our economy by raising energy costs.

I have advocated an entirely different approach than cap and tax, which would be worldwide in application and which emphasizes technology as a way of reducing total emissions.

Why has it seemed that the only way to protect the environment is with heavy-handed government regulation?

We have very strong environmental laws in the United States and elsewhere around the world. The problem is that they're seldom enforced.

Though many corporations honor commitments to reduce dangerous pollution, some cut corners and cheat. The marketplace doesn't always have mechanisms to correct bad actors.