[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 127 (Tuesday, September 13, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: September 13, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
  FRUSTRATION WITH THE NATIONAL HIGHWAY TRAFFIC SAFETY ADMINISTRATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Nebraska [Mr. Bereuter] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BEREUTER. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I want to share with you a 
frustration I am having with the National Highway Traffic Safety 
Administration.
  On June 16 of this year I wrote to Mr. Christopher Hart, the acting 
administrator of the NHTSA, and I followed it up with a letter of July 
14, 1994, since I received no response. At the time I wrote that June 
letter, I had been working with that agency for well over a year in 
behalf of a business in my district.
  I asked the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for an 
update on their rulemaking concerning compressed natural gas fuel 
containers. I asked them to provide me any evidence that this proposed 
rule is moving forward and not simply gathering dust on NHTSA shelves.
  Now, why is that important? Well, it is important because some 
American companies, like Brunswick Corp., are developing space age 
technology for the 21st century. Their efforts are being frustrated in 
this instance by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 
which seems to be struck in a bureaucratic Stone Age.
  Although the legislation requiring safety standards for compressed 
natural gas vehicle systems was signed into law in 1990, 1990, the 
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has yet to issue its 
final rule on the CNG fuel containers. This Member certainly 
understands and supports the need to protect public safety at levels at 
least equal to that required for currently approved fuel tanks. 
However, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's inaction 
and callous delays over the past several years have seriously hindered 
attempts to market natural gas vehicle fuel tanks made with carbon 
fiber, which appears to be an entirely safe product, better probably 
than the existing alternative. The Brunswick Corp., of course, 
developed their technology for a space program, where it was used to 
great advantage.
  But without a Federal safety standard, potential customers are often 
reluctant to purchase this new product. If the United States is to 
compete successfully in the global marketplace and if we are to help 
our defense-related industries to move into civilian sectors for their 
business, our businesses cannot continue to run into this kind of 
bureaucracy and red tape.
  Unresponsive agencies, such as the National Highway Traffic Safety 
Administration, in this instance, had better wake up and realize that 
people's jobs are at stake. They have cost many a job already on this 
existing example, and yet there seems to be no urgency on the part of 
the administration of this agency to look and proceed with a rule. I 
think there is no excuse for it.
  I have been working on this issue with the corporation doing business 
in my State for well over 2 years, probably 3 years by now, and we have 
no action. So I believe the only opportunity this Member of Congress 
has is to embarrass them in the public domain, and I intend to be up on 
my feet doing just that periodically until we get some action.
  I am not asking them to do anything unsafe at all. It is just to move 
something or give reasons why they are not moving something, to see if, 
in fact, they can take that paper from the bottom of the stack and 
actually look at it and proceed.
  Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I thank you for your indulgence and this 
time.

                          ____________________