[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 14]
[Senate]
[Pages 18945-18964]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




              ENERGY POLICY ACT OF 2005--CONFERENCE REPORT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
proceed to the conference report on H.R. 6, which the clerk will please 
report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Committee of Conference on the disagreeing votes of the 
     two Houses on the amendment of the Senate to bill (H.R. 6), 
     to ensure jobs for our future with secure, affordable, and 
     reliable energy, have met, have agreed that the House recede 
     from its disagreement to the amendment of the Senate,

[[Page 18946]]

     and agree to the same with an amendment, and the Senate agree 
     to the same, signed by a majority of the conferees on the 
     part of both Houses.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate will proceed to the consideration 
of the conference report.
  (The conference report is printed in the proceedings of the House in 
the Record of July 27, 2005.)
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There will now be 3 hours of debate equally 
divided.
  The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I yield myself 10 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, it is obvious that I am two things 
tonight. First, I am very happy and I am very tired. I do not know 
which one I am more of, but I am both. I am sure there are many who 
think differently than I. I hope in the Senate there is an overwhelming 
number who think as I do. There will be some who do not. But after 6 
years of effort in the Senate, and for a time period going back about 
15 years, we have not had an energy policy program of any significance 
for the United States of America. When I say 6 years, we have been 
struggling for 6 years to get a current one, and 4 of those years we 
have produced them and they have failed. I have not been part of all of 
that, but I left the Budget Committee, the Senate might recall, after 
many years, with 2 years remaining to be there. That would have made my 
30th year on the Budget Committee, and I still would have been 
chairman. I left it because this would be a nice challenge, and I 
thought maybe during the 6 years, as chairman of this committee, I 
might be party to putting together a bill that might do something about 
America's energy future.
  Everybody should know that the Senator from New Mexico knew that we 
would not do anything for tomorrow, nothing much. We would not have any 
answers for people who said, what are you going to do tomorrow morning 
or next week on the gasoline prices? But I did know that we had a 
chance of doing something that we could come to the floor and say 
within 5 to 10 years this bill will create jobs, job security, and 
clean energy.
  Now, if that can be done in the complicated maze that we call the 
energy policy of the United States--and let me repeat, the reason that 
we can say to Americans that they have more jobs, they will have job 
security and have cleaner energy being produced, I almost asked, and I 
will, who could ask for anything more? I think that is a song or 
something, but who could ask for anything more?
  So I start by saying I was very lucky today. I got a call from a 
reporter for the Albuquerque Tribune. I do not know him very well, but 
I speak to him occasionally, and I say to my friend from Tennessee, he 
asked me a neat question. He asked: Senator, people are talking about 
and maybe nitpicking this bill, and I want to ask you, what do you 
think things will look like in America with reference to energy 5 to 10 
years from now?
  That was a terrific question because it permitted me to open my 
remarks tonight the way I should have over the last couple of months. 
For once, the Congress is going to do something important from which we 
as a Nation will benefit, not tomorrow but in the next 5 to 10 years. 
Certainly, we will begin to feel it in a big way within the next 5 to 
10 years. One might say therefore that we could have put most of it 
off, and we probably would have eked along and would have had some 
difficult times, but we could have said, it will work out. But what we 
have done is to make sure that where we have the power, we have done 
something to make it better.
  I repeat, energy is the reason we have jobs. Energy is the reason we 
have warm homes, electricity, automobiles, everything we look at, 
humankind-made movement and activity, based on energy use.
  That means it is pretty important that we do it somewhat right. Some 
may say it will all work out. This is a great, powerful nation, 
everybody will wiggle and do this and do that and it will come out. 
Well, believe me, after a year and a half of learning, I think it would 
have been a real risk for America to say it will all work out.
  What we have done is very complicated. It is a lot more than people 
speaking about gasoline prices tomorrow morning. It is a lot more than 
that.
  So 5 to 10 years from now, we ought to look back and ask: Did this 
legislation make a real difference?
  I am going to start by saying something nobody cares about when they 
lobby us, but I am going to say that we are going to use less energy 
per person, per adult, per unit of our economy, sometimes called GDP, 
because of the efficiency and conservation provisions here than we 
would have without it. That means simple things, believe it or not, in 
an energy bill, such as the appliances in our kitchens, the motors used 
in manufacturing plants, the buildings we live in, and the houses we 
live in will be far more efficient and use far less energy 5 to 10 
years from now than today. For everything we use less of, we need to 
burn less coal or produce less energy or electricity or import oil 
less.
  More of our electricity will come from renewable energy in 5 to 10 
years, such as solar, biomass, wind, landfill gas, waste. All kinds of 
things that can produce energy in that manner will be coming on board 
or be on board.
  We have streamlined the tax provisions. The licensing processes for 
clean technologies like geothermal have been streamlined so we will get 
whatever we have instead of letting it be tied up forever.
  Then we are going to be making great strides toward reducing the 
carbon intensity of our economy. It is the carbon intensity of our 
economy that causes significant pollution, and for many it is a source 
of global warming.
  My colleagues do not have to believe that to vote for this, but what 
I am saying is that for those who do--and I am one--this bill will move 
us forward so that 5 to 10 years from now we can be saying we may have 
technology that will go after that carbon. One will be new nuclear 
powerplants. I say to the Senator from Idaho, if a nuclear powerplant 
cannot be built in America after this bill is signed, then I think the 
Senator and I, who have been ardent, devoted fans, will say it cannot 
be done. I think the Senator will agree with that. Everything that can 
be done reasonably will be there. The uncertainties will be eliminated. 
That which frightens investors will be eliminated. The other things are 
all in place.
  With reference to coal, we will have provided incentives and tax 
relief so that new technology will be developed to take carbon out of 
the coal that is burned and, yes, if we use the outside of my years, in 
10 years we may, I say to the Senator from Tennessee, have found a way 
to sequester the carbon and indeed be on the way to being able to use 
our biggest resource, to wit, coal, without atmospheric damage, global 
damage, and with much cleaner effect. This bill might make that happen.
  As I say, when people think of the Energy bill, they think of cars, 
automobiles, but the electricity grid of the country--how many people 
on our committee thought we were going to learn about the electricity 
grid, such as when eastern America went black, but we found out. We 
have a great electricity system.
  When the blackout came, some people called this an ancient system. 
Some called it a one-horse system. No, it is the most refined. The 
problem is that the system was not tied together properly, and it did 
not have mandatory requirements for safety. So there were some good, 
some not so good. That transmission grid will be far more reliable 
because we have put on the grid owners mandatory standards for 
operating that grid. So I would say you will not have one of those 
after this bill gets implemented. That would have been good enough to 
pass a bill, but that is just a little part of the bill--one or two 
pages.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I ask unanimous consent for 5 additional minutes. I ask 
Senator Bingaman, would that be all right?

[[Page 18947]]


  Mr. BINGAMAN. That is fine. Go ahead.
  Mr. DOMENICI. In addition, we will be building new transmission to 
move electricity around the Nation. When I say ``we,'' don't think the 
Government is going to do it. We are just going to make sure we give 
the incentive to get it done. Transmission to move electricity around 
the Nation, where it is needed the most--that is going to make our 
consumption more efficient.
  This bill repeals an ancient law. Some people wonder why it even 
mentioned it because it has a funny name and they would say what in the 
world does it have to do with energy, but it is called P-U-H-C-A, 
PUHCA. It is from the times when we had our Great Depression. It made 
it at least more difficult to get money invested in electricity and 
utility companies than it was in other enterprises. We have repealed 
that. We have made some provisions that mergers will not be damaged. 
But this should bring much more capital investment into the utility 
companies that make up this powerful institution, this entity called 
the grid of the United States.
  Most of us are aware of another thing, which the distinguished 
Senator, a new Member of the Senate and a new member of the committee, 
the Senator from Tennessee, Lamar Alexander, has put much in the public 
eye when he introduced a bill about natural gas. One of our biggest 
problems, and we surely ought to be as worried about it as we are about 
the price of gasoline tomorrow, is our dependence upon imported natural 
gas. It is such a terrific product, from the standpoint of our ambient 
air, and it used to be so cheap, as everybody here knows. But what 
happened is we used it for everything. Now, as we get in trouble with 
global warming, everybody who builds a plant uses natural gas. Not that 
it does not produce some carbon, but far less. And the price goes up.
  So it looks as if America, which is paying the highest price of any 
industrial nation in the world for natural gas, is about to put itself 
out of business. We could lose the fertilizer business, the plastics 
business, many manufacturing companies. They are already going 
overseas. People will come up here and blame free-trade agreements, or 
low pay overseas. That is not so. We do not have enough natural gas to 
keep the price steady or bring it down. We must have liquefied natural 
gas from overseas. It is terrible to admit it. I wish I were here 
saying we don't. We do. In the next 25 years we will have a crisis if 
that doesn't occur.
  We have modernized, streamlined, eliminated unnecessary delays in the 
ports we will be bringing to America that will be the source of 
distributing LNG. We have eliminated the unnecessary delays. That is 
terrifically important. Of the five most important things, one might 
say that would be one of them because we might hit 8, 10, 12, 15--one 
study says 23--new ports will be needed to use LNG in inland America. 
In other words, you locate them and then the gas can be put into 
pipelines and delivered to America's users. We permitted that to be 
done with more dispatch.
  For the first time, and we know this, since Americans began a love 
affair with the car, we are going to put in place an ethanol program.
  I ask for 5 additional minutes.
  People used to laugh at it. Let me put it this way. It is not too 
shabby, to put America's agricultural industry to work making fuel for 
vehicles. Some used to say that was foolish. It might have been when 
crude oil was $5 a barrel, or $10. But it certainly is a good 
investment when crude oil is this expensive because all you are doing 
is trading the investment in ethanol--plants, cement, steel, thousands 
of jobs, agricultural revitalization--every dollar you put in that is a 
dollar you didn't give to the Saudi Arabians or you didn't give to 
those who are selling us oil. You spent it here. We have a major new 
program, 7.5 million gallons mandated out here in the future. So that 
should be very helpful, in terms of jobs and helping with our 
importation.
  We also gave significant credits for hybrid automobiles. I think we 
all know we had that. We doubled it. We know people want them now. But 
we still put it in, the tax writers put it in, and we hope the 
manufacturers will see the demand and get more on board quickly. We 
think that was a contribution.
  I think overall we are going to try to produce as much of our energy 
domestically as possible. To do that we have streamlined the permitting 
processes where we can. For instance, the Senator from Colorado is on 
the Senate floor, and the Senators from Utah have been interested--we 
have a fantastic oil shale research and development program and provide 
leasing to see if we, one of these days, could implement the abundant 
oil resources from oil shale. Nobody knows if we could ever work that 
economically. If we could, we would not need any imported oil. We have 
more oil locked up in oil shale than America would use over 200 years. 
We just have to find a way to convert it. We are close. We are going to 
push that.
  We are deeply divided on global climate change. We have had a couple 
of votes. I will not go through them. But the legislation we are doing, 
while it does not address a global warming tax, will do more to develop 
and deploy a new generation of clean technology that will make our 
consumption cleaner and more environmentally friendly. If we ever do 
achieve a limit--say that, make the limit there--we may, indeed, have 
ready the technologies that could do it. Right now we are just saying, 
Do it. That is why Senator Craig gets up and says, How? Right? I am 
speaking for him--but how? Put everybody out of business?
  No. New technology we are going to try to get developed will clean 
the coal--take the carbon out of it, I should say. These are the kinds 
of things that are in this 1,200-page document.
  I want to close. I am a pretty experienced fellow around here. I want 
to say that I have never worked in the process on a difficult bill 
where there has been more openness and inclusiveness in my 32 years. 
Every step of this process this Senator has worked with the other 
Senator from New Mexico to ensure that we have a bipartisan bill.
  That doesn't mean that Senator Bingaman likes every provision. It 
doesn't mean that I like every provision. But nobody can say that 
anything was done in one closed back room, shoved down anybody's 
throat, or done without staff, excellent staff, on both sides working 
on it. I am thankful. Because of that, Senator Reid joined our leader 
and let us get this bill to the floor.
  We took 2 weeks. Heretofore we took 6 weeks, and still had 200 
amendments left. We didn't get a bill, a real bill.
  Believe it or not, Representatives Dingell and Barton met. Ourselves, 
we spent 20-plus hours as a foursome. Then we had 3 days, 5 open days 
of conference meetings with amendments being offered. Every conferee 
could offer amendments. They were voted on, some won, some lost--
honestly most lost, but that is the way it is. They voted.
  The last of those conferences ended a couple of nights ago at 2:30 in 
the morning. I probably was more tired then than now, obviously. Maybe 
not as happy because I didn't know the product. But I think I know the 
product now. It is finished. It is a good product. It should pass 
overwhelmingly.
  I urge Senators to consider that this bill, and the future that it 
envisions, far outstrips anyone's individual parochial concern. I hate 
to say that because nobody is going to say that is why they vote 
against it. Nobody is going to say I didn't get some project or some 
one theme. But I think if you are looking at what might be good down 
the line--which maybe we ought to do more of--you ought to vote for 
this.
  One last comment. There will be a point of order made, and tonight I 
am going to say while everybody is around, or a few are: You heard a 
lot of numbers about what this bill costs. Please understand the point 
of order has to do with none of that. The point of order has to do with 
a simple thing. This committee was given $2 billion to spend, in direct 
spending, nonappropriated money. When all the work

