Congressional Energy Bill — HR6

After nearly a year of debating, conferencing, voting, wheeling and dealing, Congress passed an energy bill designed not to upset the status quo established by the powerful (read: wealthy and generous in political donations) oil & gas industry lobby.

The bill that finally made its way down from Capitol Hill to Pennsylvania Avenue contained stricter CAFE standards for automobiles, giving Detroit all of twelve years to ease the fleet mean standard up to 35 mpg; it also contained a renewable fuels mandate and some R&D bones thrown to the solar industry. But in order to collect enough Republican votes for passage of the bill, Democrats had to drop provisions for a national renewable electricity standard (RES) and tax credits for solar installations.

In the end, it was a lesson in how not to run a democracy, by bowing to entrenched and influential corporate interests against the better interests of the American people and the world.

We understand that Senate Majority Leader Reid has vowed to force legislation for solar tax credits and an RES through Congress in 2008. Whether this is feasible is unknown at this point; the sticking point in 2007 was the proposal to raise revenue for these measures by rescinding a small percentage of the tax breaks and subsidies enjoyed by Oil & Gas, and Reid has not yet indicated where else this revenue might be raised.

As far as 2009 is concerned, we can only hope for a continuation of the shift to the left demonstrated in the last Congressional cycle; Democratic presidential candidates are currently vying with each other to be the greenest candidate in the field, while their Republican counterparts mostly have “no articulated position” on vital environmental and energy issues.

Solar Nation will continue to monitor developments in Washington and around the country as the year progresses, and will keep solar citizens up-to-date on upcoming votes. Don’t go away!