In his , President Barack Obama delivered a blow to climate change naysayers, bringing up the topic in his opening remarks and launching into a passionate defense of his efforts thus far. He took the issue a step further, placing climate change in the frame of business and innovation, urging the nation to look at it as a budding business venture.

(White House)

Below are quotes from Obama’s speech that address climate change and clean energy:

- “Look, if anybody still wants to dispute the science around climate change, have at it. You’ll be pretty lonely, because you’ll be debating our military, most of America’s business leaders, the majority of the American people, almost the entire scientific community and 200 nations around the world who agree it’s a problem and intend to solve it.”​

- “Seven years ago, we made the single biggest investment in clean energy in our history. Here are the results. In fields from Iowa to Texas, wind power is now cheaper than dirtier, conventional power. On rooftops from Arizona to New York, solar is saving Americans tens of millions of dollars a year on their energy bills, and employs more Americans than coal — in jobs that pay better than average. We’re taking steps to give homeowners the freedom to generate and store their own energy — something environmentalists and Tea Partiers have teamed up to support. Meanwhile, we’ve cut our imports of foreign oil by nearly sixty percent, and cut carbon pollution more than any other country on Earth.Gas under two bucks a gallon ain’t bad, either.”

(White House)

- “Rather than subsidize the past, we should invest in the future — especially in communities that rely on fossil fuels. That’s why I’m going to push to change the way we manage our oil and coal resources, so that they better reflect the costs they impose on taxpayers and our planet. That way, we put money back into those communities and put tens of thousands of Americans to work building a 21st century transportation system.”

- “When we lead nearly 200 nations to the most ambitious agreement in history to fight climate change — that helps vulnerable countries, but it also protects our children.”

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Policemen detain an activist during a protest ahead of the 2015 Paris Climate Conference, in Paris, France, on Nov. 29, 2015.