Chabot Space and Science Center
Oakland, California
1:51 P.M. PDT
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Good afternoon, everybody. Please have a seat. How about Sala? Can we — (applause). We have been speaking earlier than we got here out, and I’m telling you: Our future is so vibrant while you have a look at simply our younger leaders, who — she’s simply stuffed with enthusiasm and pleasure, and he or she’s dedicated and passionate. And — it simply excites me. I feel it excites us all. So, thanks all. Thank you.
I actually have loved this afternoon, being right here at Chabot and with these extraordinary leaders — simply investing in the better of who we’re and the way forward for our nation and our world and our universe. It actually is — it truly is emblematic of additionally — I’ll say this as a proud child of the Bay Area — of who we’re on this area of the world. Because we’re all the time, I feel, dedicated to seeing what is feasible after which charting a course to get there. So, thanks all very a lot.
Today, we’re joined by members of our administration and leaders of this nice state, together with our Governor Gavin Newsom and Mayor of Oakland, Libby Schaaf. We are additionally joined, after all, by lots of our non-public sector area companions. And I’m glad to see all of you.
You all are leaders who’re driving our nation ahead. And, once more, that’s what that is all about — transferring ahead collectively.
I additionally need to thank Chabot’s Science and Space Center for internet hosting us immediately and all of the work that you’ve accomplished for therefore a few years. As a child rising up simply down the means, I do know of the work that occurs on this lovely place.
Before I start my extra intensive remarks about why we’re right here, I do need to share a number of phrases about the information from Washington, D.C.
Today the House of Representatives will vote on the Inflation Reduction Act; I consider they’ve or they’re nearly to. And I do need to thank Congresswoman Barbara Lee for being in Washington immediately to make that occur. (Applause.) Yes.
And very shortly, then, President Biden will signal the regulation into motion. And it’s simply one more main element of our administration’s agenda to convey down the prices for the American individuals.
Soon, we’ll cap the price of insulin for seniors to only $35 a month, which is a large step towards making life manageable for therefore many individuals.
We will cut back medical health insurance prices for 13 million Americans by a mean of $800 a yr. Again, a really important step.
And we’ll permit Medicare to lastly negotiate the worth of prescribed drugs, which is able to convey down the price of remedy for tens of millions of Americans.
And to convey down vitality prices, we’ll give working households as a lot as $8,000 to improve their HVAC system, which suggests, after all, decrease vitality payments and cleaner air.
And we may even make new and used electrical automobiles extra reasonably priced so that folks can afford a plug-in hybrid or electrical automobile and pay much less, or possibly nothing in any respect, with regards to gasoline.
So, these local weather investments, as you all know, are the lar- — largest in our nation’s historical past — extraordinarily essential when it comes to coping with the disaster that we face. Here in California, we watch it, see it. Governor, you’ve been doing an awesome job of addressing wildfires. But round our nation, we’re floods and hurricanes, and we all know that the second is now. If we don’t act now, will probably be irreversible.
So, these investments are the largest our nation has ever made and can, in the strategy of addressing the disaster, create tens of millions of jobs — good-paying jobs in communities throughout our nation.
And if individuals ask you — simply in case they may — “Who is going to pay for all of this?” Well, allow them to know: As we promised, we’re not going to boost taxes on households making lower than $400,000 a yr, however we’re going to anticipate that our largest firms pays their fair proportion.
And as we chart a course ahead, we’re enthusiastic about the work that’s occurring proper now and the work that we’re all right here dedicated to doing collectively.
And so, let’s discuss area. (Laughter.) So, 139 years in the past, on this metropolis of Oakland, we constructed the first area observatory with funds that have been offered by a neighborhood businessman. The observatory introduced, mainly, an eight-inch telescope proper right here.
And there was excessive pleasure. We’ve checked out the newspaper accounts of the day — excessive pleasure about what this innovation meant. It was written that there was going to be the capability of individuals right here, on a transparent evening, to search for and see neighboring planets and faraway stars — issues that had by no means been seen by the bare eye by any sort of facility like this. It was so thrilling. They talked about how you might see craters on the Moon.
I invite you all to learn the articles. I used to be — I used to be tempted to only quote from all of them, however we may be right here all afternoon.
So we’ve that historical past.
And then, after all, at the flip of the century, there was a technological revolution. Wilbur and Orville Wright made their first flight. And in the span of a single lifetime, our nation went from the sands of Kitty Hawk to the floor of the Moon.
We established area stations in Earth’s orbit, and we despatched probes far out into our photo voltaic system. And all of this was made doable due to the partnerships.
From the very starting, the innovation, the creativity, and the drive of economic area firms, mixed with the assets and the imaginative and prescient of the United States authorities, has powered America’s progress in area and our management of progress in area.
So, final December, in Washington, I convened our administration’s first National Space Council assembly. I’m the chair of council. And as the chair, I’m clear: With the exploration of area being outlined the twentieth century, we all know that, dwelling on this century, we should take into consideration the place we now stand and the place we should go. So whereas it was outlined fairly effectively in the twentieth century, the alternative of area should information our work in the twenty first century.