[[Page 18948]]

was done we estimated it was $2.2 billion--two billion two hundred 
million--not billion--$200 million. You know, the budget is hundreds of 
billions. This is $200 million. I don't even know why a point of order 
should be made.
  I am going to cheat and tell you, sometimes when I was budget 
chairman we rounded numbers to 100. I am confessing that belatedly. 
Maybe we would have rounded this one to 200. Anyway, that is what we 
are going to vote on. I hope, even if you are against the bill, you 
will let us vote whether or not the country should have this.
  With that, I thank the Senate, thank the Chair, and most important, 
thank the Senators here. For the Republican Senators, as soon as 
Senator Bingaman is through I will start allocating on our side 5, 7 
minutes, whatever you each would like. Senator Bingaman will use what 
he wants and allocate the rest. He has one Senator. We will stay as 
long as you like.
  Thank you all for listening.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me say how pleased I am that we are 
able to bring back to the Senate a conference report on energy policy 
that is truly a bipartisan consensus document. This bipartisan 
consensus had its beginnings earlier this year in our committee, the 
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, where the chairman, 
Senator Domenici, my colleague from New Mexico, reached out to those of 
us on the Democratic side and pledged to work in good faith to bring to 
the Senate a comprehensive Energy bill.
  We readily accepted that invitation and we had a very open and 
bipartisan committee process. The result of that process was a bill 
that was recommended to the Senate by the Committee on Energy and 
Natural Resources by a vote of 21 to 1. On the floor of the Senate when 
this bill was first being considered, we continued to work together in 
that open and bipartisan process. The result was that the Senate as a 
whole passed the Energy bill by a margin of 85 to 12.
  In conference, my colleague from New Mexico, Senator Domenici, was 
adamant that we use an open and a bipartisan process there as well, and 
include House Democratic Members and staff who had not been included in 
the past in that same process.
  I congratulate Senator Domenici on the passage of the resolution that 
we adopted earlier this evening to designate this the Domenici Energy 
Policy Act of 2005. He successfully persuaded the chairman of our 
conference, Congressman Joe Barton, of the wisdom of proceeding in an 
open and bipartisan manner, and it proved to work very well. The 
bipartisan and bicameral conference committee staff was able, in short 
order, to resolve many of the technical issues that are so important to 
get right in this complex area of legislation. As they encountered 
issues that were unresolvable by the staff and needed guidance from 
members, Chairmen Barton and Domenici and Ranking Member Dingell and I 
were able to work together to forge compromises that we thought could 
be recommended to the entire conference. Those compromises, in fact, 
were embraced in almost all cases by our respective colleagues.
  The result was a conference report that was signed by 13 of the 14 
Senate conferees. That conference report is 1,724 pages in length. I do 
not think you can judge the quality of legislation by the size of it, 
but I do think the size of it indicates the comprehensiveness of this 
legislation and the complexity of it. The conference report was adopted 
earlier today in the House of Representatives with 75 House Democrats 
voting for the legislation, led by Congressman John Dingell.
  Most of us came away from the conference with many provisions that we 
were happy to have in the final conference report and some provisions 
that we reluctantly had to give up on. I, for example, am very sorry 
that the bill before us does not contain the renewable portfolio 
standard which would require utilities to produce a percentage of their 
electricity from renewable sources. I know Chairman Barton is 
disappointed that he was not able to get a number of his priorities 
agreed to in the conference. But the nature of a good conference is 
that it is a give and take and not everything ultimately can be agreed 
to. So compromise is the order of the day.
  The result of this conference is a bill that has many more bright 
spots than flaws and a bill that deserves passage by the Senate and the 
signature of the President. I will mention a number of the bright 
spots, and then I will acknowledge some of the flaws and gaps that are 
contained in the conference report.
  The conference report has strong provisions for increasing energy 
supplies from a number of sources. As I have often said, increased 
domestic energy production is one of the four key elements of sound 
energy policy. We have good provisions for producing oil and gas in an 
environmentally responsible way, for unlocking the untapped energy 
potential on Indian lands, for relicensing of hydroelectric dams, for 
improving geothermal leasing on Federal lands, and for opening a path 
to renewable resources in offshore environments. We are making a major 
push in the area of energy from coal toward new technologies that have 
better environmental characteristics and that will be adaptable to a 
future in which we may want to capture and sequester carbon dioxide.
  The conference report has strong provisions for increasing energy 
efficiency. Over a dozen new appliance efficiency standards are called 
for under this act. The Federal Government's own energy efficiency will 
be enhanced through the strengthening of the Federal Energy Management 
Program and through extension of authority to enter into energy-saving 
performance contracts.
  The conference report expands authorizations both for the Low Income 
Home Energy Assistance Program and weatherization and State energy 
programs.
  The conference report has perhaps some of the strongest provisions in 
the area of protection of energy consumers. Both the electricity and 
natural gas provisions of the conference report contain broad new 
provisions to ensure market transparency and to prohibit market 
manipulation. In the area of electric utility mergers, we have expanded 
the jurisdiction of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission over 
mergers involving existing generation plants; that is, plants that are 
in existence at the time the merger takes place. We have also created 
new requirements in the Federal Power Act for special scrutiny for 
possible cross subsidization as a result of mergers. Before the Federal 
Energy Regulatory Commission can approve a merger, it must find that 
any possible cross subsidization is actually consistent with the public 
interest, which I think will prove to be both a flexible and a strong 
protection for ratepayers and for workers and for other persons who 
should be protected if we are being consistent with the public 
interest.
  The conference report authorizes a broad range of research and 
development and demonstration and deployment activities for new energy 
technologies that will help us toward our energy future. It couples 
them with energy tax incentives and a comprehensive new approach to 
loan guarantees at the Department that will help these technologies 
over the final threshold into commercialization. This latter part of 
the bill is a particular accomplishment of Chairman Domenici that I 
think will pay off in this country for years to come.
  The conference report also will result in major changes in our 
national slate of transportation fuels. It requires that we reach a 
target of 7.5 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2012. It sets a 
path forward for the development and commercial introduction of ethanol 
made from cellulosic biomass which promises to have a profound impact 
on our ability to manufacture and use renewable fuels in the future. 
Our work on fuels and fuel additives in this conference report is not 
complicated by the issue of developing safe harbors for product 
liability claims for any fuel additive, whether ethanol or MTBE.

[[Page 18949]]

Resolving this dispute involved including a provision that, when it 
first appeared in the publicly released base text of the conference 
report, caused some confusion. I know that some Members may want to 
address this issue in this debate. The best explanation, though, of the 
intent of this provision was given by Chairman Barton himself in the 
course of the final public meeting of the Energy bill conference Monday 
night. He did it in the course of an exchange with Congressman Bart 
Stupak of Michigan, who was about to offer a clarifying amendment to 
this provision in the conference report. Based on the understanding 
conveyed in that exchange, Congressman Stupak decided that he did not 
need to offer his intended amendment.
  Since that exchange was crucial to how this provision was dealt with 
in conference, I ask unanimous consent that the transcript of that 
exchange be printed in the Record following my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, there is much more that I could say on 
behalf of the energy conference report that is before us, but I want to 
allow time for others to speak as well. It is worth acknowledging that 
in the process of conferencing with the House, we had to yield to their 
strong demands and desires in a few areas. Some of those provisions, in 
my view, were misguided. They include some weakening of environmental 
laws and some additional subsidies to energy industries that are 
probably unnecessary. I am sure that some of my colleagues will explore 
those problems in more detail. But these flaws, serious as they are, do 
not, in my opinion, lead to a conclusion that this bill should not be 
enacted. On balance, this is a good bill for the country and the best 
Energy bill this Congress is going to produce. We should enact it into 
law.
  To the extent that there are gaps in the bill, that there are 
subjects that we should have covered and have not adequately covered, 
we need to look to the future. It has taken Congress over 4 years to 
craft this Energy bill. The Energy bill prior to that was the Energy 
Policy Act of 1992, passed 13 years ago. When we complete this bill, I 
don't believe we have the luxury of waiting another 13 years to pass 
the next Energy bill. The energy security needs of this country that 
are not addressed in this bill will not wait for another decade for 
attention. The threats posed by our dependence on oil imports or by 
global warming will continue to face us and will continue to grow as 
issues. This bill does maintain and increase our investment on a range 
of clean energy sources, but it does not contain a critical mechanism 
that was contained in the Senate Energy bill; that is, the renewable 
portfolio standard that I referred to earlier.
  This bill has positive and helpful measures to increase domestic 
refining, but consumers will still face burdens at the gas pump. There 
is critical work to be done on these issues, but I believe the positive 
message coming out of this bill is that we have developed a truly 
bipartisan way to move forward on those issues in the Senate and the 
House of Representatives. I think that I speak both for myself and for 
my colleague who is chairman of the Committee on Energy and Natural 
Resources in saying that we intend to work together both in the short 
term and in the long term to address the issues that need additional 
attention in this general legislation. He has my pledge to continue to 
work in this Congress to advance the ball and to get to a finish line 
on proposals that we could not achieve closure on in the context of 
this bill.
  Let me just mention three of those. First, flexible mandatory 
measures to address global warming. We had an excellent hearing which 
Chairman Domenici chaired in the Energy Committee. In fact, during the 
time that this bill was being considered in conference, time was taken 
out to have this hearing on the issue of global warming. I believe it 
was a very useful hearing. Chairman Domenici stated that it was the 
first of several that we may be able to have to better understand that 
issue and see if a consensus can be reached on a path forward in 
dealing with it.
  Second, doing more to tap the potential of renewable energy. Again, I 
believe that more can be done there, and I hope we can revisit that 
issue before this Congress adjourns.
  Third, we need to continue to focus on oil savings. The United States 
imports more than 65 percent of our oil, and the Energy bill will not 
reduce those imports significantly. Reducing oil consumption will make 
us less dependent on foreign oil and ultimately save Americans money at 
the gas pump. Although the oil savings approach that we took in the 
Senate bill did not win acceptance by the House of Representatives, 
that is a concept that continues to hold promise as a way of addressing 
the problem, and we need to revisit that issue in legislation, in my 
view, as soon as we possibly can.
  We worked hard to create the Energy bill compromise before us today. 
We should enact that compromise and move forward aggressively to ensure 
that it is implemented rapidly by the executive branch of our 
Government. If there are negative consequences to what we have enacted, 
then we can document those and work to correct those errors. If there 
are topics we need to address more effectively, then we certainly can 
do that.
  Again, I congratulate my friend and colleague on his accomplishment. 
But securing our energy future in some sense is a job that is never 
done. I look forward after we have had time to rest and reflect on what 
has been done to again begin the effort to address policies that will 
increase our energy security, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, 
provide for more use of clean energy, lower gas prices, and deal with 
the emissions that are leading to global warming.
  Again, I congratulate my colleague and all members of the conference 
and all Members of the Senate for the constructive approach they have 
taken to the development of this legislation.
  At this point, I yield the floor.

                               Exhibit 1

       Chairman Barton. Are there other amendments from the House 
     conferees to Title XV? Mr. Stupak.
       Mr. Stupak. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have an amendment at 
     the desk, but if I may, before I offer it, I would like to 
     ask you, as chairman, a couple questions on Section 1504, if 
     I may?
       Chairman Barton. The gentleman is recognized.
       Mr. Stupak. Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank you for 
     your willingness to come to a consensus on the MTBE. I know 
     it has been a difficult couple days, and I am trying to get 
     this thing resolved and I----
       Chairman Barton. Well, I am not consenting, I am just 
     admitting that I don't have the votes in the Senate.
       Mr. Stupak. Well, your willingness to work with the 
     conference committee.
       Chairman Barton. I know when to fold them and this is one 
     time you got to fold them. So what was the question?
       Mr. Stupak. Well, in light of that, Mr. Chairman, I just 
     want to be clear about one of the compromise provisions 
     that's been inserted into the amendment and this is Section 
     1504, called Claims Filed After Enactment. Can the chairman 
     clarify for us what this language means and is intended to 
     do, this Section 1504?
       Chairman Barton. If you will suspend just briefly.
       Mr. Stupak. Yes, sir.
       Chairman Barton. The Section 1504 is a negotiated section 
     between the House and the Senate, that in lieu of the base 
     text language in the House bill on MTBE, we put in a section 
     that is permissive, that for prospective claims, defendants 
     may request that they be consolidated in a Federal court as 
     opposed to a State court. It is a permissive, not mandatory, 
     thing.
       Mr. Stupak. So in that case, then it can remain in the 
     State courts. So this provision does not in any way give the 
     Federal courts a new subject jurisdiction over MTBE cases?
       Chairman Barton. The base text that's before the conferees, 
     on existing MTBE lawsuits, changes nothing on prospective 
     MTBE lawsuits, that is, lawsuits that have not yet been 
     filed.
       Mr. Stupak. Correct.
       Chairman Barton. It gives the defendant in the lawsuit, the 
     prospective lawsuit, if it were to be filed, the right to 
     request that the lawsuit be sent to a Federal court.
       Mr. Stupak. Or it could remain the State court if----
       Chairman Barton. Well, it just gives them right to request 
     it. Now I am not an attorney, so I am not--but that's what 
     the section does.

[[Page 18950]]

       Mr. Stupak. I just want to make sure that the Federal 
     courts don't have an exclusive right to try these cases and 
     it is my understanding they would not, based upon----
       Chairman Barton. Well, of the existing cases that have 
     already been filed, they are in the hundreds, all but 12 are 
     in Federal court.
       Mr. Stupak. Correct.
       Chairman Barton. They are 12 that are in State court.
       Mr. Stupak. So it is really----
       Chairman Barton. I don't think this section is unduly 
     restrictive or adverse to the current situation.
       Mr. Stupak. So Section 1504, then, is it fair to say, gives 
     those involved in future MTBE litigation or disputes, the 
     discretionary ability to remove their case to Federal court?
       Chairman Barton. No, it gives them the right to request it.
       Mr. Stupak. Okay.
       Chairman Barton. That's all.
       Mr. Stupak. Discretionary. They don't have to. It is within 
     their discretion to go to Federal court, if the defendants so 
     choose.
       Chairman Barton. That's correct.
       Mr. Stupak. And then it is up to the judge whether or not 
     the case is properly there or remanded back to State court?
       Chairman Barton. That's my understanding.
       Mr. Stupak. So we are not conferring a new substantive or 
     subject matter jurisdiction over these cases?
       Chairman Barton. Not to my knowledge.
       Mr. Stupak. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With that, I will not 
     offer my amendment.
       Chairman Barton. We appreciate the gentleman.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I know Senator Kerry wants to speak, but I would like 
to ask that we may have time to arrange all of this right now. My next 
speaker is Senator Craig. I would like to yield 5 minutes to him and 
then we go to somebody on your side.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Senator Kerry will be the first Senator on this side, 
followed by Senator Wyden. So why don't we go back and forth, if that 
is acceptable.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I might ask the Democrat side, since we have two 
Senators with 5 minutes each, would it be fair to say we go back and 
forth with 5 minutes?
  Mr. KERRY. Under the order, I have 30, and I intend to use it.
  Mr. DOMENICI. You have 30.
  Mr. WYDEN. I have 15 under the agreement.
  Mr. KERRY. I don't want to be limited to 5 minutes.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I am not going to limit you. You have an order. I am 
just talking about sequence.
  Mr. KERRY. I thought you said limited to 5 minutes.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I did. I am wrong, so I am telling you you have 30; you 
are going to get 30. It is just a question of when.
  Mr. KERRY. I am happy to go back and forth. That is the way we have 
always done it.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair will advise under the previous order 
as the Chair recollects it, the Democratic side set up specific times 
for their members while on the Republican side 90 minutes was allocated 
but not allocated in any definitive way.
  Mr. DOMENICI. So what we are saying is the Senator from New Mexico 
can speak for 90 minutes. I don't want to do that. I want to let my 
Senators speak, so I would like to change that. If we don't change it, 
I will speak for 90 minutes.
  Mr. CRAIG. The Senator was to allocate 90.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I know I was. I would like to allocate if I could. If 
Senator Kerry is going to speak 30 minutes, I would like to have 
Senator Craig and Senator Thomas speak for 5 minutes each. That is 10 
minutes. And then we go to Senator Kerry for his 30. Then we come back 
to Senator Alexander for his 5, and then we go back to Senator Wyden 
for as long as he would like.
  Mr. WYDEN. That will be very adequate. I thank the Senator.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Is that fair enough, Senators?
  Mr. WYDEN. Yes.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Fair enough. Thank you. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I think all of us stand here tonight happy 
that a work product is before us, and it would be remiss of me not to 
congratulate both of the Senators from New Mexico but clearly to 
recognize Senator Domenici for his chairing of the Energy Committee 
here in the Senate and the work he and Senator Bingaman have done to 
operate in a bipartisan way to bring us to where we are tonight.
  You have heard from both of these Senators, and they have spoken 
clearly about the substance of the conference report that is before us. 
I will not go into the detail of that substance.
  At the outset, let me thank at least two of my staff members, George 
O'Connor and Corey McDaniel. Both of them have worked on these issues. 
George O'Connor has been with me literally all of these years as we 
have worked and struggled through the process. I thank them and thank 
the staff of the full committee for the tremendous effort at hand that 
has produced this important conference report.
  In the 5-year struggle that many Members have been engaged in 
developing a comprehensive energy policy for this country, at times we 
thought it was for naught. We would bring it to the Senate, we would 
spend weeks voting on it, we would work with the House, but we could 
not produce a final conference report.
  That work was not for naught. In that process of the last 5 years, 
not only did we learn there were issues we simply could not arrive at a 
solution on, but over that 5 years there was a learning process for all 
of us and for all Americans on a variety of issues.
  Senator Domenici spoke tonight of a new, comprehensive national 
policy to deal with nuclear energy and to bring it online. Five years 
ago we could not have accomplished what we accomplished in the last 
several months. Why? The public was not with us in general nor was 
there a growing realization that obviously did occur that the way to 
build new base load, to turn on the lights of America 10 years out, was 
with an existing technology while we worked on future technologies. And 
we wanted it to be clean. That new technology was an existing 
technology: It was nuclear.
  Once again I believe the world is increasingly excited that America 
has decided to take a leadership role in the area of nuclear instead of 
to hide behind the politics of the issue, as we have as we have lost 
that leadership role over the last two decades. In our action here, 
comprehensive work has been done of a bipartisan character.
  Senator Domenici also reminds me, as he should, he wrote a book on 
the issue, a book that is selling pretty well, but also a book that was 
part of that educational process that caused us, along with the critics 
of the issue, to begin to understand if we want clean energy, and we 
do, and we want abundant energy, and we must have it, under current 
technologies there is only one place to go to get it.
  Clearly, we have incentivized that. The Senator from New Mexico is 
right. If you cannot begin to design and ultimately build new nuclear 
production facilities in this country, new electrical productions in 
this country fueled by nuclear reactors, then we will not get it done. 
But we will, and not only will we go through a new generation, we will 
go into new technologies. That is laid out in this bill. It is 
critically important.
  So while we are working on the new, we also do something else. We 
realized the old must be renewed, and that was hydro. For the Pacific 
Northwest, it was critical. In the Energy Policy Act of the mid-1980s, 
we created a problem. We included everybody except the producer and 
said, You have a right to shape the new facility when it is relicensed, 
no matter what the cost and no matter what the demand, as long as it 
fits the environmental desire of the stakeholders involved. We could 
not get licensing completed.
  It went on for years and years and cost hundreds of thousands, if not 
millions of dollars, and nothing got done. When it did get done, the 
production plant usually produced less than it had before. That is 
unacceptable when we see so many of our hydro facilities needing to be 
relicensed in the next 20 years. I and many others worked and

