Jeff Bingaman

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. In the case of New Mexico, the renewable portfolio was included in a much larger deregulation proposal the State adopted before the difficulties in California. Once the difficulties in California became evident with supplies of electricity there, our legislature got concerned and essentially put on hold and suspended any effect of the entire statute until the year 2006, when they said they would look at it again. The renewable portfolio standard, which obviously is not in any way related to the issue of deregulation that they were struggling with in California, was a casualty of the concern. I am not disagreeing with the decision of our legislature to put off the deregulation, but I think they made an error in putting off the effort to move toward a renewable portfolio standard. Clearly, though, they are counted in what the Senator has in mind in his amendment as having a program in New Mexico, even though it is suspended until the year 2006.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am glad to respond.

Mr. BINGAMAN. The Senator is correct in that a renewable portfolio standard that is not as effective as the one we are proposing would not meet the Federal standard and would not be adequate. The Federal standard would still prevail. I point out what the amendment of the Senator says: The provisions of this section-- That would be this renewable portfolio standard we had the vote on earlier with the Kyl amendment---- shall not apply to any retail electric supplier in any State that adopts or has adopted a renewable portfolio energy program. He then cites a variety of States that are on the chart that have adopted these renewable energy portfolio programs. He has included New Mexico on the chart. We have no renewable energy portfolio program in our State. We adopted one and suspended it for 6 years, but it is on the chart as a State qualifying to be exempt from the Federal program. He has included Illinois. I have a description that says on June 22, 2001, Illinois Governor George Ryan signed legislation creating the Illinois Resource Development and Energy Security Act. The legislation states, as an explicit goal, at least 5 percent of the State's energy production and use derive from renewable forms of energy by 2015 and 15 percent from renewable sources of energy by 2020. However, it does not include an implementation schedule. There is nothing in the Illinois-passed law that will actually get them to the stated goal. They have adopted a renewable portfolio program under the definition of his amendment, but it has no teeth. The summary on the Nebraska program he cites says in April of 1998 the Lincoln Electric System created a wind power green pricing program called the Lincoln Electric System Renewable Energy Program. It is a green pricing program and does not require them to make available renewable power in any way. It says they should give an option when people pay their bill for so-called green pricing. The point is, if we want to have a national program to deal with the national electric grid we have talked about for several weeks, and we want to move this country in the direction of using renewable energy to a greater extent than in the past, we have to go ahead and maintain this renewable portfolio standard we proposed in the bill. To say any State that wants to can adopt something, set a goal or put in a program, suspend it for 6 years, as in New Mexico, and thereby satisfy that State from being out from under the requirements of the law, totally guts the effect of the law. This is essentially another vote like the vote we had with the Kyl amendment. The Kyl amendment said renewable power shall be made available to customers to the extent it is available. This amendment says States will comply with the renewable portfolio standard in this bill, except to the extent they determine to do something else. We cannot let them off the hook on that basis. Either we favor a renewable portfolio standard--and I believe a majority of the Senate does; that is what the Kyl vote was an indication of; the majority of the Senate believes we should require this modest commitment to renewable energy--either we do that or we do not. To say any State that adopts anything that they call a renewable portfolio program is out from under any requirement clearly guts the effort we are making. I strongly oppose the amendment and hope we defeat the amendment. I yield the floor.

Mr. BINGAMAN. You are interrupting, but go right ahead.

