The Comprehensive American Energy Security and Consumer Protection Act uses incentives and initiatives to encourage energy efficiency and the development and use of renewable energy, while ending the 27-year moratorium on offshore oil drilling. The Act mandates that 15% of electricity be generated from renewable sources by 2020 and requires the establishment of a market for buying, selling, and trading renewable energy credits that would reward providers that meet the standard and punish those who do not. The legislation extends tax credits for renewable energy from sources like wind, solar, and geothermal heat and extends and expands incentives for residential energy efficiency. The bill includes tax incentives for investment in plug-in electric vehicles, alternative fuel vehicles, energy-efficient buildings and appliances, and projects designed to reduce emissions from burning coal. The Act supports national building codes that achieve energy savings and employs a series of standards and incentives to encourage energy efficiency in a variety of housing-related federal programs, including low-income and multifamily housing initiatives.
Several new bonds are authorized to encourage natural gas refueling, energy conservation, and renewable energy, while major oil companies that own retail gas stations are required to have at least one pump that dispenses alternative fuel. A Strategic Energy Efficiency and Renewables Reserve would use revenue from oil and gas royalties to offset the cost of legislation to encourage use of domestic renewable energy and alternative fuels and to provide increased assistance for low-income home energy and weatherization programs. The Act mandates that 15% of electricity be generated from renewable sources by 2020. The bill also includes the Saving Energy Through Transportation Act.
The Comprehensive American Energy Security and Consumer Protection Act permits drilling between 50 and 100 miles offshore if a state opts in through state legislation and beyond 100 miles without the state opt-in. The legislation excludes sensitive environmental areas, such as marine sanctuaries and the Georges Bank in New England. Other provisions designed to increase the supply of oil and gas include a temporary release of 70 million barrels of petroleum from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, measures to ensure that oil companies diligently extract all oil possible from federal lands leased for drilling, and inducements to accelerate leasing in the National Petroleum Reserve and construction of a pipeline servicing the Reserve. The bill bans the export of Alaskan oil and encourages ethics reform in the Mineral Management Service, the federal agency that collects royalties from oil and gas companies.
Finally, the Comprehensive American Energy Security and Consumer Protection Act raises revenue by revising royalty agreements, repealing a tax deduction for the major oil companies, and closing a tax loophole for foreign oil-related income.
The Middle-Class Position:
Middle Class Supports. Though the extremely high gas prices experienced this summer have eased, middle-class Americans remain strapped by a combination of difficult economic conditions that include elevated fuel costs, a tanking housing market, an endangered financial system, and widespread unemployment. The renewable energy and energy efficiency provisions adopted by the legislation – from credits for energy-efficient home appliances to green building standards and energy-conscious low-income housing – demonstrate a commitment to transforming the environment and the economy that can reduce energy costs and provide jobs for middle-class Americans struggling to make ends meet. Such measures are impotant steps in making the country more energy efficient and ensuring that the nation retains and produces more jobs in renewable energy and technology. Finally, the renewable electricity standard establishes an important incentive for electricity providers to switch to renewable energy sources, a commitment these providers have not made on their own.
The revenue-raising measures appropriately target the oil companies who have benefited grandly from high oil prices. Additionally, ethics reform is desperately needed in the Mineral Management Service after disturbing reports of oil industry influence buying in the agency.
From the Experts:
“While far from ideal, the energy package offered by Democratic leadership in the House at least included significant investment in clean energy through a Renewable Energy Standard, improved public transit and green building measures, and an extension of clean energy tax credits…Of course the House package also included compromise provisions for expanded offshore drilling but a package of clean energy measures would help solve our energy crisis and protect consumers--a stark contrast to a drill-only policy, which will do nothing but endanger our coasts and add to Big Oil's profits.” – Carl Pope, Executive Director, The Sierra Club (9/16/2008)
“The House-passed tax breaks would not only help consumers and businesses lower their energy bills, they also would provide longer-term benefits for our economy by encouraging investment in new technologies that will, in turn, create new jobs, improve our environment, and protect our national energy security.” – Kateri Callahan, President, Alliance to Save Energy (9/18/2008)
Beyond this Bill:
Despite the panoply of positive environmental measures included in the Comprehensive American Energy Security and Consumer Protection Act, the bill incorporates provisions that will continue the nation’s reliance on fossil fuels while doing little to relieve high oil prices. [I think the changes to the “Middle-Class Position” section make this appropriate criticism now.] Not only will releasing petroleum from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, permitting offshore drilling after a 27-year moratorium, and requiring “diligent” exploitation of oil and gas fields have a limited effect on gas prices, but this effect will not be experienced for many years when other global factors will make incremental production increases irrelevant. The inclusion of these provisions is evidence of the oil industry’s continued influence on Congress.
Percentage increase in annual crude oil production in 2030 if restrictions on access to drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf are lifted, according to the Energy Information Administration: 7
Projected impact of this increased production on the price of oil: “insignificant”
Percent of world’s known reserves in the United States: 1.58%
Percentage of carbon emissions in the United States from residential and commercial buildings: 39
Number of new jobs that the American Solar Energy Society found were generated by U.S. renewable energy and energy efficiency industries in 2006: 8.5 million
Estimated number of jobs created in 2030 in U.S. renewable energy and energy efficiency industries, assuming no policy changes before 2030: 16 million
Estimated number of jobs created in 2030 in U.S. renewable energy and energy efficiency industries, assuming moderate, incremental federal and state renewable and energy efficiency initiatives and favorable market conditions: 21 million
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