[[Page 18951]]

we have what we believe is a new and better way to relicense our 
facilities with that clear recognition.
  There are many key components in this critical legislation that, as 
both the Senators from New Mexico have said, put us back into the 
business of producing energy, clean energy, appropriate for our 
national needs, meeting the demands, creating jobs, and saying to our 
young people, there is a variety of abundant energy future for our 
country.
  I applaud my colleagues for working with us in accomplishing what I 
believe to be a very comprehensive piece of work.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Vitter). The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I will yield very soon to Senators.
  I make one observation and ask one question and then I will yield to 
my friend from Wyoming.
  First, fellow Senators, Senator Bingaman mentioned something about 
renewables. I failed to mention, while we did not accept the Bingaman 
amendment, the tax portion of this bill allocates the largest 
percentage, largest piece of the tax incentives to renewables, to wind. 
Some did not like that. Some think it is great. One of the Senators is 
here and smiling. He did not like that. But that means as much wind 
energy as you can throw for the next 3 years, as much as you can 
manufacture and use, will be manufactured and used. Hopefully during 
that period of time Senator Bingaman can return and speak more to the 
issue of longevity and continuity.
  I thank two people: Alex Flint, my staff director, and Bob Simon, the 
staff director of Senator Bingaman. It is fair to say they have become 
friends, too, just as my friend Senator Bingaman and I have.
  With that, we have the order for the next hour or so. I will leave 
for a while and leave it to one of my friends. Senator Murkowski is the 
last one, although we have not provided for her.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I will be short. It is a real honor to be 
here this evening to talk about the introduction of this bill, a bill 
for which we have waited a very long time, and worked a very long time. 
I thank the chairman and the ranking member. We worked very hard on 
this bill to get it into conference and worked very hard through 
conference.
  Since we started formulating policy, we have worked on a number of 
issues. There have been changes. Many things have remained the same 
because the policies need to be the same. The issues are the same. We 
have had to move forward.
  We still need a comprehensive policy. That is an important issue 
because now, as we read in the paper, there are questions as to why we 
are not going to affect the gas prices tomorrow or the day after. We 
are talking about down the road. We are talking about where we will be 
over a period of time. This is a policy. It is very important to 
remember and to understand as we talk about the changes that will 
eventually take place in the kind of energy we will use, in terms of 
renewables, in terms of alternatives. We will be moving there, but we 
are not there. Alternative energy creates now about 3 percent of what 
we use. It will be much higher than that, but it won't be higher than 
that next year or next month.
  We have to make sure what we are using now for energy can continue to 
be maintained and that we will find new ways of dealing with the 
energy. For instance, that we can take coal, our largest fossil fuel 
resource, and find ways to use it in a more environmentally sound way, 
find ways to change the way it is moved, for hydrogen or synthetic 
diesel, and do that over time.
  It is important we understand that we have to do two things: We have 
to look to the future about alternatives. We have to find ways to use 
what is available now to keep up production in this country and to keep 
our economy strong. We ought not to forget that is what we need to do.
  This is a bill that is very balanced. That is important. It has 
already been talked about. I will not go into the details. We have 
talked about renewables. We have talked about ways we can renew--
whether it is gasoline, ethanol, or opportunities for electric 
generation, whether nuclear or whatever--areas we can move to. That is 
very important over time.
  We ought to talk about coal. We do here. We spend a good deal of 
money. By the way, we divide this total expenditure in about six equal 
ways between renewables, conservation, doing something to make coal 
more usable. There are six distinct areas spread in fairly equal 
amounts.
  I will talk a second on coal. It is our largest fossil fuel resource. 
We have more of it for the future than any other energy. We need to 
find better ways to use that. Much of it will be generating 
electricity. Sometimes we do not think about where electricity comes 
from; we just think it is automatically there. It is not. We have to 
continue to do that. Coal is in one place; the need for electricity is 
in another. We need transmission. We have to have new transmission 
ideas and do things that are more efficient than they have been in the 
past. We need to find a way to make sure it is safe and secure.
  The same thing is true with oil. We use oil a great deal. About 60 
percent of it now is imported. We will continue to do that. Certainly 
over time we will find ways to get better mileage in automobiles. It is 
not going to happen right away.
  Of course, there will be some arguments that we should put some 
defined times when you have to get CAFE standards. It is very difficult 
to do that. But it will happen. It will happen in the marketplace. It 
will happen as we can do it. And we can do it efficiently. We have to 
find better ways to get more oil out of the ground. We produce a lot of 
oil in Wyoming. The old oilfields are about exhausted, but below that 
is a great deal more oil if we find different ways of doing that, if we 
use renewed production or carbon sequestration. And much of that is in 
this bill.
  We do have conservation and efficiency, as we should have. We have 
opportunities to make the use of energy more clean and better 
environmentally. We have ideas for producing more production of our 
resources available now. And we need to do all of these things as 
quickly as possible, but we cannot do them overnight.
  I urge passage of this bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized 
for 30 minutes.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I wish the senior Senator from New Mexico 
were in the Senate because I wanted to say a few words to him 
personally as well as about him, but in his absence I will certainly 
say them.
  In the Senate, we all have an ability, thank Heaven, to be able to 
separate the policy from personality and from the personal. I know how 
hard Senator Domenici has worked through the years. I know how 
committed he is personally to developing an energy policy. That goes, 
also, for the junior Senator from New Mexico, my friend Senator 
Bingaman, who has worked closely and diligently under difficult 
circumstances to try to deal with these energy issues.
  On a personal level, I am genuinely happy for the Senator from New 
Mexico because I know this is a moment of completion for him, and on a 
personal level he is happy and he has worked hard to get there. All 
Members are gratified when a colleague has that kind of success. 
Nevertheless, on a policy level, I have enormous disagreements with 
where this bill has finally put the Senate and our country.
  Our Nation's energy crisis has reached historic levels. What we need 
today is not a policy that puts enough good stuff in it that enough 
Senators will grab onto it and say: OK, I can vote for that bill. What 
we need is an energy policy that is as bold and big as the challenge is 
significant to the country. That is not, under any analysis, what we 
are getting in this bill.
  This is, frankly, largely a lobbyist-driven bill. What underscores 
that is

[[Page 18952]]

when you measure what is happening in this bill--as you must in making 
any decent policy for our country--when you measure this bill against 
families who are struggling to balance their checkbooks, who cannot pay 
easily the additional cost of gasoline, when you measure this bill 
against small businesses, which have had an enormous rise in the cost 
of doing business--just the cost of getting to and from the business, 
let alone the cost of trucks delivering goods to that business. There 
has been something like a $25 billion to $30 billion energy gas tax 
increase on businesses over the course of the last couple years. They 
are paying those additional costs.
  We passed, in the Senate, an energy provision to be able to provide 
loans--not grants, not giveaways, but loans--to those businesses so 
that they might be able to adjust for the cash flow problems they have 
because of the increased cost of energy. The Senate passed it. The 
Senate passed it 3 years ago. But it was taken out in the conference.
  Gone from this bill is any kind of emergency lending assistance to 
the small businesses of our country that are hard-pressed because of 
energy costs. Why? What is the reason for that? When you see our 
children breathing air already that is dangerously polluted, and you 
know the levels of asthma among children are increasing, and the 
greatest cause for the hospitalization of children in the summertime in 
America is an asthma attack, which is air-induced, and the quality of 
our air is not being cleaned as much as it was, as rapidly as it could 
be, nevertheless, you see us going backward with respect to the new 
source performance standards in air quality, when you read about rival 
nations that are rapidly moving ahead of the United States of America 
with respect to alternative energy technologies--and they are creating 
high-paying jobs by moving in that direction--but the United States is 
only moving incrementally, without a genuine commitment--and I will 
come to that in a minute--when you recognize that our dependence on 
foreign oil sees us sending $25 billion a year just to the Gulf States 
alone--Mr. President, $200,000 a minute, $13 million an hour, we send 
to those countries; And how much of that money falls into the hands of 
Hamas, al-Qaida--when you see what the complication of oil dependency 
does to the foreign policy of the United States as well as the health, 
economy, and security of our Nation, you have to ask yourself why we 
are not moving more rapidly to deal with these issues.
  Senator Domenici said a moment ago this is the largest portion that 
has gone to renewables. Well, let me show my colleagues this pie chart, 
which simply contradicts that. That is not accurate. It may be a larger 
amount of money than it has been in the past, but of the money that is 
being put out in this bill, only 16 percent goes to renewables. And 10 
percent goes to efficiency. That is a total, between them, of 26 
percent going to renewables and efficiency. Mr. President, 37 percent 
alone, eclipsing renewables and eclipsing efficiency combined, is going 
to nuclear--going to nuclear.
  When you add the combination of oil and gas, you have an enormous 
proportion of this bill's tax benefits and funding that is going to the 
status quo--the status quo--``same old same old'' energy policy of the 
United States, not to the creation of the new high-paying jobs, to 
clean air and to renewables and the kind of technologies we need. There 
is no explanation for that.
  Mr. President, I voted for the Senate bill. I joined with colleagues, 
85 of us, in sending a bill to the conference that had about a 50-50 
split. I was not pleased with a 50-50 split. I thought we could have 
done better than that. Guess what. We are going backward in this bill. 
Why? What is the rationale? What is the policy rationale for having 
taken a Senate bill that had a larger amount of money going to 
renewables and alternatives, that passed with 85 votes, and here we are 
with a bill on the floor of the Senate that has a paltry 26 percent, 
only 16 percent going to renewables? If you ask the American people, 
the American people would overwhelmingly vote to do otherwise. But the 
Senate will not.
  The conference committee takes a huge step backward in other places--
for instance, the requirement that U.S. utilities generate 10 percent 
of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020, 15 years from now. 
We are trying to set a goal that just 10 percent of America's 
electricity is going to be produced from alternatives and renewables. 
We could achieve it. Other nations are moving to a much higher level of 
alternatives and renewables. Not the United States of America. We are 
going to do the ``same old same old.'' We are going to do the nuclear 
and do the oil and gas.
  Well, most of our electricity actually is not oil-fired. It is either 
coal-fired or natural gas-fired. But the fact is that instead of 
setting a standard, which we had in the Senate--in the Senate bill, we 
said 10 percent of the electricity by 2020 will be from renewable 
sources--that is gone, taken out of the bill. Why? Because special 
interests on the House side demanded that happen.
  As to language that recognized global warming, I remember how many 
Senators came to the floor, and they all embraced the language of 
global warming in a nonbinding resolution. They just said: We are going 
to deal with it, and this is important. Guess what. Even the nonbinding 
language that acknowledged the problem of global warming has been taken 
out. There is nothing in this legislation to deal with one of the 
single greatest environmental challenges on the face of this planet--
nothing.
  And how do you explain this next one? The United States uses about 19 
million barrels of oil a day. We had a requirement in the Senate bill 
that we reduce oil consumption in America by 1 million barrels a day. 
Imagine that: We were going to try to get 1 million out of 19 million. 
We were going to require that the country set a goal of reducing that 
dependency on oil. Gone. It has been taken out. Why? Why would we not 
want, as a nation, to set a goal of trying to reduce our dependency?
  I guarantee you, Mr. President, we are going to be back here in the 
Senate facing real energy crises as we deal with the realities of what 
is going to happen in the world, with a China that is going to move to 
something like 13 million barrels of consumption on a daily basis from 
about 5 today. You have India that is going to go from about 2 million 
barrels up to 5 million barrels a day.
  You are going to have some trillions of dollars that are going to 
continue to be exported abroad, and you will see more efforts by China 
and other countries to take the fruits of their oil and buy American 
companies. Is America going to be stronger for that?
  I would like to know why, instead, billions of American tax dollars 
are not going to go to renewables and alternatives, but they are going 
to go into oil and gas. Let me make it clear. I support clean coal 
technology. I think it is important. It is one of the most vast 
resources of the United States, one of our biggest reserves. And it is 
absolutely technologically feasible for us to be able to burn coal more 
cleanly. We need to do that. I support our efforts to move in that 
direction.
  But why, at the last minute, is there a $1.5 billion deal that goes 
to Halliburton? Halliburton, which is making billions of dollars off of 
Iraq, Halliburton, which is a hugely profitable company, is going to 
get $1.5 billion out of this instead of some of these other nascent 
technologies that are screaming for assistance.
  Why is it that children are going to get weaker environmental 
protections, dirtier air and water? Is there any person in the Senate 
who has received mail from their constituents saying: Give me dirtier 
air for my kids. Give us dirtier water to drink. That is what you are 
getting. That is what this bill gives you.
  Americans get no relief at the pump. And we are left more dependent 
on foreign oil than we are today. Imagine that. Here is an energy 
policy that people are going to come and celebrate. I can see the 
President's signing ceremony now. And he will go out and tell America 
how terrific it is going to be.

[[Page 18953]]

But this does nothing to reduce American dependency on oil.
  Let me make it clear. Don't take my word for it. The President's own 
economists say that oil imports will increase 85 percent by 2025 under 
this proposal. The President's own economists found--and I quote them--

       [C]hanges to production, consumption, imports, and prices 
     are negligible [in this bill].

