[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 17 (Thursday, January 28, 2016)]
[Senate]
[Page S298]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           ENERGY LEGISLATION

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I have joined with the Republican leader 
over the last couple of days saying good things about the bill that is 
on the floor. But today my friend the Republican leader stated that 
nothing has happened with energy in this country since 2007. That 
simply is not right. It is not true. We have done a lot of stuff in the 
Senate under President Obama to do good things about energy.
  For example, the first major bill under President Obama was the so-
called American Recovery Act, the stimulus bill. In that bill there was 
a lot of stuff to change the energy delivery system in this country to 
allow the creation of new power lines which were so badly needed all 
over America.
  For those of us who represent Nevada, we have a power line that now 
goes from northern Nevada to southern Nevada, and it would never have 
happened but for that legislation we passed. And there was an 
announcement made 2 weeks ago that that line is now going to be taken 
even farther to make it easier to transport power to California--
renewable energy power. I spoke to the owner of that line, who owns 
half of it with NV Energy, and soon they will be taking it clear to the 
Northwest.
  Of course, in the stimulus bill, it was the first time there has been 
major legislation allowed for tax credits, tax incentives for doing 
renewable energy. And the bill we just passed, the omnibus bill, the 
tax extenders--there is tremendous stuff in that bill for renewable 
energy and other electricity initiatives.
  So I like this bill that is on the floor. It is a good bill. But it 
simply is not valid to say that nothing has happened since 2007 because 
that is a gross understatement.
  I really hope we can pass the bill that is on the floor. The vast 
majority of this bill contains the Shaheen-Portman legislation that we 
tried valiantly to get done in the past. It was blocked by Republican 
filibusters. Sadly, the cosponsor of the bill twice voted against his 
own bill. The Senator from Ohio voted against his own legislation. I 
hope that doesn't happen again.

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