SENATE PASSES OLD ENERGY BILL

To paraphrase Casey Stengel, some of them you win, some of them you lose and some of them get watered down.

The so-called energy bill was finally passed by the Senate. It came through without significant provisions for New Energy. It is an Old Energy bill.

The matter of extending Production Tax Credit (PTCs) and Investment Tax Credits (ITCs) for New Energies still hangs in the balance. If Congressional leaders can find some way to fund them, they can be attached to another bill. Otherwise, they will expire next year.

Critics contend Congressional leaders handled the bill badly by being too ambitious about New Energy incentives and by excluding minority leaders from the process and alienating key Republicans. It is easy to criticize the manager after the game.

Opponents of New Energy would have hung the leaders up in the conference process if they had not pushed it out where the public could see who stands where. Note what Senator Boxer said: "We want the American people to look at what happened here and see who voted which way…"

In politics, the race often goes not to the swift but to the steady. Lyndon Johnson fought for civil rights and voting rights for a decade before he got those bills through in the mid-60s.

Note what Speaker Pelosi said: "One vote short…I think it is important to note with all legislation, you put out your high-water mark. You accomplish what you can do, and you signal where you are going next with it. And that issue will be revisited."


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Senate Passes Watered-Down Energy Bill
Brian Wingfield, December 13, 2007 (Forbes)
and
Senate Passes Energy Bill; Bush to Sign Into Law
Siobhan Hughes, December 13, 2007 (Dow Jones via CNNMoney)

WHO
The Senate of the United States of Fossil Fuels. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-La).

WHAT
Having rejected mandates and incentives for New Energy, the Senate sent President Bush the energy bill he wanted. Earlier in the day, the version of the bill with significant funding and incentives for New Energy fell 1 vote short when Democratic Senator Landrieu, fighting hard for re-election in the strongly oil and gas-oriented state of Louisiana, voted against the bill.

WHEN
- Speaker Pelosi’s Churchillian leadership in the House of Representatives (it would have made Sam Rayburn proud) came undone in the Senate as Majority Leader Reid failed to find the needed 60th vote to put over an energy bill with incentives for New Energy.
- Finally, at the end of the day, the Senate approved a neutralized bill 86 to 8.

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WHERE
The bill will now go to the White House where President Bush is expected to approve. It will probably please his closest allies in the oil and gas industry.

WHY
- The bill as passed will raise fleetwide fuel-economy standards by 40% to an average of 35 miles per gallon by 2020.
- It will also increase biofuel production to 36 billion gallons per year by 2022, 21 billion gallons of which must be biofuels other than corn-based ethanol.
- There are also energy efficiency requirements for appliances and buildings.

QUOTES
Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM): “We do intend to try to come back to both of those in the next session of Congress…"