  In other words, the very things we want to affect--prices, 
consumption, imports, production--are going to be negligibly affected 
by this bill.
  You do not have to be an expert, you can be a kid in any classroom in 
America, in middle school or elementary, and know that if the United 
States of America only has 3 percent of the world's oil reserves--that 
is all we have in all of Alaska, underneath all of our national 
monuments, in all of our waters that are accessible to the United 
States. We have 3 percent of the world's oil reserves. Saudi Arabia 
alone has 65 percent of it. As I have said many times, and as this bill 
ignores, there is no possible way for the United States of America to 
build its security in the long term by drilling our way out of this 
crisis. We have to invent our way out of it. This bill barely scratches 
the surface of the kind of invention America is capable of and the 
kinds of opportunities we know of.
  I heard the Senator a moment ago say we do not have the ability now 
to be able to do better in our automobiles. That is just not true. For 
a $200 expenditure, anybody could go out now and get their car 
converted to be able to go use ethanol fuel, biomass fuel. It is just 
that we do not do enough of it. Imagine what we could do for farmers 
across our Nation. Imagine what we could do with respect to the 
possibility of new jobs and new production facilities and delivery 
facilities and infrastructure. None of that is being adequately tapped 
with respect to this legislation.
  All you have to do is look at what this bill does for the 
environment. There is in this bill an amendment to the Safe Drinking 
Water Act. Do you know what it does? It allows unregulated underground 
injection of chemicals during oil and gas development so that we 
threaten clean water. Did anybody in America say, I think it is a good 
idea for us to have chemicals put into the underground water supply in 
order to bring out oil and gas? Why would we exempt it from the 
standards we have applied to our Nation over the course of the last 30 
years? The oil and gas industry is getting an exemption for their 
construction activities from compliance with the Clean Water Act. Why 
would you exempt construction activities from compliance with the Clean 
Water Act?
  The Energy bill also requires an inventory of offshore oil and 
natural gas resources. That is supposed to pave the way for offshore 
drilling along America's coastlines, including areas off Florida's 
coastline, which is banned.
  This Energy bill should have been a net plus for the environment. 
Instead, it goes backward.
  Are there some positive provisions in this bill? Of course there are. 
I could stand up here and talk about the importance of clean coal 
technology. There are other things. I am encouraged by the strong, new 
standards and consumer protections in electricity. I am encouraged we 
finally authorized Energy Star. But the bottom line is, we did better 
in the Senate bill that went to the conference committee. We did 
better. And there is no policy rationale, no common sense in going 
backward from the standards that were set in that Senate bill.
  The fact is, if we end our energy dependence on foreign oil, we 
strengthen our national security. If we lead the world in inventing new 
technologies, we create thousands of high-paying technology jobs. If we 
learn to tap clean energy sources, we preserve a clean environment for 
our families and for future generations. If we remove the burden of 
high gas prices, American consumers can spend elsewhere and give our 
economy the boost it needs.
  This Energy bill does not take anywhere near the advantage that we 
had in the Senate bill or that we could have had even beyond the Senate 
bill.
  I understand it is hard to get an Energy bill passed. We all 
understand the powers and the force of money in American politics and 
the lobbying that takes place. But we have a powerful opportunity to 
make a renewable electricity the standard in the United States. This 
bill ought to be increasing our electricity supply from renewables up 
to 20 percent of electricity from wind and solar and geothermal and 
biomass facilities by 2020. Instead there is nothing.
  The renewable portfolio standard is a simple mechanism to diversify 
energy sources, to stabilize electricity prices, to reduce air 
pollution and other harmful environmental impacts of electricity 
generation. The fact is, this administration has even let the big old 
powerplants off the hook by reneging on the new source performance 
standards so that they don't have to live up to the higher standards as 
they put new technologies in place. The result is, Americans will have 
dirtier air than they would have had otherwise.
  Second, we need to take serious steps to help the domestic auto 
manufacturers build the cars, trucks, and SUVs of the future. The 
market for hybrids is set to take off. Over the next 3 years, the 
number of hybrid models is going to increase to almost 20. By 2012, 
there could be possibly more than 50 models. These are representative 
of real potential volume and unbelievable value. If we don't build 
them, someone else is going to do it. The fact is, others are doing it 
more effectively and rapidly than we have. The global market for 
hybrids, by one estimate, could be as much as 4.5 million units by 
2013, perhaps $65 billion alone in the United States. I believe we 
ought to put American ingenuity back into our vehicles. We ought to be 
encouraging, to a greater degree, the ability to transform that 
marketplace. That is why any Energy bill that we consider ought to have 
both manufacturer and consumer incentives that are adequate to help 
accelerate that transition. This bill doesn't.
  Third, Congress can't responsibly continue to ignore the global 
climate change issue. Higher temperatures threaten serious 
consequences. I met the other day with our top experts from NASA. How 
many Senators realize that it is now not a question of whether; it is a 
certainty. Nothing we do today is going to stop this. To show you how 
far behind the curve we are, it is a certainty that the Arctic ice 
sheet is going to melt. If the Arctic ice sheet melts completely, that 
exposes the Greenland sheet. Nobody can tell you with certainty what is 
going to happen to Greenland. But any policymaker ought to stop and 
shiver at the prospect that it is a certainty the Arctic ice sheet will 
melt. The Greenland ice sheet will be exposed. And if it were to melt, 
with catastrophic consequences, say goodbye to Florida, goodbye to the 
port of Boston, and New York, and a bunch of other places. That would 
be a catastrophic event. There is nothing in this bill that tries 
adequately to deal with that reality.
  What is going to happen with respect to drought, disease, floods, 
lost ecosystems? And from sweltering heat to rising seas, global 
warming effects have already begun. Sit down with the top scientists. 
Sit down with Nobel Prize winners and listen to them tell you about the 
certainty of what is already happening, not a matter of scientific 
speculation. The seas are rising. It is getting warmer. They will tell 
you what is happening. This bill doesn't deal with it.
  We tried, on this bill, to pass an economywide cap-and-trade bill, a 
bill that uses the marketplace to be able to work effectively. Didn't 
get enough votes. The compromise was, they passed the language that 
didn't require anything, and they even took out of this bill the 
language that didn't require anything. This is the most obtuse, head-
in-the-sand ostrich policy I have ever seen in my life. A bunch of 
responsible people in the Senate and House of Representatives, ignoring 
scientists all across the globe, turning their backs on foreign 
ministers, trade ministers, environmental ministers, prime ministers, 
presidents of countries, all of whom have embraced, at

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political risk, the reality of that science, and only the United States 
of America stands apart and alone, ignoring that reality. Where is the 
leadership?
  Fourth, to ensure that technologies capable of providing clean, 
secure, and affordable energy become available in the timeframe and on 
a scale needed, we need to dramatically increase our commitment to 
research and development. I am in favor of advancing the research on 
nuclear waste and on third-generation, fourth-generation nuclear 
capacity. A lot of people in my party are not, a lot of 
environmentalists aren't. I think it is responsible to do that. But it 
is not responsible to go rushing headlong with the greatest proportion 
of technology alternative here, without having dealt with those issues 
and dealt with the American public in a responsible way with respect to 
that.
  I think the bill ought to include provisions to dramatically increase 
Federal Government funding for new energy research and development, 
increased incentives for private sector energy research and 
development, and expanded investment in cooperative international R&D 
initiatives. It does not.
  Maybe most important of all, we need to attack our energy crisis with 
the same intensity that we showed under the leadership of Franklin 
Roosevelt and Harry Truman when we undertook the Manhattan Project or, 
subsequently, when we did the space program and the Apollo program. Our 
competitors are showing that kind of urgency. Prime Minister Blair has 
been fighting hard to get the G8 to come together. He had to back off 
because of American pressure. We pushed backward, not forward. Great 
Britain wants to do almost 100 percent of its electricity from wind 
power over the course of the next years. Other countries are moving to 
80 or 90 percent goals of biomass for fuels. Not the United States of 
America, despite so many farmers who are desperately waiting for that 
marketplace to exist.
  In Germany, where heating is a huge drain on energy, a new law sets 
the standard of a house designed to use just 7 liters of oil to heat 1 
square meter for a year. A new national campaign in Japan urges 
replacement of older appliances with new hybrid products as part of 
their nationwide effort to save energy and fight global warming. In 
Singapore, air-conditioning is a big drain on energy. So new codes 
encourage the use of heated blocking window films and hookups to 
neighborhood cooling systems which chill water overnight. Other 
countries are way ahead of the United States of America in exploring 
these possibilities.
  In Hong Kong, an intelligent elevator system uses computers to 
minimize unnecessary stops and minimize, therefore, unnecessary use of 
energy. If these nations can reduce their dependence on foreign oil and 
invest in advanced energy technology, surely the United States of 
America can do better than this paltry 16 percent renewables and 10 
percent efficiency.
  Their urgency is more than justified because, frankly, this goes way 
beyond our economy. Energy is a legitimate and central global security 
issue. The era when the United States and Japan comprised the bulk of 
the world's demand for oil is over. Oil consumption from developing 
Asian nations will more than double in the next 25 years, from 15 
million to 32 million barrels a day. We only have 3 percent, as I said 
earlier. There is no way the United States is going to be part of that 
bargain. The way the United States can be part of that future is by 
creating those alternative sources and gaining our independence.
  Chinese consumption is going to grow from 5 million to nearly 13 
million barrels a day. India is going from 2 to 5 million barrels per 
day. This global race for oil is potentially a devastating, 
destabilizing force, certainly a challenge to the security of our 
country.
  We are going to be back here on the floor of the Senate in a short 
period of time lamenting that we didn't do more now. Increased American 
energy dependence further entangles also our Nation in these areas of 
the world. You look at our troops now. This is not good for our troops. 
In recent years, U.S. forces had to help protect a pipeline in 
Colombia. Our military had to train indigenous forces to protect a 
pipeline in Georgia. We plan to spend $100 million on a special network 
of police officers and special forces to guard oil facilities around 
the Caspian Sea and continue to search for bases in Africa so we can 
protect oil facilities there. Our Navy patrolled tanker routes in the 
Indian Ocean, South China Sea, and the western Pacific. The reality is 
that we have to protect oil at risk to our troops and at cost to 
Americans to protect our way of life because we are not working the way 
we could to provide an alternative to that.
  This is a serious issue with real consequences. In the spring of 
2004, insurgents attacked an Iraqi oil platform. There was violence 
against oil workers in Nigeria. The result was depressed global oil 
output and record high gasoline prices. The United States is now on a 
course where we are opening a target to terrorists. The more you rely 
on oil, the more disruptive it becomes to your economy, the more it 
becomes a target to terror, rather than growing it here at home.
  If anyone needs an example of how energy dependence can shortchange 
national security, you can look at the war on terror. Let's assume that 
oil were to miraculously drop to $30 a barrel over the next 25 years. 
The United States will send over $3 trillion out of the country, much 
of it to regimes that don't share our values. Today, America spends 
these enormous amounts. About $25 billion a year goes to Persian Gulf 
imports alone. It is bad enough to think that those dollars aren't 
going to stay here and help grow our economy. But it is worse to 
consider that they empower, in many cases, some of the most extreme 
elements in the world to be able to take advantage of that richness. 
The fact is the madrassas in many of these countries and the deals that 
have been cut in regimes like Saudi Arabia between those extremists are 
part of what has provided the recruitment and destabilization with 
respect to the violent extremists of the world today.
  We know that al-Qaida has relied on prominent Saudi Arabians for 
financing. The fact is that the bottom line of this policy is, it works 
for Saudi Arabia. It works for oil and gas companies. But in the long 
run, this is not going to be what the American people need or want.
  Americans deserve better, and they also deserve the truth. We had a 
debate on the floor of the Senate on an Energy bill, during which we 
were debating efficiencies. This administration delayed an EPA report 
that slammed fuel economy. It didn't allow the report to come out until 
after the bill had passed.
  Washington failed the American people with respect to an opportunity 
to provide both the economic, health and security and energy policy 
that this Nation so desperately needs. My hope is that as much as there 
are some good things in this bill, the Senate at some point will come 
back and get the real job done.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, the legislation that the Senator from 
Massachusetts described bears very little resemblance to the 
legislation I have been working on for the last couple of years with 
Senators Domenici and Bingaman and that 13 out of the 14 Senate 
conferees of both parties just approved.
  Let me say what I believe we did and then spend a minute, at the end 
of my 5 minutes, correcting a couple of things the Senator from 
Massachusetts said.
  Energy is not usually what we talk about at the dinner table, but it 
is today. For example, in Tennessee, if you are working at 
International Paper in Memphis or at Eastman Chemical in east 
Tennessee, you know that if the price of natural gas stays as high as 
it is today, the highest in the world, those jobs are going to move 
overseas. And those are thousands of jobs in Tennessee and millions of 
blue-collar jobs in America. If you are a farmer and

