President Obama at National Clean Energy Summit

… we’re here today because we believe that no challenge poses a greater threat to our future than climate change.

But we’re also here because we hold another belief, and that is we are deeply optimistic about American ingenuity. We think we can do good and do well at the same time. We believe we have the power, the dynamism, the creativity to solve a big problem while keeping the engines of the American economy moving.

When I took office, I pledged to double our production of wind and solar by the end of my first term. We met that goal ahead of schedule. (Applause.) As Harry just mentioned, six years ago, the Recovery Act marked the single biggest investment in clean energy in our history. And by the way, what we did was not revolutionary. We did what the federal government has always done — we invested in promising new technologies to spur private sector investment and innovation all across the country.

Today, there are thousands of renewable energy projects employing tens of thousands of Americans all across the country. Right here in Nevada, for example, renewable energy generation has increased 180 percent since I took office.

we’re making even more progress on solar. (Applause.) I notice you got a lot of sun around here. (Laughter.) America generates 20 times as much solar power as we did in 2008 — 20 times. Last year was solar’s biggest year ever. Prices fell by 10 percent; installations climbed by 30 percent. Every three minutes, another home or business in America goes solar. Every three weeks, we install as much solar capacity as we did in all of 2008. And the world’s largest solar installation came online last year, with 9 million solar panels generating enough electricity to power more than 100,000 homes with clean, renewable energy — not in Germany, not in China, not in Saudi Arabia — right here in the United States of America.

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