posted August 5, 2005
On Aug. 8 in Albuquerque, N.M., President Bush will sign into law the bipartisan Energy Policy Act of 2005.
Just before August recess, the United States Senate passed this comprehensive energy legislation by a vote of 74-26. As chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy and a Senate conferee on the energy bill, I was very involved in the process and am pleased with the outcome.
To me, the most important part of this bill is that it should stabilize and begin to lower the price of natural gas. We hear a lot about the importance of gasoline prices at the pump, but the bigger problem is the high price of natural gas. This is especially important for home owners, for farmers and for blue collar workers in America. Home owners are paying too much to heat and cool their homes. Farmers are taking a big pay cut because of fertilizer costs, and we have a million chemical workers whose jobs will gradually move overseas if we don’t lower the price of natural gas.
The second thing this bill does is to change the way we produce electricity. All of us are excited about the different ways of making electricity. I strongly supported the new solar energy provisions, and others support wind, biomass and geothermal provisions. But there’s a new realism in this bill, because those renewable and exotic energies will not fuel our needs for the next generation in America. This bill focuses on the techniques that will: First, conservation and efficiency. Second, nuclear power. Third, coal gasification and carbon sequestration. And four, new supplies of natural gas.
The Energy Policy Act of 2005 features aggressive efforts toward conservation and energy efficiency – these are the most immediate things that can be done to lower energy prices. A number of these conservation and efficiency measures will directly benefit Tennessee consumers and Tennessee businesses: measures to make many major appliances more energy efficient – reducing demand and lowering the price of energy and tax credits for home energy efficiency, and for solar heating and cooling equipment. It also includes grants to auto manufacturers to encourage domestic production of fuel efficient hybrid and advanced diesel vehicles and tax credits to consumers for the purchase of hybrid vehicles.
In addition, it encourages advanced nuclear power plants, coal gasification power plants, clean renewable energy bonds to encourage all kinds of renewable energy and tax credits for small cogeneration, industrial gasification, trash combustion and landfill gas.
The completion of a clean energy bill is by far one of the most important things we have done in the 109th Congress, because it affects millions of Americans. It helps us deal with global warming. It helps us deal with clean air problems, and it helps us have enough electricity to keep American and Tennessee jobs in a more competitive world marketplace.
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