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you know that the natural gas price stays as high as it is today, you 
know you are going to have a big pay cut because of the cost of 
fertilizer. And if you are a homeowner, you know the bills are up.
  The first thing this legislation does is to take significant steps to 
stabilize the price of natural gas and hopefully bring it down. That is 
worth talking about at the dinner table.
  The second thing it does is to change the way we produce electricity 
so that it is by low-carbon and no-carbon means. That is worth talking 
about at the dinner table because it helps deal with global warming, 
and it helps deal with clean air. The third thing it does is begin a 
long-term switch from a dependence on oil, especially foreign oil. That 
is worth talking about because of our national security. Does it really 
do that? I would submit that it does. To begin with, the conservation 
and efficiency provisions in this bill will save the building of 50 
major powerplants over the next 20 years. That is the first and most 
important thing we should do.
  The second thing it does is to focus on accelerated investment and 
research for the next generation of nuclear power.
  If you really care about global warming, you want to support nuclear 
power because 70 percent of our carbon-free electricity in America 
today comes from electricity generated by nuclear powerplants.
  The third thing it does is to adopt a strategy that the Natural 
Resources Defense Council and many others have urged on us, which is to 
explore seriously making gas from coal and turning that into 
electricity and taking the carbon out and putting it into the ground.
  The fourth thing it does is to create new supplies of natural gas to 
begin to lower the price of gas and further produce clean air.
  Mr. President, that is really the way to address global warming. That 
is really the way to reduce the price of natural gas. That is a serious 
policy to change the way we produce electricity so it is low carbon/no 
carbon--conservation and efficiency, nuclear power, coal gasification, 
carbon sequestration, and new supplies of natural gas. And then, for 
the long term, a focus on hydrogen fuel cell economy, but that is 
several years away.
  The Senator from Massachusetts talked passionately about renewable 
energy. We all hope we can expand renewable energy. I fought very hard 
and I am glad to see in this legislation, for the first time, a carve-
out for solar power, which was getting nothing from our renewable tax 
credit. But how much are we going to spend on energy that produces 2 
percent of the electricity we use?
  If you look at the figures in terms of the tax incentives in the 
bill, the Senator from Massachusetts didn't multiply very well because 
we spend 20 percent of the money on renewable. That is for 2 percent of 
the electricity. We spend 18.6 percent on energy efficiency and 
conservation. Most of us wish that were more. We spend 18 percent of 
the money on oil and gas production. That is 40 percent of our energy. 
Of the amount we spend on electric reliability, we spend $400 million 
of that for clean energy renewable bonds. That is renewable. We spend 
20 percent on clean coal.
  Mr. President, if anything, I think we are overspending on renewable. 
We have committed of taxpayers' money $3 billion over the next 5 years 
building giant windmills with flashing red lights. The Senator from 
Massachusetts may want a national windmill policy. That is for a desert 
island. For the United States, we need a serious clean energy policy, 
and that is this bill. So I congratulate Senator Domenici and Senator 
Bingaman. I am proud of this bill and I hope we adopt it.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon is recognized.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, sometimes the test of legislation in the 
Senate is did we do less harm than good. Some might say, by that test, 
this Energy bill is worth voting for. I will tell you that test is not 
good enough when America is at war and our dependence upon foreign oil 
is putting our citizens at risk each and every day.
  The test in the Senate that, well, maybe this legislation has some 
good is unacceptable when there is a rare opportunity and a rare 
obligation to avoid the terrifying human costs of future wars. In those 
rare instances, the test in the Senate should be did Congress meet its 
obligations. I have concluded that in this energy bill we have not.
  Our dependence on foreign oil will not be reduced as a result of this 
legislation. As a result, we have not reduced the prospect of going to 
war once again in the Persian Gulf in the next decade. I do not 
understand how we will explain to every man and woman who fights so 
courageously in Iraq and Afghanistan, or how to explain to every 
veteran who fought in the Persian Gulf in the last decade, how we 
failed to meet our obligation to avoid future wars.
  For this reason, I want to express a deep regret to those soldiers 
and veterans because your children are now no less likely to be asked 
to fight a very similar war. I want to express a deep regret to the 
families of those soldiers and veterans because their children may 
someday face the very same burdens. I want to express a deep regret to 
the American public, which is spending hundreds of billions of dollars 
to prosecute the war in Iraq and may someday be asked to spend far more 
on the next war because the Senate is about to pass a pre-9/11 energy 
policy. After 9/11, it became clear that energy policy was a national 
security issue and that reducing our dependence on foreign oil had to 
be a national security priority. That hasn't been done.
  So today Americans continue to pay what I call a terror tax--the 
price we pay in insecurity for our dependence on foreign oil. I call it 
a terror tax because when each of us pulls up to the corner gasoline 
station and pays $2.40 a gallon, or so, for gasoline, a portion of that 
money goes to foreign governments that in turn send it out the back 
door to Islamist extremists who use the money to perpetuate hate and 
terrorist acts. But in this bill Congress has squandered a golden 
opportunity to dam that river of terrorist funding.
  It is not good enough to accept business as usual when our citizens 
pay record prices at the gas pump, only to see foreign governments wink 
and nod while terrorists make off with substantial amounts of the money 
and use the funds to target America. The recent bombings we have seen 
have been a sober reminder of just how vulnerable America, our allies, 
and our strategic partners remain to terrorism. In my view, there is an 
indisputable link, not only between the American dependence on foreign 
oil and the price our citizens pay at the pump but between our oil 
addiction and our vulnerability to attack here at home.
  What I have come to learn as a member of the Energy Committee, and as 
the one member of the conference who was unwilling to sign the report, 
is that any energy policy proposed in the future should have to contain 
a statement of how that bill will reduce the terror attacks. There 
ought to be a statement in the future with respect to energy 
legislation on how that legislation would actually reduce our 
dependence on foreign oil in the short term and in the long term.
  If that had been required for this legislation, there is no way this 
bill would get a passing grade. This legislation does virtually nothing 
to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. You look at what was said in 
2003, not by partisans on one side or the other but by the Bush 
administration's Energy Information Agency. They said that bill would 
have increased our imports of foreign oil by 2025 by about 85 percent. 
This legislation, with respect to oil imports, would produce virtually 
the same result.
  Now, to give the country a sense of just what we were up against--
those of us who wanted to break our dependence on foreign oil--I would 
like to discuss an amendment I tried to offer in the conference. In the 
conference, I proposed that the automobile industry be required to 
increase auto efficiency by 1 mile per gallon for each of the next 5 
years. The reason I did that is a basic fact of energy policy. You 
cannot

[[Page 18956]]

transform this country's energy sector if you give the automobile 
industry a free pass. So when I made that proposal, I said to myself, 
what a modest step, just 1 mile per gallon for just 5 years. Yet it 
would have had a huge impact in terms of reducing our dependence on 
foreign oil. Unlike this legislation, which doesn't reduce our 
dependence on foreign oil, that would have made a difference.
  In the 2001 report, the national academy found that the technology 
exists today to raise the average fuel economy nearly 40 miles per 
gallon by 2012 without sacrificing safety. My proposal was much more 
modest than what the leading scientific experts in this country found 
was both technologically feasible and affordable to consumers. Yet the 
conference rejected even this modest proposal out of hand.
  I particularly thank Senator Bingaman, who supported it and said we 
ought to at least, at the very minimum, not go to the American people 
and say, gosh, 5 miles a gallon over 5 years is too much. But even that 
modest advance could not make it into this legislation. So, as a 
result, Americans will get no relief from this terror tax brought about 
by our addiction to foreign oil. And at the same time, their hard-
earned dollars will flow out the back door straight to the entrenched 
energy interests.
  Now, even the President has said that when oil is trading at upwards 
of $55 a barrel, the oil companies are not in need of any more 
incentives. When the President says the oil companies don't need a deal 
from the Government, that ought to tell you something--you are going 
too far. But even so--even with the remarks of the President, who was 
dead right--this bill is now stuffed with a smorgasbord of subsidies 
for a whole host of energy special interests. The buffet of subsidies 
is so generously larded that, in many cases, it will allow second and 
even third helpings from the energy subsidy buffet table. Loan 
guarantees are letting these special interests double dip and even 
triple dip on some energy projects. Projects that would already be 
subsidized in other provisions of the Energy bill will also receive 
loan guarantees under the incentives title.
  They are also going to get tax credits in the finance title. That is 
dip 1. Then they are going to get loans under the incentives title. 
That is dip 2. Then there will be loan guarantees on top of that. That 
is dip 3. These guarantees are some of the largest subsidies in the 
Senate Energy bill, and they are risky ones.
  Mr. President, the subsidy title of this legislation, in my view, is 
a blank check for boondoggles that simply doesn't decrease our foreign 
oil dependence.
  In closing, the most patriotic thing this Congress could have done in 
the summer of 2005 was to write an energy bill that did three specific 
things: reduce our dependence on foreign oil, lower gasoline prices for 
working families and businesses, and end the energy subsidy smorgasbord 
that has offered these heaping helpings of taxpayer dollars to the 
energy industry for decades.
  I am sad to say, as one who was involved in this from the outset as a 
member of the committee and the conference committee, that the final 
product does not accomplish any of those three things. It doesn't 
reduce our dependence on foreign oil. Nobody has to take my word for 
it. That has been on the front pages of the papers all this week. It 
doesn't lower gasoline prices. And, again, you don't have to take my 
word for it. The President has already stated that. It doesn't end the 
subsidy buffet for the big energy interests, and you won't have to take 
my word for that either. You are going to hear those special interests 
breaking out the champagne bottles all over town in the next few days.
  My constituents have been hit especially hard by high energy costs, 
and they and millions of Americans had hoped that the Congress would 
step up and take bold action, truly bold action, to shake us free of 
our dependence on foreign oil and these other concerns that I have 
addressed tonight.
  What I hope is that, as the country sees how little is actually 
accomplished here, there will be an opportunity--and an opportunity 
soon--to come back and address some of the shortcomings that have been 
discussed on the floor of the Senate tonight.
  I hope there will be a transformational policy put in place with 
respect to the automobile sector. That is the ball game in terms of 
energy conservation and reducing oil consumption. This legislation took 
a pass on it.
  With respect to reducing carbons, again, there was a marketplace 
approach--a bipartisan marketplace approach--that the Congress could 
have moved ahead on.
  The bottom line, the Congress could have done much better. I think 
our colleagues in the Senate know this bill is literally a series of 
missed opportunities. It is right to vote no on this legislation.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Ensign). The Senator from Alaska.
  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I have waited my time in the queue this 
evening because I wanted to take a few minutes to speak not only about 
the importance of this Energy bill we are poised to vote on tomorrow, 
but to acknowledge those who did I think yeoman's work in getting us to 
where we are.
  As my friend from Oregon has pointed out, this is not a perfect piece 
of legislation. He and I would disagree on certain areas of it. But I 
think when we look at the work product of what we do in the Senate, the 
day that we come to complete agreement--complete agreement--on all 
aspects of legislation we move forward, I think we will have all lost 
our collective senses. We will always find room to improve our 
legislation. We will always find room to make something better. We need 
to look at where we are at this point in time with the Energy bill we 
have before us.
  As was pointed out earlier this evening, we have not had an energy 
policy updated or presented or worked through this Congress for 13 
years. Thirteen years is a long time to be floating without a specific 
policy, a specific policy direction, particularly in an area that is as 
important as energy.
  I had the opportunity yesterday to address a group of a couple 
hundred young people in a junior statesman-type forum. It was an 
opportunity for me to speak on the subject of my choosing. Since we 
have been so focused on energy these past couple weeks and we have been 
moving this bill through the conference process, I spent my time to 
talk about what we had been doing and the significance of energy to us 
as a nation, as a people, and particularly to these young people.
  As Senator Alexander, the Senator from Tennessee, mentioned earlier, 
energy is not typically something we talk about at the dinner table. We 
need to understand as a country how important energy is to our daily 
world.
  I have often described the way Americans think about energy--we have 
this kind of immaculate conception notion of energy: It just happens. 
You flip the switch and the lights go on; you adjust the thermostat and 
you are cooler or warmer, and it just happens. There is no connection 
between how we respond to the energy we have, whether it powers us, 
heats us, cools us, it moves us. We do not think about it. We do not 
connect the dots between what we are consuming and where from it comes.
  As I explained to this group of young people, we get most of our 
energy from the ground. It comes from underneath, whether it is oil or 
whether it is natural gas that is extracted off our shores, say, in 
Louisiana, or whether it is from our coal resources that we mine. 
Sometimes that is not a particularly visually appealing thought, to 
think that we have to dig it out, we have to drill it out, we have to 
extract. But the fact of the matter is, we are energy consumers. We are 
a nation that is dependent on our energy for what we do, for who we 
are, for the strength of this Nation. If we couldn't move, if we 
couldn't communicate the way we do, we would not be the Nation we are.
  So it is important for us as Americans to realize, to appreciate, to 
connect those dots and say, this is important to us. It is important to 
us to have

[[Page 18957]]

an energy policy that is comprehensive, that is sound, that is 
balanced, that not only looks to the production from the traditional 
sources, such as oil, gas, and coal, but looks to the production from 
the sources for the future in the renewables, in the alternative 
sources of energy. That also has as a component of our energy policy 
the conservation aspects, the efficiencies. This must be part of the 
plan.
  That is what this Energy bill we have before us is and does. It is 
comprehensive in those ways.
  The point has been made tonight that we have done nothing in this 
Energy bill that is going to bring down the price of gasoline at the 
pump tomorrow. I am not going to stand before you tonight and say that 
if we pass this legislation tomorrow and if the President signs off on 
this in the next couple of weeks the American consumer is all of a 
sudden going to see the price of gasoline drop at the pump. I cannot 
make that promise, and I would be foolish to do so. We know that is not 
going to happen just because we enact this bill.
  Here is the point: If we had done this 8 years, 10 years ago, 5 years 
ago when we had been working on energy policies over this period of 
time, perhaps we would not be at this point where we are paying $2.40 
at the pump, as we are paying in my hometown of Anchorage right now. 
Perhaps we would not be at this point if we had enacted an energy 
policy some years prior to this. But we did not, and we are here now.
  Now we have an opportunity to do something, to move forward with a 
policy that does make some sense. So we have to start somewhere. We 
have to put in place the procedures and the mechanisms that will work. 
We have to understand that we cannot expect an immediate fix. We did 
not get to $2.40 a gallon gasoline overnight. We are not going to 
remedy it overnight. So our expectations need to be realistic.
  As the Senator from Tennessee said when he was talking about natural 
gas, one of the things we will see through what we are putting in place 
with this legislation is a stabilizing effect, hopefully, with our 
natural gas prices as we are able to provide for those incentives and 
encourage more LNG facilities around our coasts so we can get more of 
the natural gas into this country. Those things have to all start 
somewhere, but the recognition is let's be realistic in terms of when 
we are going to see the results.
  People want to know, What does it mean to me today? We need to 
appreciate the fact that we have to look to what it is going to mean to 
us tomorrow. With the provisions we have put in place, hopefully we 
will not see the blackout we had a couple years back. We have enhanced 
the reliability standards of our electricity grids so that we are not 
going to see that.
  Points have been made on the floor tonight that what will come out of 
this Energy bill is not a cleaner America. I challenge that absolutely. 
The provisions that have been put in place, the incentives that have 
been put in place, whether it is the clean coal gasification that will 
work to reduce those emissions, to reduce the carbon, to make our air 
more clean, our waters more clean--these are things we are putting in 
place through the incentives. My colleague called them subsidies. The 
fact is, when you are changing technology, when you are making things 
different to make them better, to make them cleaner, to make them more 
efficient, it is going to cost some money. Should we not help to make 
it cleaner, to make it more efficient? That is what the incentives are 
for. So let's work to make those happen.
  Think about these processes. We have provisions in place for enhanced 
oil recovery, and in my State of Alaska, we have some aging oilfields 
out in the Cook Inlet. They have been producing and doing a darn fine 
job for a couple decades, but these fields are declining. With the 
technology and the processes now available, we can, through enhanced 
oil recovery, through injection of the carbon dioxide, inject into 
these aging wells, enhance the oil so that we get more oil from these 
aging wells while we are sequestering the carbon. We have a win-win 
situation. It is an environmentally more sophisticated and more helpful 
process, and we are getting more of the energy source we are seeking. 
It is through these types of technologies that we benefit, that we 
proceed to win in so many different ways.
  Again, I want to reinforce that what we will have an opportunity to 
accept tomorrow is a comprehensive policy, a policy that has balance to 
it, that is not totally loaded to the production side.
  I come from a State where, quite honestly, we want to see additional 
production coming out of the State of Alaska because we have the 
resource there and we want to be able to help meet the Nation's energy 
needs. But we know--I know--that is not necessarily the energy for the 
long-term future of this country; that the direction we take is in the 
area of renewables and the alternatives. We have to start. We are 
making a start with this legislation.
  It is not just a focus on production, it is the renewables, the 
biomass, the geothermal, the solar, the wind, ocean currents; we have 
ocean energy for the first time. Think about the possibility of 
harnessing the currents in our oceans, the temperature differentials in 
the ocean waters. There is so much potential out there.
  Again, when we are talking about new technology and new processes, it 
takes a little bit of money, it takes a little bit of help, and this is 
where we can step in to provide that.
  Senator Bingaman made a comment at the conclusion of his initial 
remarks that we do not want to wait another 13 years to take up an 
energy policy again. It is probably premature to be talking about the 
next energy policy when we have not even concluded this one, but I 
think we need to recognize that what is happening in this country now 
and as we collaborate with other nations in clean energy research, the 
technology changes so quickly--or we hope we can encourage the 
technology to change so quickly--that we have to keep on top of this. 
We have to have an energy policy that is current, that does look toward 
tomorrow. So we want to make sure this is not the end of the 
conversation, that once we conclude with the Energy bill, we close the 
books and don't start looking at it for another 10 years. I am not 
willing to do that, and I think most of my colleagues would be joining 
me in saying we need to be constantly on top of and involved with this.
  I want to comment before I conclude that there have been several of 
my colleagues on the other side who have mentioned there is absolutely 
nothing in this Energy bill that reduces our reliance on foreign 
sources of oil, that, in fact, we become more dependent on foreign oil. 
I do have to tell my colleagues, as one of the Senators from Alaska who 
has been very focused on ANWR and opening ANWR, I am sitting back in my 
chair here listening to this, scratching my head--scratching my head--
because they are saying to me we are not doing anything to reduce our 
reliance on foreign sources of oil, we must do more domestically.
  We have been saying we have a portion of the answer. Opening ANWR is 
not going to make us not rely on foreign sources of oil. We know that. 
But it can help us. Should we not be doing all that we can domestically 
to help us?
  I know the critics and that we are going to go into this argument in 
September all over again so I do not need to take the body's time 
tonight to dwell on these facts, but for those who say there is not 
enough there to make a difference, the mean estimate coming out of ANWR 
will be what we have been getting from the State of Texas for the past 
75 years. The mean estimate coming out of ANWR is what we have received 
from Saudi Arabia for 25 years. That is not insignificant amounts of 
oil. This can help us.
  ANWR is not contained in this Energy bill, much to my dismay. The 
House included it on their side. We know that in the Senate ANWR, when 
it was tried to be placed in the Energy bill, was subject to a 
filibuster. It was subject to a filibuster by some of the same 
individuals who tonight have stood and said this Energy bill does not

