Senate Filibuster Dooms Energy Bill

by Edith T. Carper

There will be no comprehensive energy package this year. On the morning of 21 November, the door was closed on The Energy Policy Act of 2003 (H.R. 6) by a Senate filibuster, organized by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), most of his Democratic colleagues and a handful of defiant Republicans. Supporters of the bill fell just two votes short of the 60 needed for cloture — the process to terminate debate on the bill's conference report — but in the end, they couldn't force a vote. Lawmakers will now have to start again from scratch next session, which will convene shortly after the new year.

Why Did H.R. 6 Fail?

H.R. 6 was based on a two-year plan drafted by the administration, with the aim of reducing U.S. dependence on imported oil. Some observers expressed doubt that real changes in the law that might increase energy supplies or decrease consumption couldn't get through Congress. Observers predicted — and got — a “titanic debate” in Congress over whether the bill was too friendly to the energy industry and/or whether it actually would accomplish anything to bring about wiser use of electric power.

Ultimately, it was a provision that would exempt firms that produce gas additive MTBE from lawsuits that catalyzed opposition and brought negotiations to a standstill. Despite the best efforts of the bill's supporters — including the White House, who urged House leaders to drop the MTBE provision in order to save the bill — they could not cobble together the votes needed to bring the vote to the floor.

The Energy Policy Act was the work of the House Energy Committee's Republican members, and involved compromises among industries, various U.S. regions and many interest groups. According to some observers, the bill didn't contain language that would either increase energy supply or decrease consumption. Such examples as drilling for oil in the Alaska National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR) or requiring auto manufacturers to build thrifty SUVs are too controversial to get through Congress, they said.

Alaska's voice was heard early. Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) pointed out that his state has “half the coal in the United States; half the oil in the United States; half the natural gas in the United States; and there’s nothing in...[the legislation] to help Alaska develop its resources.”

House members had what appeared to be an enjoyable time in considering a motion to set the rules for debate on H.R. 6. The chief players were Reps. Bob Filner (D-Calif.), Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) and Joe Barton (R-Texas). Filner took the stage first with a comment that the Republican Party (GOP) “actually stands for Gas, Oil, and Petroleum.” Filner continued: “And any suggestions that we invest more in renewable energies or in cleaner energies all were thrown out, and the handouts to the oil companies just keep getting bigger.”

Filner had an ally in Rep. Woolsey, who said the Republican Party decided that instead of “working on an energy bill…to solve our nation’s energy crisis, it appears that the Republicans are using this bill to wage a tax on our national resources, on our air, on our water.” She added that Congress is moving forward “without a single hearing in the committee of jurisdiction and without the benefit of the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) years of work. It is time for the GOP gas/oil/petroleum group and their leadership to stop putting the interests of big oil and gas companies ahead of what is best for the American people.”

Rep. John Sullivan (R-Okla.) told his colleagues “we depend far too much on foreign oil. We import more than half of our oil from foreign sources, a number that is expected to grow to 66 percent by the year 2010, if we do not act now.”

Continuing his arguments, Filner said the Republican Party was rationalizing “the destruction of our environment.” The reason these industries are exempted is “because every election cycle, they spend millions of dollars on campaign contributions.”

He went on to say that “this exemption allows one business, one sector of our economy, to buy its way out of the Clean Water Act. I think that is a terrible thing to say to our nation that if one gives campaign contributions, they get exempted from the environmental protection that is required of everyone else.” Barton’s version of the motives and interests of the Filner group goes like this: “…heaven help the poor guy or girl who wants to go out and try to find some more oil and gas and they actually put up their own money — go to the bank, borrow it, whatever. Let us not require them to get a wastewater runoff permit from the EPA that explicitly says in the current law that one does not have to have, once the site is active.”

IEEE-USA supported language in H.R. 6 that would empower the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to create a self-regulating reliability organization — the Electric Reliability Organization (ERO) — that would have the legislative authority enforce stronger reliability standards throughout the electric power industry. IEEE-USA and others believe that such reliability provisions are absolutely essential to ensuring continuous delivery of reliable and economical electric power to the nation's grid — and to avoid more massive outages like the one that blacked out the Northeast and parts of Canada this past August.

On 25 November, after supporters of H.R. 6 had thrown in the towel, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham issued a statement calling on the Senate to complete action on a comprehensive energy bill: "We recently experienced our nation’s largest blackout. Our citizens continue to suffer from period price spikes for necessary commodities like gasoline, home heating oil, and natural gas. And all of us should be asking why? The answer is fairly straightforward: because we have yet to get our energy house in order. And, that will not happen until the Senate passes the comprehensive energy bill."

Abraham expressed optimism that such an energy package would be realized, saying, "I am confident that we will pass a comprehensive energy bill in January that benefits the American people."

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Edith T. Carper is a special correspondent to IEEE-USA Today’s Engineer.