And to grab that chance, our authorities should deepen and strengthen our partnership with the non-public sector.
Today, at laboratories, on launchpads, and in orbit — usually, in partnership with our authorities — industrial area firms are making actual the alternative of area for tens of millions of Americans. Their work is accelerating innovation in the area sector and shaping our nation’s future in area.
They are serving to — working with us, they’re permitting us, collectively, to construct a succesful, inventive, and more and more various STEM workforce. We’ve talked about that, many people, this afternoon. And this work helps to guarantee that what occurs in area advantages the individuals right here on Earth.
For instance, industrial area firms design and launch satellites that predict the sample of hurricanes and detect wildfires earlier than they unfold.
Here in my dwelling state and our dwelling state of California, firefighters depend on industrial satellites to speak in areas the place hearth has destroyed a mobile community.
And quickly, a brand new technology of satellites will assist us battle the local weather disaster by monitoring and — and permitting us to see the patterns of greenhouse gasoline emissions and to see that in actual time.
The industrial area trade can be a strong engine for financial development. Our nation’s area financial system employs over 354,000 individuals and generates $200 billion a yr.
As lots of , later this month, NASA will launch Artemis I. We’re very enthusiastic about that. And it’s the first in a sequence of missions that may return American astronauts to the Moon, together with the first girl and individual of coloration. (Applause.) And do you have to select, Sala, you’ll be subsequent. (Laughs.)
The Artemis Program wouldn’t be doable with out the management and the partnership that we’ve with the industrial area trade.
The United States, you see, is the flag of alternative for area actions. It is the flag of alternative. And with that comes nice alternative but in addition nice duty when it comes to what course we’ll chart for the work that occurs right here on Earth that may then maximize the alternatives in area.
So our nation is getting into a brand new period. And that new period consists of contemplating and interested by our exploration in area, and the way we use area, and are we ready for the potentialities but in addition the challenges.
To that finish, we perceive that we’ve received to replace the guidelines, as a result of they’re simply merely outdated. They have been written for an area trade of the final century. And once I was going by right here simply immediately, talking with a few of our innovators and the place the expertise has grown in simply the final decade, we all know that we actually are fairly behind when it comes to maximizing our collective understanding about how we’ll have interaction on the expertise of immediately and what we are able to rapidly and simply predict will probably be the expertise over the subsequent many years.
So, to keep up our place as the United States of America on this difficulty, it’s essential that we work collectively to know the place we’re; to acknowledge and have the braveness to talk fact about what’s out of date; after which to companion to make sure that we’re talking the identical language, with the identical motivation, impressed by the alternative of it in any respect, however then doing the work of updating how we’ve been speaking and interested by our exploration in area.
And so, we’ll do that work to verify our nation stays a task mannequin for the accountable use of area, as a result of we all know we should preserve tempo with the large charge of innovation. So we should write new guidelines to supply the readability that every one of us require, to supply certainty.
We know that if we’re to companion, if we’re to speculate, if we’re to hunt those that perceive the potential of all of it, readability and consistency is essential. And we all know that we should write new guidelines that permit flexibility to include the innovation that’s occurring in real-time.
And so, all of that is one thing that we are able to think about, and never solely think about, however the work that we’re dedicated by this convening and the convening we’re going to have in a couple of month to get this job accomplished and to get it accomplished with a way of swift tempo, understanding the expertise is rising each day.
So I’m proud immediately to announce that our partnership with regulatory companies will have interaction the non-public sector as we develop a brand new guidelines framework. And we’ll talk about this work and rather more at our subsequent assembly, at the subsequent convening of the National Space Council. That assembly will happen on September ninth, and I stay up for seeing lots of you there.
So this can be a convening with — the preparation for a working assembly, is my level. And — and with that, I’ll finish with this story.
So, final month, President Biden and I unveiled the first pictures taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. I feel we have been all simply in awe. I used to be sharing with a few of the buddies that once I first noticed these pictures, I had a really — a really mental response, which was, “Wow.” (Laughs.)
It was simply extraordinary what it’s educating us in these moments the place we face so many challenges in the world. And then to see these pictures and understand there’s nonetheless a lot we don’t know and we’ve not seen, and giving us a way of optimism about all of it.
And so, these photographs, after all, they have been of our toddler universe, because it was billions of years in the past; of swirling galaxies and dying stars — photographs that exposed a universe of humble dimension and awe-inspiring magnificence.
So, seeing these pictures, as all of us did — let that be a reminder to us of how far we’ve come from peering up at the planets by an eight-inch telescope to capturing pictures of the very start of our universe.
So, allow us to do not forget that we’ve come a great distance, however we nonetheless have to date to go. And we’re going to do that work collectively. And I thanks all for the partnership and for the innovation and for the awe-inspiring work.
Thank you very a lot. Have afternoon. (Applause.) Thank you.
END 2:06 P.M. PDT