[[Page 18958]]

provide for any lessening of foreign dependence on oil. Well, I would 
like to suggest that this energy policy that we are about to vote on 
tomorrow is one piece of what we need to look to as a Nation. The piece 
tomorrow will be the piece that includes the focus on conservation, the 
focus on renewables, alternatives, the focus on efficiencies.
  Last year we were successful in moving forward the Natural Gas Act 
that provided incentives for construction of the natural gas pipeline 
coming out of Alaska, where we hope we will be able to provide to this 
Nation a good source of domestic natural gas. That is a huge piece for 
us. I would also like to think that before the end of the year we would 
also be able to put into place the rest of the comprehensive energy 
policy that would include oil coming out of a tiny sliver of the 
Coastal Plain of Alaska's North Slope.
  I publicly thank Chairman Domenici and the ranking member, Senator 
Bingaman, of the Energy Committee. Both Senators did an incredible task 
shepherding this legislation through the floor. Their staffs were 
excellent. There was a great deal of hard work. It was a pleasure to 
sit in my first conference and see the manner in which it was 
conducted. It was a very open, very respectful deliberation of some 
very difficult issues conducted by the Members on our side as well as 
Chairman Barton from the House side. It was a pleasure to be a part of 
it. I am proud of the product that has come out of this body, and I 
urge the Members' support.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to this Energy bill. 
Even though I am opposed to the bill, I first want to pay my 
compliments to both Senators from New Mexico, Mr. Dominici and Mr. 
Bingaman, for the work that they have done. While I am opposed to the 
Energy bill for a variety of reasons, which I will elucidate in a 
minute, it was Senator Bingaman and Senator Domenici who worked very 
hard to make the bill better.
  The bill that left the Senate was considerably better. I thought the 
House bill could not have been much worse. The bill that comes back to 
us obviously is somewhere in between. Without the efforts of the two 
Senators from New Mexico, it would have been considerably worse.
  I want to say one other thing. It was of monumental strength that the 
odious MTBE provisions that the House had clung so steadfastly to, that 
brought the bill down last time it came around, are not in the bill. 
That is because the Senate, on the Democratic and Republican sides, 
hung tough. The MTBE provisions were a disaster. To reward polluters 
and stick taxpayers who had lost their supplies of drinking water with 
a bill for what had happened would have been a disgrace. To pay the 
MTBE companies over $2 billion because they could no longer sell as 
much of their product as before was doing what we do for very few 
businesspeople who produce far more worthy products.
  So I want to compliment my two colleagues for knocking out that 
provision. It is the reason we are sitting here with a conference 
report.
  Let me talk about one provision in the bill that bothers me greatly 
but then talk about what bothers me more than that because what bothers 
me most is not what is in the bill but what is not in the bill. What is 
in the bill is an ethanol provision that will force people on the 
coasts, States that do not grow much corn, to buy ethanol whether they 
need it or not. I understand the need to help agriculture. I have voted 
for many of those types of provisions myself. I know the dairy farmers, 
apple growers and cherry growers in New York State, and they do need 
some help. I am not adverse at all to the Government helping. But this 
``Gyro Gearloose'' way of helping the corn growers of the Middle West 
by foisting the costs upon drivers, particularly on the east and west 
coasts, at a time when gasoline is already $2.30, $2.40 or $2.50, makes 
no sense.
  We want to keep the air clean, and we need to make sure that gasoline 
burns, but there are many ways to do it, not only with ethanol or 
MTBEs. To require the refiners throughout the country to use MTBE or at 
least pay for MTBE, even when they are not going to use it, is a 
disgraceful subsidy. We already subsidize ethanol heavily, and it is 
very unfair to do it.
  If one wants to encourage ethanol, I have no problem with encouraging 
the creation of ethanol plants in places such as New York or maybe 
Nevada, where there is not much ethanol now. The real cost of ethanol 
is not in making it but in transporting it. While it is dubious, recent 
studies have shown that the energy cost into making ethanol exceeds the 
energy benefit into using it as a substitute for gasoline. Nonetheless, 
growing it near the source of use would make it far more efficient. I 
am very regretful that it is in here.
  New York drivers will pay 5, 6, 7 cents a gallon more than they have 
to because of this ethanol provision. It is unfair to make the 
salesperson in Rochester who drives 500 or 600 miles a day and has 
enough trouble earning a living pay a direct subsidy to a corn grower 
in Iowa, however much that corn grower needs help. It is not a way to 
do business, and yet that is what we have done here.
  So the ethanol provision is rotten. The ethanol provision is a 
boondoggle. The ethanol provision occurs only because of the political 
power of the ethanol makers and the growers of corn in the Middle West 
and some other parts of the country, not because it is right. It is 
indefensible on the merits. It should not be in the bill.
  Having said that, what bothers me even more is what is not in the 
bill. I love this country, and I try to think what could make this 
country decline, what has made other great powers decline, whether it 
is the Roman Empire or Great Britain in the 19th century. When one 
reads history, it is that they became so preoccupied with enjoying 
things day to day that they were unable to look beyond the horizon a 
little bit and try to solve problems that might be upon them 5 or 10 
years down the road. That is exactly what we are doing with energy.
  Our dependence on foreign oil, our lack of being able to solve our 
growing energy needs is a crisis in the making. It is not a crisis 
today, but it is going to be a crisis 5 and 10 years from now. Even 
now, energy costs are akin to a slit on the wrist. We slowly bleed and 
it weakens our economy.
  Yet, in this bill, we do some things but not close to enough, and 
nothing major and nothing of vision to reduce our dependence on fossil 
fuels in general and imported fossil fuels, in particular. 
Conservation--we know that we should do both things. I do not disagree 
with the far left or the far right. The far left, conserve only, get 
rid of fossil fuels; far right, produce more oil, forget about 
conservation. We should be doing both. I am not adverse to better 
utilizing fossil fuels, to figuring out coal gasification, even to 
looking at oil and gas reserves off our coasts, if it is done in a 
careful and pro-environmental way, as it was done when we sold some 
tract in the east Gulf several years ago.
  Conservation has to be part of any plan to reduce our energy 
dependence. CAFE standards, not in the bill; major incentives for 
conservation, not in the bill, even mild provisions, such as the 
Senator from Oregon offered to raise CAFE standards a mile per gallon a 
year were rejected. That is because of the cloud of the big three auto 
companies in America and, frankly, I regret to say, the unions that 
serve them. They have been arguing for the status quo for years. For 
that reason now, I hate to say it but foreign automakers are again 
overtaking them.
  We have to look to the future. I am happy to help our auto industry 
with new incentives to figure out ways to burn less fossil fuel and 
have alternative sources, but we are not doing it. It is no good for 
the auto companies, it is no good for the autoworkers, and it is no 
good for America.
  So conservation is not in the bill, nor is a dramatic program to 
reduce our energy independence. There are some subsidies here and there 
for wind power, solar power and biomass. There are subsidies for coal, 
gas and oil. But

[[Page 18959]]

the emergency that we face to really engage in crash programs, to use 
hydrogen better, to use fuel cells better, to find other alternatives, 
is virtually a necessity or will be a necessity 5 years or 8 years from 
now, lest our economic vitality continue to be sapped.
  It is amazing to me that China, a country not regarded for its fealty 
to the environment, has stronger CAFE standards, stronger incentives 
for alternatives to gas and oil than we do. That is a sign that this 
great American experiment, this noble experiment, as the Founding 
Fathers called it, may be at least in this area losing its bearings. If 
we are more interested in providing immediate subsidies to the powerful 
few in the energy industry who are around us than figuring out a grand 
plan to reduce our dependence on foreign oil and on fossil fuels in 
general, we are not serving the people of America.
  The amazing thing is I think the people of America are ready for a 
vision, if we look at all the surveys, finding a way to be independent 
of imported oil.
  I ask unanimous consent for an additional 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Dependence on foreign oil gets our foreign policy 
twisted in a knot, which, of course, saps our country of wealth every 
minute, every second, 365 days a year, and the American people want 
some change. They are willing to make some sacrifice and tighten their 
belts. As China is ahead of America in this area, the American people 
are ahead of this Congress. Again, we seem more concerned with feeding 
particular special interests, some good, some bad, than we do with 
coming up with a vision as to how we are going to reduce our energy 
independence.
  So is this bill an evil, horrible bill? No. The ethanol provision is 
odious, but the bill on balance may take a small, few steps forward, 
but not close to what is needed. I cannot think of an area, in a large 
policy way, where the needs and the political possibilities are not far 
ahead of what we have done tonight.
  I regret to say I am going to vote against this bill, not only 
because of the ethanol provisions in it, but because at a time 
demanding vision, at a time demanding foresight, at a time demanding an 
effort to solve problems that are only problems today but could become 
crises 5 years from now, we have done mostly the prosaic, the mundane, 
the expected. That is not what a great power does. That is not what 
true leaders do. That is what this bill does.
  So despite my respect for the leaders of the bill and the wonderful, 
harmonious way in which they worked, I have to say, to me, this bill is 
a serious disappointment and I have no choice but to vote against it 
tomorrow.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. CORZINE. Mr. President, I rise to express my opposition to the 
energy conference report. I thank the managers of the bill, the two 
Senators from New Mexico, for their diligent effort in putting together 
an energy bill. While I cannot support the final product, I respect 
that they have made every effort to make this a bipartisan process and 
I thank them for their leadership.
  I voted against the Senate energy bill last month because it 
inadequately addresses several major priorities that should be included 
in a sound energy policy--reducing U.S. dependence on foreign oil, 
implementing CAFE standards, decreasing greenhouse gas emissions that 
cause global warming, and protecting the coastline from offshore energy 
drilling.
  Unfortunately, the bill has only become worse in conference and 
amounts to a missed opportunity to create an effective comprehensive 
energy policy. This bill does not do enough to lead this Nation toward 
energy independence and energy security.
  The bill also does not address an issue that faces Americans daily--
soaring gas prices. A a time when gas prices are skyrocketing and our 
dependency on oil is steadily increasing, we are voting on a bill that 
the President himself has said will do nothing to address those prices. 
The people of New Jersey, and in fact this Nation, deserve a bill that 
tackles this problem. I'm sure all Americans will be disappointed to 
know that instead of helping them at the gas pump, the bill provides 
giveaways to the Nation's fossil fuel industries.
  To truly make a dent in our energy independence, we need at least a 
savings of three to five million barrels of oil per day, yet this bill 
does not include any oil savings provision. Furthermore, this bill 
misses an opportunity to effectively reduce this Nation's oil use by 
increasing the fuel economy of passenger vehicles. Indeed, improving 
fuel efficiency, or CAFE, standards is not only a cost effective way to 
improve our energy security, but it would be instrumental in reducing 
soaring greenhouse gas emissions. During the debate on the Senate 
energy bill, Senator Durbin proposed an amendment that would have 
raised CAFE standards and closed the SUV loophole, both of which would 
save this country over 101 billion gallons of oil by the year 2016.
  In addition, the bill does not do enough to encourage the use of 
renewable energy sources. One of the few good provisions of the Senate 
energy bill was the ten percent renewable portfolio standard. My home 
State of New Jersey has been a leader in the area of renewable 
portfolio standards as it already has a 20 percent RPS. It is about 
time that the rest of the Nation follow suit. A Federal RPS is a 
crucial step in weaning this country from its dependence on foreign oil 
sources and I am disappointed that this conference report excludes this 
provision.
  The bill also includes a seven and a half billion gallon ethanol 
mandate. Those in favor of an ethanol mandate claim that it will 
enhance U.S. energy security. In fact, increasing the renewable fuel 
standard would not significantly reduce U.S. oil imports because each 
gallon of gasoline blended with ethanol to make gasohol has less energy 
in it than regular gasoline. Therefore, we need increased petroleum 
product imports to make up that energy loss. In addition, producing 
ethanol requires a significant amount of fossil fuel. Worst of all, the 
ethanol mandate amounts to a new gas tax for my constituents. With the 
cost of living in New Jersey being one of the highest in the Nation and 
gas prices at an all-time high, an ethanol mandate is not acceptable 
for New Jerseyans.
  I am also extremely disappointed that energy conferees voted down an 
amendment in conference that would have stricken the seismic inventory 
of the Outer Continental Shelf. This seismic inventory is paramount to 
opening the door to drilling off the coast of New Jersey. This is a 
crucial issue for the state of New Jersey.
  My State is the East Coast hub for oil refining and with three 
nuclear power plants, many traditional power plants, and hopefully an 
LNG terminal in the near future. We have made these contributions to 
energy production and we have made them without offshore drilling.
  A seismic inventory threatens New Jersey's way of life. It is a 
slippery slope toward drilling that threatens not only New Jersey's 
environment, but also its economy. Drilling endangers New Jersey's 
pristine beaches as well as jeopardizes the tourist industry, which 
generates $5.5 billion in revenue for my State and supports 800,000 
jobs. Furthermore, the seismic explosions put our marine life and 
fisheries at risk. I made my opposition to undermining the moratoria on 
drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf when I spent hours on the floor 
during the Senate energy debate to defend against amendments that would 
weaken the moratoria in any way. That effort was successful, but this 
inventory that remains in the bill will weaken the current moratoria on 
drilling, and I am very concerned about the potential consequences.
  Another major issue that the energy conference report fails to 
address is climate change--one of the most pressing issues facing our 
planet today. The science makes it increasingly clear that that 
greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activity are changing the 
earth's climate. The rest of the industrialized world understands the 
danger of this problem and the United States must catch up.

