by Rob Hogg, Iowa State Senator

In case you missed it last week, Mitt Romney said in his nomination acceptance speech that “President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet. My promise is to help you and your family.”

And then the crowd erupted in laughter and cheers.

There is something wrong when, in 2012, a major party candidate for President uses global warming and the environment as a quip – especially when much of the State of Louisiana is still under water from Hurricane Isaac, which brought huge storm surges and record rain falls that were literally pulling parts of the Gulf Coast back into the ocean.

It is surreal. It ignores the reality of what is happening. But it does provide an opportunity to explain better why rising seas and the planet’s declining health hurt us and our families.

If you are concerned about yourself and your family, you ought to be concerned about fossil fuels, climate change, and the sustainability of the planet. Here’s why:

Jobs and our Economy – The single most important reason that our economy remains sluggish is high gas prices and the high cost of imported oil. We import the same amount of oil into this country as we did in 1997 – but it now costs us nearly $300 billion a year more, a five-fold increase.

That is nearly $1,000 more per American each year. If we had that money here, rather than sending it out of the country, we could employ almost 5 million people with jobs that pay wages and benefits worth $60,000 per year.

Increasing our dependence on expensive oil, domestic or foreign, will not help our economy. The most expensive oil in the world, both economically and environmentally, is offshore oil and oil extracted from the tar sands of Canada.

By contrast, energy conservation, energy efficiency, fuel efficiency, and clean renewable energy like wind power are already creating jobs, saving consumers money, and growing prosperity right here in Iowa.

Health Care Costs – One of the causes of increasing health care costs is pollution from coal and other fossil fuels – a cost of more than $175 billion a year from coal alone according to research led by Paul Epstein of the Harvard Medical School. That figure is more than $560 per American every year.

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Wind energy draws strong bipartisan support, with more than 81 percent of installed wind capacity located in Republican congressional districts, bringing billions of dollars in private investment.

You wouldn’t know it based on Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. Romney has called wind investments “boondoggles” and wind jobs “imaginary.” And the candidate doubled down on his anti-wind policies by announcing his opposition to extending the production tax credit for the industry.

This policy has infuriated some Republican voters and lawmakers from wind-driven states. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) explained his increasing frustration with the campaign at a recent town hall:

“I’m the author of the wind energy tax credit of 1992, and there were people from outside the state came into Iowa and issued a press release that the Republican candidate for president was opposed to wind energy, and I felt it was just like a knife in my back, as the author of the bill, without even being consulted about it,” he said during a town hall meeting at the Greater Burlington Partnership offices in Burlington.”

Grassley takes a much harsher tone now than when Romney’s campaign first announced the policy. Grassley was initially skeptical of Romney’s true position, saying in July, “I have got to get to the bottom of what they are doing, because I think people that didn’t know what they were doing said it, because [Romney] was over in Poland, he obviously wasn’t thinking about wind energy.” But Romney has maintained the position.

Romney’s campaign still hasn’t gotten the message from Grassley, or the dozens of other Republican supporters, wind businesses, and the majority of Americans who support wind investment. It hasn’t helped that Romney has been completely silent on what his policy would do to the 215 wind-related businesses in Iowa, and 75,000 jobs nationally. He offers no alternative to the 37,000 jobs that could be lost if the tax credit isn’t extended past 2012.

Now that Mitt Romney’s campaign has officially declared the candidate’s desire to kill tax credits for wind while maintaining tax credits for the mature oil and gas industries, Midwestern Republicans are not happy.

Iowa Republican Representative Tom Latham said Romney’s decision “shows a lack of full understanding of how important the wind energy tax credit is for Iowa and our nation.”

And Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, the man working behind the scenes to get an extension of the tax credit for wind, said he thinks “people that didn’t know what they were doing said it.”

In an interview with Radio Iowa today, Republican Governor Terry Branstad also had strong words for Romney’s campaign, saying they “need to get out here in the real world and find out what’s really going on” before abandoning support for the industry. The wind industry supports 7,000 jobs in Iowa and makes up 20 percent of the state’s electricity.

Branstad said he’d like to speak with Romney personally about the issue:

“I hope to have that opportunity….  The statement has been made by somebody involved in his campaign, not by Governor Romney. And I think there’s a confusion on their part.

“We think it needs to be continued, not forever, but it does need to be continued for a while and the result is it’s been a very good thing for Iowa in terms of 20% of our energy is now generated by wind. We now have a lot of farmers that receive rent from having wind turbines on their property and we have a lot of jobs associated with it so we think he needs to be educated as to how important this is and I’m hopeful that we can see.. they’re lumping the two together and they need to understand there is a differential… And Senator Grassley is working really hard to get this extended.”

Reporter: “But on his campaign website for months, he has called them wind mills, he doesn’t call them wind turbines and he says they are as economically unproductive as solar energy.”

Branstad: “They don’t understand. You’ve got a bunch of people that have put the website together that are a bunch of east Coast people that need to get out here in the real world and find out what’s really going on.”

The wind tax credit, which has helped the wind industry drop costs by 90 percent and compete with the heavily subsidized coal and gas sectors, is set to expire at the end of this year. Already, wind companies are laying off employees and cancelling factories. Navigant Consulting estimates that up to 37,000 jobs could be lost if the credit is allowed to expire.

Fellow Republicans aren’t just concerned about the economic impact. They’re also concerned about potential political fallout in a region where wind is such an important piece of the economy. Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Iowa Republican Representative Steve King implied he thinks the tax credit issue could have an impact:

“We need to win Iowa this time. President Obama thinks it’s a must-win state for him, and I think it’s a can-win state for Mitt Romney, but this wind piece.…”

He faded off without finishing the sentence — unsure what Romney’s stance on wind will do to the candidate’s political prospects.