Energy Bill Checklist

The Cunctator — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 09:23:00 -0500

Crossposted at Daily Kos.

Last week I diaried on the key battles in the Senate energy bill, the Renewable Fuels, Consumer Protection, and Energy Efficiency Act of 2007 (SA 1502):

No on Coal-to-Liquid
No on restricting EPA or state regulation of motor vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases
No on diluting definition of biofuels
No on changing “renewable” to “alternative” in legislation
No on offshore drilling
Yes on strong CAFE standards (no on weakening further)
Yes on price-gouging regulation (the right-wingers are fighting this hard)
Yes on national Renewable Portfolio Standard of 15% by 2015, 20% by 2020 (if we’re lucky, we’ll get legislation for 15% by 2020)
Yes on incentives for distributed generation (aka cogeneration, net metering, electranet) at the commercial and residential level
Yes on support for energy efficiency, especially
Yes on funding of The Weatherization Assistance Program
Yes on funding renewable energy by removing some oil subsidies

So what were the results?

Here are the issues:

ISSUE	RESULT
No on Coal-to-Liquid	(Tester amdt. S.AMDT.1614 rejected 33-61, Bunning amdt. S.AMDT 1628 rejected 39-55)
No on restricting EPA or state regulation of motor vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases
No on diluting definition of biofuels	(Kyl amdt. S.AMDT.1800 rejected 45-49)
No on changing “renewable” to “alternative” in legislation
No on offshore drilling
Yes on strong CAFE standards (no on weakening further)	(Pryor-Bond-Levin-Stabenow amdt. S.AMDT. 1711 not considered)
Yes on price-gouging regulation (the right-wingers are fighting this hard)	(Title VI of S.AMDT.1502)
Yes on national Renewable Portfolio Standard of 15% by 2015, 20% by 2020	(Bingaman amdt. S.AMDT.1537 withdrawn under filibuster threat)
Yes on incentives for distributed generation (aka cogeneration, net metering, electranet) at the commercial and residential level	(issue held for next round of energy legislation)
Yes on major increase in funding of The Weatherization Assistance Program (which Bush is trying to slash)	(Title II, Subtitle F of S.AMDT.1502)
Yes on funding renewable energy by removing some subsidies to oil industry	(Baucus amdt. S.AMDT.1704 filibustered 57-36)

The caveats to the table above include:

while the CAFE standards are being increased, they are certainly not aggressive increases. Still, a lot better than the zero action the Bush administration and auto industry wanted.
the increase to the Weatherization Assistance program is about 7%, instead of the 25% increase which would have had optimal results. Still, a lot better than the zeroing out that Bush wanted.

Hill Heat: Tag SA 1537

Energy Bill Checklist