[[Page 18960]]

  I have long been a proponent of legislation that would counter this 
problem and encourage reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. My 
advocacy on behalf of climate change legislation is not limited to the 
current Congress. Senator Brownback and I led the way to passing a 
greenhouse gas registry and reporting amendment to the Energy Bills in 
the 107th and 108th Congresses. The current voluntary programs 
encourage reductions from only a small group of industry leaders, and 
have little to no effect on most of the economy. Despite these well-
intended programs, greenhouse gas emissions have risen on average one 
percent per year for the last several years. Our Nation can do better.
  The potential effects of global warming are dire for my State. If we 
do not control climate change, New Jersey could face a receding 
coastline along the shore, loss of habitat in our beautiful beach towns 
like Cape May, and more extreme weather events such as storms and 
flooding. Similar to the effects of the seismic inventory, this 
devastation would directly affect New Jersey's economy. If our beaches 
are threatened, and our coastline damaged, New Jersey will see an 
economic impact of catastrophic proportions. Our second largest 
industry, tourism, will be devastated.
  This is an issue for New Jersey and the rest of the United States, 
but it is also an issue for the world. Unless Congress acts, the 
effects of global warming may be devastating to the worldwide economy 
and environment.
  Finally, while the bill does not include the MTBE liability provision 
that has stalled past energy bills, it does include a provision that 
moves MTBE claims from State court to Federal court when the claims are 
based on State tort law, nuisance law, or consumer law. This provision 
amounts to backdoor immunity for MTBE producers by unfairly depriving 
injured parties and their representatives of their right to have their 
claims heard in their State forum. This language could even derail many 
legal claims entirely, effectively shielding those companies 
responsible for MTBE contamination from their full financial liability 
for the damages they have caused. This is unacceptable.
  I voted against this bill when it was in the Senate with the hope 
that it would have been improved in conference. Unfortunately, the bill 
has only been made worse. A sound energy bill must move this country 
toward energy security and independence. This bill does not come close. 
I must, therefore, vote against this conference report and urge my 
colleagues to do the same.
  Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I rose earlier to discuss my general 
thoughts regarding the Energy bill conference report. I now want to 
take an additional moment to provide my thoughts regarding a specific 
provision in this conference report.
  I am pleased the conference report includes provisions that will help 
some of our most vulnerable citizens, low-income energy consumers. 
While we need to protect against energy price volatility to protect our 
economy, industries and households, nobody is harder hit by high-energy 
prices than low-income energy consumers.
  The conference report increases the authorization for the Low-Income 
Home Energy Assistance Program, LIHEAP, from $2.0 billion to $5.1 
billion to reflect the increased demand for energy assistance due to 
high energy prices. At current funding levels, LIHEAP serves less than 
15 percent of the eligible population. The increased funding 
authorization is much needed. I hope we can also increase 
appropriations to meet this increased demand for energy assistance.
  The conference report also contains a provision originating in the 
House bill that authorizes the Secretary of Interior to begin a new 
program to assist low-income energy consumers. Section 342 of the 
report authorizes the Secretary to grant a ``preference'' to low-income 
energy consumers when disposing of royalty in kind gas.
  This provision originated from a constituent of mine, John Harpole, 
who is the president of a natural gas production company and also an 
advocate for low-income energy consumers. Pursuant to this 
authorization the Secretary of Interior may begin a demonstration 
program that would provide royalty in kind natural gas to low-income 
energy consumers at below market cost. In order to do so, the Secretary 
could enter into agreements with natural gas distribution companies to 
provide them natural gas at below market value as long as they 
guarantee such gas will be delivered to low-income energy consumers. In 
practice, the transfer would occur through accounting mechanisms, not 
the actual exchange of natural gas molecules.
  The specific details of the demonstration project will be worked out 
through a public and transparent process that will include the public 
and all interested parties. The benefits provided under this section 
are intended to supplement and not supplant funds otherwise provided 
under the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program. Finally, the 
Secretary would be required to issue a report to Congress on the 
effectiveness of the program, with specific recommendations for 
modification. I look forward to working with you and the Department of 
Interior to implement this program.
  Mr. President, America has an energy problem. We waste tremendous 
amounts of energy, and that keeps prices high. We continue to consume 
more energy than we produce, and that means our oil imports keep going 
up. And the more we are held hostage to foreign oil, the more our 
national security is impacted.
  I recognize that the energy conference report represents a compromise 
between competing House and Senate approaches to addressing our 
Nation's energy needs. As with all compromises, the report is not 
perfect. Much remains to be done to promote energy independence and 
increase our national security. But even so, this Energy bill is an 
important first step forward, and I support its final passage.
  I am very pleased with many aspects of the Energy bill. The bill 
retained incentives for new, cleaner coal technologies, and incentives 
for energy efficiency and conservation. It improves electric 
reliability standards and provides much needed regulatory reform. It 
contains incentives for the production of wind and other renewable 
energy, and it contains a strong renewable fuels standard to promote 
the production and use of American-grown renewable energy sources such 
as ethanol and biodiesel.
  By beginning to address our Nation's need to develop additional 
sources of energy and to reduce our consumption of fossil fuels, the 
Senate's bipartisan work on the Energy bill was more comprehensive and 
more forward-thinking than the final version agreed to in conference. I 
am disappointed, for example, that the House and Senate conferees did 
not retain the Senate's national renewable energy standard, and that 
other strategies for reducing our dependence on foreign oil are not 
included in the final bill. Conferees also decided to take a more 
aggressive stance on oil shale development than I and my Senate 
colleagues had advocated, and they rolled back certain environmental 
protections. These changes could significantly impact Colorado's 
Western Slope, and I will monitor the implementation of both provisions 
closely.
  Because there is so much more that we must do in this country to 
ensure greater independence from foreign oil, I am going right back to 
work. I believe strongly that we must reduce America's dependence on 
foreign sources of energy, particularly our dependence on foreign oil, 
and that we must do more to protect the environment. Greater energy 
independence is vital to protect our national security. Energy 
independence is also good for Colorado's economy--we are home to the 
National Renewable Energy Laboratory, NREL, and to countless companies 
and entrepreneurs working on developing alternative fuels, including 
wind, biofuels, solar, and many, many other clean energy technologies. 
In the Senate, I will continue to work hard to establish a viable 
national renewable energy standard, to promote oil savings, to adopt a 
responsible climate

[[Page 18961]]

change policy, and for increased production of renewable fuels. I will 
also continue to work on cost-effective measures that will help us 
achieve greater energy efficiency and conservation. I look forward to 
working with my colleagues in the Senate on these and other priorities 
for Colorado.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I rise to commend the conferees who have 
been meeting over the last few weeks to complete this comprehensive 
energy legislation. In particular, I want to thank the chairmen and 
ranking members of the House and Senate committees for their leadership 
in guiding this highly complex and important legislation through the 
process. Congress has tried several times to approve a comprehensive 
energy bill. Under their wise guidance and counsel, I believe that we 
will be successful this time. It is critical that we provide the 
country with the resources and tools to meet our growing energy needs 
and this bill will go a long way in accomplishing that goal.
  There are many good and worthy provisions in this legislation. In 
broad terms, having a national energy policy will enable the country to 
more effectively utilize our resources to reduce our dependency on 
imported oil. It will enable us to diversify our sources of energy with 
renewable fuels, develop resources like nuclear power in the future and 
conduct research into hydrogen fuel cells. The bill recognizes that we 
need to develop ways to utilize one of our country's largest resources, 
centuries worth of coal deposits, and develop ways through research to 
burn it cleanly so it doesn't contribute to pollution and harm our 
environment.
  However, I must express my disappointment that many of the provisions 
dealing with MTBE were not ultimately included in the final bill. As a 
lawyer and a former judge, the issue of liability is an issue that is 
near and dear to my heart. That we are denying liability protection to 
MTBE producers is disturbing to me. When Congress set out to encourage 
clean air by passing the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments and passed a 
particular fuel standard, Congress knew that MTBE would be widely used 
to satisfy the standard. As a result, manufacturers produced and 
marketed MTBE to satisfy the Congressional standard. Now, manufacturers 
face significant lawsuits solely because they produced a product that 
Congress encouraged them to produce.
  Manufacturers did not make mistakes in production, they did not cut 
comers in an attempt to increase profits, and they did not try to trick 
consumers. All they did was exactly what Congress wanted them to do. It 
is only fair that any fuel producer who responds to a congressional 
mandate should be protected against legal action based upon the use of 
that mandated product. No one should be penalized for obeying the law. 
I am disappointed that there was a failure to address this issue.
  Texas is proud of its heritage as an energy producing State. Texas 
will continue to play a vital role in providing for the Nation's energy 
needs. Even in light of my disappointments with the bill, I believe 
that this legislation provides strong leadership and guidance to 
address the critical energy needs of our country.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, we have before us today an opportunity to 
chart a new course for the Nation's energy future.
  The energy bill includes vitally important measures to boost 
renewable energy and energy efficiency, to improve our electricity 
grid, and to protect consumers from bad corporate actors like Enron.
  I am very pleased that it includes the lion's share of the renewable 
fuels standard bill I introduced earlier this year with Dick Lugar and 
many of my colleagues. This is an accomplishment of historic 
proportions. Oil refiners will be required to blend 7.5 billion gallons 
of ethanol and biodiesel annually by the year 2012--more than twice the 
current rate. This RFS is 2.5 billion gallons higher than what was in 
the House bill. Obviously, this is great news for farmers, biofuels 
producers, and the rural economy in Iowa and throughout the country. It 
is the single most important provision in the bill, certainly in the 
near term, to displace ever increasing amounts of foreign oil that we 
import into this country. The RFS is a big step in the right direction 
and I am very proud to have helped get it done.
  I am also excited that the ``bioeconomy'' amendment I authored with 
Senators Lugar, Obama, Coleman, and Bayh was included in the bill. It 
gives a real boost to biomass R&D to expand the production and use of 
biobased fuels, chemicals and power. It provides grants to small 
biobased businesses to get their products into the marketplace. It will 
increase purchases of biobased products by the Federal Government by 
extending the farm bill's biobased purchasing preference to Federal 
contractors and the Capitol complex. In short, with appropriate 
funding, it will make it possible to convert much more biomass--corn, 
soybeans, wheat, and other crops--into petroleum substitutes for 
everyday use in our homes, businesses and vehicles. And we will do it 
without negatively impacting our abundant food supply.
  The RFS, complemented by these biobased initiatives, will be a heck 
of a one-two punch for our farmers, small businesses and rural 
communities.
  I am also very pleased that the final bill extends the wind 
production tax credit, and that it includes my amendment to allow 
farmer-owned co-ops to pass on this tax credit to individual members of 
the co-op. The biodiesel tax credit extension is also a valuable asset 
in the bill. So is the tax credit for the installation of new E-85 
pumps. I have pushed for all of these provisions for some time. The tax 
incentives for renewable energy and conservation, while less than 
needed, still represent a major boost for clean energy.
  The energy bill we will soon vote on is by no means perfect. It drops 
several of the Senate's best bipartisan provisions to reduce our 
dependence on fossil fuels and foreign oil--the Renewable Portfolio 
Standard, and the oil savings amendment, in particular. These were 
common sense provisions that should have been included. It is a 
terrible mistake not to have done so.
  The bill also does too little to improve fuel economy and address 
climate change. It lavishes tax breaks to oil companies reaping record 
profits from $2+ a gallon gas, and spends more reviving a nuclear 
industry that has never proven cost-effective and has not solved the 
problem of nuclear waste. It also includes some very questionable 
environmental provisions to aid oil and gas companies.
  Like I said, not a perfect bill, but it is a start, and we can thank 
the bipartisan process that was taken in the Senate for that. The 
challenge now will be to take the next steps toward a truly sustainable 
energy future--one that our farmers, who are increasingly at the 
forefront of the country's clean energy strategy, can help lead. I will 
continue to work to make this a reality.
  When we draw our energy from the corn and soybean fields of rural 
America rather than the oil fields of the Persian Gulf, we do four 
things: We increase America's energy security; we boost our rural 
economy; we create a cleaner environment; and we put downward pressure 
on prices at the pump. That's why I intend to vote for this bill, and I 
hope many of my colleagues will follow.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I rise today to congratulate Senators 
Bingaman and Domenici for their hard work to develop a bipartisan 
energy bill over the last several months.
  When the energy bill came to the Senate floor, Democrats had one goal 
in mind: enhance our national security by moving America toward energy 
independence.
  Together, we were able to achieve some our goals: a renewable 
electricity standard, the 3-year tax credit for renewables, oil 
savings, global warming, and a Federal ban on MTBE. That's why I voted 
for the Senate energy bill.
  Unfortunately, despite our best efforts of our Senate negotiators, 
the conference rejected all these provisions. I sincerely hoped to have 
been able to vote for the energy bill conference report. I cannot 
support the bill.

[[Page 18962]]

  I truly believe we have missed an incredible opportunity to establish 
a renewable electricity standard, provide help to consumers facing 
record prices at the gas pump and, most importantly, to reduce our 
dependence on foreign oil.
  For these reasons, I will vote against the energy bill conference 
report.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I would like to comment on two specific 
provisions of the conference report. I am pleased that the provisions 
contained in the conference report on hydroelectric relicensing, 
section 241--Alternative Conditions and Fishways, have been improved 
over the provisions contained in both the House and Senate bills. I 
continue to have concerns that the new process for alternative 
mandatory conditions and fishway prescriptions will add complexity and 
delay to the process. The requirement that the resource agencies afford 
all parties an opportunity for an on the record trial-type hearing on 
material issues of fact could prolong these proceedings. However, I 
understand that the intent behind the provision is that these not be 
lengthy hearings. Rather they are to afford an opportunity for a review 
of narrow issues of fact, and not a review of the application of the 
facts or the decisions based upon them.
  I am pleased that the provisions allow all parties to the 
proceedings, including States, tribes and third parties, to participate 
equally. I understand the conference language ensures that the heads of 
the resource agencies retain discretion to employ scientific data and 
other information submitted by any of the parties to licensing or 
relicensing proceedings in determining what conditions will provide for 
adequate protection and use of tribal lands and what fishways are 
needed for the protection of fishery resources for which the United 
States has a legal or trust responsibility to preserve and protect on 
behalf of Indian tribes. I also am satisfied that the conference 
language preserves the principle that Indian lands and fishery 
resources held in trust by the United States, or for which the United 
States has legal responsibility, will continue to be protected and 
preserved in a manner consistent with the provisions of the Federal 
Power Act of 1920 and subsequent rulings of the Federal courts that 
reaffirm these protections for tribal lands and fishery resources.
  Finally, I understand the motivation behind these provisions to be an 
effort to improve the cost-effectiveness and efficiency of conditions 
and fishways--and not to be an opportunity to undermine the conditions 
and fishways that resource agencies determine are necessary for the 
adequate protection of federal reservations and fish resources. I 
expect that the resource agencies will carry out these provisions with 
this intent in mind.
  Mr. President, section 354, Enhanced Oil and Natural Gas Production 
Through Carbon Dioxide Injection grants the Secretary authority to 
provide royalty relief in order to achieve the dual purposes of the 
section, which are both to promote the capturing, transporting, and 
injection of produced carbon dioxide, natural carbon dioxide and 
``other appropriate gases or other matter'' for sequestration, and to 
promote oil and gas production by providing incentives to undertake 
enhanced recovery techniques using injection of these substances. It is 
my understanding that the provision is intended to encourage the 
sequestration of greenhouse gases, and the ``other gases or matter'' 
referred to are gases and matter that fall within that definition. I 
understand the intent to be that any royalty relief under this section 
be made available only where doing so achieves the dual purposes of 
benefitting the environment through sequestration of greenhouse gases 
while also bringing about enhanced recovery.


