[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 76 (Wednesday, May 9, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5758-S5759]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          ENERGY INDEPENDENCE

  Ms. CANTWELL. Madam President, I come to the floor this morning with 
a lot of enthusiasm for the progress we are making in various 
committees toward an energy policy we can discuss on the Senate floor 
which will eventually lead us to greater energy independence. I am very 
excited about this prospect; especially since I participated in the 
2005 energy legislation, which was passed with great bipartisan 
support. We worked together to enact this groundbreaking energy bill in 
2005, which greatly benefitted my State by giving tax credits to 
alternative energy technologies--wind and solar--and aided in the 
further development and broadened use of biodiesel and including the 
construction of a 100 million-gallon biodiesel facility in Washington 
State.
  There were many great things about the 2005 Energy bill but the fact 
that stood out to me the most was that it was a bipartisan effort. I do 
wish that there had been a much more aggressive effort on energy 
independence then, but I think today we are on the cusp of achieving 
this important goal.
  Senator Reid has been very specific since the beginning of this 
legislative year that he wants energy independence to be a key 
priority. In fact, there are six different committees that are working 
on energy legislation today: the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry 
Committee, the Finance Committee, the Commerce, Science, and 
Transportation Committee, the Environment and Public Works Committee, 
the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and the 
Energy and Natural Resources Committee. All of these committees are 
working hard on legislation, and more importantly, they are working on 
legislation in a bipartisan fashion. In fact, two of these committees 
have reported out significant energy legislation, working across the 
aisle ensure that we are getting the best ideas onto the Senate floor 
and continuing to discuss those ideas on which we have not yet been 
able to reach consensus.
  Yesterday was undoubtedly a historic day because it marked the first 
time in 20 years, that we have been able to, in a very bipartisan way, 
put a CAFE bill on the Senate floor--which I hope we will be discussing 
soon--that actually increases the fuel efficiency standards of 
automobiles and hopefully lowers our consumption of foreign oil. If we 
can move from the current miles-per-

[[Page S5759]]

gallon standard of 25 miles today to 35 miles in a 10-year period, this 
would unquestionably be a great accomplishment.
  Attached to this legislation is also very important consumer 
protection legislation that provides the Federal Trade Commission the 
tools it needs to protect consumers against price gouging. With our 
current statutes, the FTC has the ability to investigate certain cases 
on the basis of antitrust laws, which are based on whether we think oil 
companies are colluding to set prices. What we really have to question 
is whether the companies may be conducting activities that actually 
take supply offline and thereby decrease the supply, leading to 
shortages at the pump. Therefore we need to give the FTC the authority 
it needs through this legislation and make sure consumers are 
protected.
  This legislation, as part of a package, was passed unanimously out of 
the Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee yesterday. It was 
the result of a bipartisan effort, led by the work of the chairman, 
Senator Inouye, and the ranking member, Senator Stevens. Unfortunately 
certain provision did not make it into the final version of this bill, 
however I firmly believe that it is a historic and important piece of 
bipartisan legislation that will come to the Senate floor for all of us 
to discuss.
  Just recently, the Energy and Natural Resources Committee passed 
another very positive landmark legislation which relates to setting a 
higher mandate on biofuels. In the last Energy bill we were able to 
pass, we stipulated that we should have a goal of producing 7\1/2\ 
billion gallons of biofuel a year by 2012. Both the President and the 
Congress are trying to achieve a higher goal. In this legislation, that 
sets the goal that by 2022, we would actually have a mandate of having 
36 billion gallons of alternative fuel produced in this country. I 
firmly believe that this is a realistic goal and an achievable mandate 
for us, and that it will aid in starting mass-production of alternative 
fuels in this country.
  In addition, that legislation had money for what we call a biofuels 
infrastructure--how we do actually get this product out to the consumer 
and to the corridors of transportation so the public does not have to 
worry about where they can fill up their cars. Thanks in part to this 
legislation we will have the infrastructure to do that.
  In the Commerce Committee, we also produced legislation focusing on 
flex-fuel cars so that, by 2015, 80 percent of the cars being driven on 
our roads will be flex-fueled. These are vehicles that could either use 
gasoline or an alternative fuel.
  We have also passed legislation now for studying plug-in hybrids and 
making sure the plug-in hybrid research continues to move ahead.
  In the Energy bill, we also included language about carbon 
sequestration, making sure we move ahead so carbon sequestration 
becomes a reality. Again, this is an important issue and it is a very 
important bill to my colleagues in various parts of the country in 
which we have an ample supply of coal. I commend Senators Domenici and 
Bingaman for working so closely together. That legislation also was 
passed in a bipartisan effort. It is a great compliment to those two 
distinguished Senators who worked so closely on the last Energy bill to 
yet produce another Energy bill.
  We are in a position to make a very positive impact on what I think 
is one of the biggest challenges we face, getting off our 
overdependence on foreign oil and providing sources of cleaner energy. 
We are well poised to take up that debate here on the Senate floor with 
this landmark bipartisan legislation out of two different committees.
  We will have a lot of work to do across the aisle. We still have 
great opportunities to see legislation out of those other four 
committees I mentioned that will contribute to this energy package. But 
we should embrace the opportunity the President laid out in his State 
of the Union Address when he said that he wanted to make sure we had a 
higher fuel efficiency standard and that we also set a higher renewable 
fuel standard, and that is exactly what we are doing now.
  I personally think we should also set a renewable standard for the 
amount of electricity we use from our electricity grid to further 
reduce our dependence on fossil fuel. These are topics that will be 
debated. I am sure later in the year we will have an important debate 
about climate change. But for now we are making great progress. I hope 
my colleagues will focus on the fact that this energy bill gives us 
another opportunity to work together here on the Senate floor and put 
real energy solutions before the American public.
  Right now, with gas prices reaching $4, Americans want to know we are 
going to have an aggressive policy, not only giving them consumer 
protections but better planning for the future so our economy can 
benefit from alternative sources of fuel.
  I yield the floor.

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