                           BLM Cost Recovery

  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I would like to commend Senator Domenici, 
chairman of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, and Senator 
Bingaman, the ranking Democrat, and all the Senate conferees for their 
excellent work on a number of areas in the conference report agreement 
on H.R. 6, especially those relating to processing of energy permits. I 
would like to point out one particular provision that will provide a 
basis for future work to ensure more energy supplies from Federal 
lands.
  Section 365 of the H.R. 6 conference agreement outlines a multistate 
pilot program to improve coordination of energy permit processing in a 
number of Western States. That section includes a provision to allow a 
share of the money from Federal oil and gas lease rentals to be used by 
the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management, BLM, and 
other agencies to ensure adequate resources for processing and 
considering applications for permits necessary for natural gas and oil 
drilling and other operations.
  As the conference on H.R. 6 was getting underway, the BLM released a 
proposal that, if implemented, would begin charging fees for permit 
processing. Called a ``cost sharing'' proposal, it was really a ``cost 
shifting'' one. And it came at a time when Federal revenues from 
leasing and production of Federal oil and gas as a result of such 
permits being issued total approximately $1.8 billion each year.
  In one Wyoming office alone the proposed fee which could be as high 
as $4,000 for a single application would generate $11 million, far in 
excess of the office's total oil and gas program budget. I would prefer 
that producers put this money back into the communities where they are 
doing business and expand their investment to produce more energy.
  In the strong belief that the Federal Government has a responsibility 
to budget and pay for advance environmental work and consideration of 
the permits necessary to explore and produce on its leased acreage, 
Senator Hatch and I filed an amendment to prevent the BLM from 
instituting fees during the period of the permitting pilot program. I 
was pleased that the House conferees joined my Senate colleagues in 
approving that amendment.
  Now that the Energy bill conference agreement is before us, I hope 
that my colleagues will agree that in the future we need to provide 
adequate Federal funding for energy permitting, and that we should 
continue to prohibit attempts to shift Government costs to the private 
sector as was attempted by the BLM.
  Mr. HATCH. If the Senator will yield, I would like to associate 
myself with his remarks and make an additional point. As a sponsor of 
the Energy bill amendment, I want to make clear that even though we 
were able to stop the specific proposal on fees for processing of 
applications for permits to drill during the pilot program relating to 
such permitting, the BLM should understand that our concern is with the 
broader issue of cost shifting. We would be as concerned if BLM 
proposed to shift the permitting burden for any fluid or solid mineral 
leasing or permitting to those who are already required to pay for 
their Federal mineral rights through bonuses, rents and royalties. I do 
not want to see additional attempts to shift costs in this manner.
  Mr. CRAIG. Will the Senator yield? In listening to this discussion 
and the points being made by my colleagues, I agree that we should not 
be shifting costs as BLM apparently proposed. Nor should other charges 
and fees for other energy and mineral permitting be put forward. We 
want our companies to put that money in the ground, not in the Federal 
Treasury with no guarantee that any of it will be spent on better 
energy permitting.
  Surely out of the $1.8 billion already being received from industry's 
exploration and development of Federal oil and gas resources alone we 
can fund the planning, environmental, permit processing and other 
responsibilities of the Federal Government.
  I am pleased that my colleagues were successful in amending the 
energy conference agreement to stop the cost sharing proposal and 
commend them for doing so.
  I would also like to point out that as chairman of the Energy and 
Natural Resources Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests, I plan to 
hold hearings this Congress on Federal lands energy and mineral access. 
As part of that hearing, I intend to find out more about the ability of 
our Federal agencies to process leasing, drilling and

[[Page 18963]]

other applications in a timely manner. Delaying permits is the same as 
delaying energy and mineral supplies to those who need them.
  In addition, shifting costs to those who need the permits for any of 
these activities is also a way of discouraging what needs to be done to 
find and produce the supplies we need. As a result, I will be glad to 
consider including this subject in our hearings.


                        seawater cooling systems

  Mr. AKAKA. Mr. President, I would like to engage my friend from Iowa, 
the chairman of the Finance Committee, as well as my friend, Senator 
Baucus, the ranking member of the committee in a brief colloquy.
  There is an important project under consideration in Hawaii that 
would use deep seawater to cool buildings in downtown Honolulu. This 
project may be funded, in part, by private activity bonds. I would like 
to ask whether piping used to bring cold water from the ocean to the 
distributional facility would be considered part of the local system 
consisting of a pipeline or network, which may be connected to a 
cooling source, providing chilled water to two or more users for 
residential, commercial or industrial cooling as provided in section 
142(g) of the Internal Revenue Code.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. It is my understanding that if a traditional plant were 
constructed several miles from its customers, the network to deliver 
cooling would qualify. It seems to me that piping used to draw cold 
water from the ocean is analogous to piping used with respect to a 
traditional cooling system and also should qualify.
  Mr. BAUCUS. I concur with the chairman. The piping in this case is 
integral to the delivery of cold water from the ocean to be used in the 
chilling of residential, commercial and other buildings and therefore 
should qualify for tax-exempt financing.


                      Energy Efficient Appliances

  Mr. SMITH. Mr. President, with respect to the credit for energy 
efficient appliances, section 1334 of the Energy Policy Act, I 
understand that the dishwasher credit amount is based on a comparison 
of changes to the Department of Energy's Energy Star specification for 
its 2007 qualifying level as compared to the existing Energy Star 
qualifying level for this product. In particular, the amount of the 
credit for these products to be provided is determined, in that 
section, by calculating the percentage increase in efficiency--measured 
as an ``Energy Factor'' or ``EF''--from the 2005 Energy Star level to 
the 2007 Energy Star level. The current Energy Star specification for 
dishwashers is measured by EF. There is the possibility that the Energy 
Star Program might change the metric for measuring efficiencies of 
these products from EF to another measurement and this might create 
confusion in the calculation and implementation of the credit. I would 
like to ask the bill's manager if it is his understanding that the IRS 
has the authority, in consultation with DOE, to establish an equivalent 
level of efficiency for dishwashers in case the Energy Star Program 
establishes an efficiency metric for these products that is different 
than the current EF metric.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. I agree with the Senator's understanding of the IRS's 
authority to consult with DOE in this regard, and to establish an 
equivalent level of efficiency for dishwashers for determining the 
amount of the credit.


                              section 1503

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I rise today to engage my friend, the 
Senator from New Mexico, who serves as the ranking member of the Energy 
and Natural Resources Committee and who acted as the ranking Senate 
conferee, in a colloquy regarding the conference report on the Energy 
Policy Act of 2005. I thank my friend for his service in this body and 
hard work on this bill, and particularly his efforts in resolving the 
contentious issues surrounding MTBE remediation litigation. It is my 
understanding that the language contained in section 1503 of the 
conference report addresses this issue in a matter consistent with 
current law on three vital fronts. First, it would in no way preclude 
or abrogate the right of citizens and local governments to pursue all 
available State and Federal remedies where there is environmental harm 
and other injury that results from contamination of MTBE into 
groundwater and public water supplies. Second, nothing in the language 
will alter the substantive law that courts currently apply in these 
cases and that they will apply to future claims. And finally, it is not 
intended to provide Federal courts with exclusive or subject matter 
jurisdiction or grant Federal courts jurisdiction over nonproduct 
liability cases, such as environmental cleanup and cost recovery cases 
involving general petroleum spills initiated by State governments and 
private citizens. Rather, it is intended that under section 1503, cases 
involving general spills will remain in State court, where many of 
these cases are currently handled. Does the Senator from New Mexico 
share my understanding of this language and its intent?
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I share the understanding of the 
language expressed by my friend from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. I thank the Senator from New Mexico for sharing his 
understanding of section 1503.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, the joint explanatory statement 
accompanying the conference report on the energy bill is noteworthy for 
its brevity, but somewhat short on explanations. The managers simply 
did not have time to say more than we did if we were to file the 
conference report in time for both the House and Senate to act on it 
before the August recess.
  As a result, the statement of managers omits explanations of several 
important provisions that many of us believe are key to understanding 
the agreements we reached on these issues and the meaning of these 
provisions. In some cases, specific text had already been negotiated 
and agreed upon for inclusion in the managers' statement, and the 
assurance that the agreed upon text would be included in the managers' 
statement was a critical component of the compromise reached on the 
legislative text.
  Would the senior Senator from New Mexico, as the chairman of the 
Senate conferees, be willing to put these explanations on the record 
for the information of all Senators?
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I would be happy to. Senator Bingaman is 
correct. We had agreed upon text for insertion into the managers' 
statement on a number of provisions, but it was left out in order to 
file the conference report in time for us to complete our work this 
week. I agree that those explanations should be placed on the record 
for the information of all Senators.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. The first of these explanations relates to section 210, 
which establishes two grant programs to improve the use of forest 
biomass for energy production. Section 210 was included in response to 
Federal land managers and other experts that have recommended removing 
some of the slash, brush, pre-commercial thinnings, and other non-
merchantable wood and plant material from many of our forests to 
improve forest health and reduce the threat of uncharacteristic 
wildfire.
  One hurdle that must be overcome is that in many regions of the 
country there currently are few economically viable enterprises using 
this type of biomass. If a viable market for these materials existed, 
the ultimate cost of forest restoration treatments would decrease as 
landowners who currently pay to have this biomass removed could sell it 
at a profit.
  During the conference, we deliberated about the potential for the 
grants authorized by these programs to adversely affect current and 
future markets for using such material for other value-added products 
that are not provided grants through these programs. Along with biomass 
energy, alternative markets are a critical element of the effort to 
make forest health treatments cost-effective. This was a significant 
concern, was it not?
  Mr. DOMENICI. Senator Bingaman is correct. Section 210 was 
specifically drafted to address the concern he identified by focusing 
on nonmerchantable biomass that would not otherwise be

[[Page 18964]]

used. It was our intent that the Secretaries implement the grant 
programs with sensitivity to alternative uses--both current and 
future--for the byproducts of preventive treatments, to the affects of 
other grants or support for encouraging the use of forest biomass that 
are provided pursuant to any other authority, and to the potential for 
alternative uses to provide a greater return to the taxpayer in the 
long run.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, the second of these issues relates to 
oil and gas leasing in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska. The 
Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act of 1976 established the 
National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska. Four years later, the Department 
of the Interior Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 1981, Public Law 96-
514, directed the Secretary of the Interior to open the Reserve to 
competitive oil and gas leasing, subject to specific terms and 
conditions.
  Both the House bill and the Senate amendment transferred the 
competitive leasing program in the appropriations act into the Naval 
Petroleum Reserves Production Act. The Senate amendment went further, 
however, by requiring the Secretary of the Interior to prevent, to the 
maximum extent practicable, and to mitigate, adverse effects from 
leasing and development activities. The conference report omits this 
additional Senate language.
  It is my understanding, however, that the Senate language was omitted 
because the Department of the Interior is already interpreting the 
standard in existing law in the manner set forth in the Senate 
language. For that reason, the conferees decided that the language was 
unnecessary. Is that the case?
  Mr. DOMENICI. The Senator is correct. It is my understanding that the 
transfer of the matter under section 347(a)(2) does not affect or 
otherwise modify the standard for activities undertaken pursuant to 
Public Law 96-514. The Senate included language in section 107(b) of 
the Senate bill relating to mitigation of adverse effects that the 
managers have not adopted as unnecessary. It is the understanding of 
the managers that the Department of the Interior is interpreting the 
current standard in the manner set forth in the Senate language.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Finally, the conference report contains an entire title 
designed to help Native Americans promote the development of tribal 
energy resources, including an innovative program of tribal energy 
resource agreements. Would the distinguished chairman of the Senate 
conferees comment on this title?
  Mr. DOMENICI. I would be happy to, Mr. President. The managers 
recognized the large supply of energy resources existing on Indian 
lands, as well as the desire of many Tribes to increase access to those 
resources. The Indian Energy title is designed to provide economic 
development opportunities to Indian tribes by assisting and empowering 
them to develop and utilize tribal energy resources in a manner that 
meets the needs of Indian country and the Nation as a whole.
  The title will also continue and strengthen efforts to improve access 
to electricity for native people who are ten times more likely to be 
without such access than their counterparts residing outside of Indian 
reservations. Of particular note, is the creation of a new Office of 
Indian Energy Policy and Programs within the Department of Energy that 
is dedicated to working with Indian tribes on energy development 
matters.
  The Title also creates a new program in section 503 related to energy 
leases, agreements, and rights-of-way on tribal lands that continues a 
policy of promoting tribal self-determination while preserving the 
trust relationship between Tribes and the Federal Government. The 
leases, agreements, and rights-of-way section preserves the full 
application of Federal environmental laws while authorizing eligible 
Tribes to approve individual energy projects without duplicative 
Federal approvals.
  The title contains several other provisions, all of which the 
managers believe will provide significant benefits to Indian country.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. I thank Senator Domenici for placing these explanations 
in the Record.
  Mr. President, before I yield back the remaining time, since I see 
there are no additional Senators waiting to speak, unless there are 
some who appear, I want to take a few minutes to thank committee staff 
for the excellent work that went into the development of this bill. We 
have had superb staff work here in the Senate on the Democratic side 
and the Republican side. I particularly want to single out the staff 
members on the Democratic side who have worked so hard, over many 
weeks, months, and even years in the development of this legislation. 
To the extent this work product is a step forward, it is a result of 
their hard work and their commitment, and clearly this is an 
accomplishment which could not have been achieved without that 
excellent work.
  Bob Simon is the staff director on the Democratic side. He has done a 
superb job. Sam Fowler is the chief counsel and also has done yeoman 
work. Vicky Thorne; Bill Wicker; Patty Beneke; Deborah Estes; Mike 
Connor; Jennifer Michael; Leon Lowery; Jonathan Black; Al Stayman; 
Scott Miller; David Brooks; Michael Carr; Sreela Nandi, who is an AAAS 
fellow sponsored by the American Chemical Society who works with our 
committee staff; Tara Billingsley, who is a Department of Energy 
detailee who worked with the committee in May and June of this year; 
Amanda Goldman; Mark Wilson; Jonathan Epstein, who is a fellow in my 
personal office who also worked hard on various aspects of this 
legislation; and James Dennis in my office, who worked on the tax 
provisions of the bill.
  In addition, I want to acknowledge the extremely capable staff on the 
Republican side, in particular Alex Flint, who was mentioned by Senator 
Domenici earlier, the staff director; Judy Pensabene, who is the chief 
counsel on the Republican side; and the other many staff members who I 
am sure will be recognized by Senator Domenici before action on this 
legislation is complete.
  Let me also acknowledge key House staff who worked so hard during 
this conference committee that we concluded: Mark Menezes, who is 
counsel for Chairman Joe Barton; Sue Sheridan and Bruce Harris, who are 
counsels for the ranking member on the House side, Congressman John 
Dingell. 
  All of these individuals whom I named made a tremendous contribution 
to this legislation and all of them deserve our great thanks. No 
constructive work is done here in the Congress without this kind of 
excellent staff work and we are very fortunate in the case of this 
legislation.
  I am informed there are no other Senators wishing to speak at this 
point. I am also informed we will have additional time tomorrow for 
statements before any actual votes occur on or in relation to the 
conference report.
  I yield the floor at this time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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