Mr. BINGAMAN. In response to my colleague, that is exactly right. They can do anything in addition in the way of requiring renewable energy generation and they can specify any technology mix they want. There is nothing in the Federal law restricting a State in this regard. If I may continue.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I yield for a question.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I rise in strong opposition to the amendment the Senator from Alaska has offered. The amendment essentially guts the renewable portfolio standard contained in the amendment I proposed. The amendment I proposed has a provision called State savings clause that reads: This section does not preclude a State from requiring additional renewable energy generation in that State or from specifying technology mix. Any State that wants to step up and do something more, or specify the technology mix appropriate for their State, is encouraged. It is not discouraged. It will control. That is not what the amendment of the Senator is proposing.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I wanted to speak very briefly in agreement with the majority leader about his comments on both trade promotion authority and trade adjustment assistance. I think the two clearly have to go together and quickly. There are a great many workers in this country who are getting inadequate benefits. Many are getting no benefits because we have not modernized our Trade Adjustment Assistance Program. We have a good proposal to modernize that program which we passed out of the Finance Committee, and I think it is very important that we bring that up on the Senate floor after we return and pass that as quickly as possible. I know that is intended to pass in tandem with the trade promotion authority. The administration is anxious to see that pass. I think if there are disagreements about the trade adjustment assistance proposals that we have reported out of the Finance Committee, we need to have early negotiations to resolve this. I know the administration has expressed concerns. To my knowledge, we have not had any real counterproposals that could be seriously considered. So I hope that will get done in the next couple of weeks before we return, and I hope we will be in a position to pass a new, improved set of provisions regarding trade adjustment assistance. I think that is a real priority. I was pleased we were able to move ahead in the Finance Committee. I think it is very important to move ahead on the floor as well. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished majority leader for his comments on the trade legislation package that we will be considering soon. Clearly, this legislation is extremely important to the economic welfare of the country and I look forward to helping him get it passed. In particular, I want to get trade adjustment assistance legislation to the floor so we can begin to help American workers and communities in a more effective way. I have heard a lot of criticism lately about the trade adjustment assistance bill especially concerning its linkage to fast-track legislation but I have to agree with the majority leader that I see fast-track and trade adjustment assistance to be complementary. Fast- track will allow the creation of free-trade agreements that will provide broad collective benefits to Americans, but it will also result in negative impacts on American workers and communities. From where I sit, we should not pass legislation that will negatively impact American workers without expanding and enhancing the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program. We need strong protections in place for American workers and their communities. We need a safety net that keeps these workers competitive and their communities strong. The Bush administration has stated as much many times, most recently in their trade policy agenda that came out this week. My colleagues know that trade adjustment assistance has never been about ideologies or political parties. It has always had bi-partisan support. If my colleagues look at the number of people in their state that have used trade adjustment assistance over the years, or are using it now, they will admit the program is about helping people and communities get back on their feet. I am prepared to negotiate on the outstanding issues, and I am convinced that common ground can be found rather easily on the core components of the bill. I thank the distinguished majority leader for his continued efforts to bring this legislation to the floor in a timely fashion, I want to thank Senator Baucus for his continued efforts to emphasize the importance of trade adjustment assistance, and I look forward to working with both of my colleagues in the future to ensure we pass this important legislation. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, this does clarify the intent on both sides. I think this additional definitional language is useful. We have no objection to the amendment.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. BINGAMAN. That is correct. Pumped hydro is included as an existing renewable. With regard to how renewable power is measured, we intend the Secretary of Energy or the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would set a normalized level for all hydro facilities, taking into consideration capacity and generation at normal or historical average water flows. For other renewable technologies, the volume is calculated based on actual generation. There has been some misunderstanding about the Texas plan, on which my amendment if modeled. The Texas statute set an overall increase in capacity, but in the implementation the requirement was converted to a generation measure. A generation metric is critical to ensure efficient operation of these facilities.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I will go ahead and use the 2 minutes in opposition to the Kyl amendment, and then the sponsor, Senator Kyl, will use the final 2 minutes. The main reason to oppose this amendment is that it totally eliminates, if adopted, any kind of provision in this bill that would move us toward more use of renewable fuels in the future. We need to diversify our supply of energy in this country. We need to be less dependent on some certain specific sources and more dependent on new technology. That is possible. It is happening. It is not happening as quickly as it should. Ninety-five percent of today's new power generation that is under construction is gas fired. That is fine as long as the price of gas stays low. But if the price of gas goes back up to what it was 18 months ago, then we are going to see a serious repercussion in the utility bills of all consumers. This underlying amendment, which the Kyl amendment would eliminate, tries to, in a very modest way, move us toward more use of renewables. It provides that we have 1 percent in the year 2005. Various utilities around this country would be required to produce 1 percent of the electricity they generate from renewable sources. That is not an excessive demand. It goes up in very small amounts each year thereafter. I believe strongly that the renewable portfolio standard we have in the bill is a good provision. The suggestions Senator Kyl and others have made that this is going to drastically increase everyone's electricity bills is not borne out by the analyses that have been made. The Energy Information Administration has analyzed this. At the request of Senator Murkowski, they have concluded that this does not raise energy prices.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time on the Kyl amendment.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, until we can get a better read from the leadership as to whether they have additional business to transact, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I will not use the full 22 minutes, but I would like to summarize some key points in response to some of the debate we have heard today. A major criticism of the Bingaman amendment--which we have been talking about, as well as Senator Kyl's amendment--has been that the proponents of Senator Kyl's amendment--Senator Kyl, and others--believe that to require the generation of some portion of a utility's power from renewable sources is going to dramatically increase utility prices. All I will do is once again refer, as I did yesterday, to the study which Senator Murkowski, my colleague, the ranking member on the Energy Committee, requested of the Energy Information Administration. He asked them to study this exact issue. And he was very specific. He said: Please study this and do not consider any tax benefit we are providing for any of these renewable energy sources. They came back with their conclusion. They concluded--I am now quoting from an article in the Energy Daily dated March 12--``that a 10 percent renewable portfolio standard would have little impact on future electricity prices.'' That was their conclusion. They spent some time on this. They have capable people in the Energy Information Administration, and they were being asked to study this by Senator Murkowski, who was hoping, I am sure, they would conclude something else so he could use their study as part of his argument on the Senate floor. Let me go on with what is said in this article. It says: The study, released Friday, concludes that the retail price impacts of a requirement that electricity generators provide at least 10 percent of their output from renewable resources by 2020 ``are projected to be small because the price impact of [the program] is projected to be relatively small when compared with total electricity costs and to be mostly offset by lower gas prices.'' It is clear to me that we have some scare tactics going on here. We have all these allegations: All these utilities are going to see this cost added, that cost added. The reality is that many of the utilities that were cited here as having to anticipate great cost increases will not see any cost increase because they will be sellers of renewable power, both to their customers and, perhaps, to other utilities because they have been forward thinking and they have been developing renewable power as one of the sources for energy. The simple fact is, every utility in this country--virtually every utility in this country--is going to have to add capacity. They are going to have to add additional generation capacity over the next 18, 20 years, over the period that this amendment covers. Most of them are doing so now. In my home State, very near my hometown--I live in the southwest part of New Mexico; that is where I grew up, Silver City, NM--the three nearest communities to my hometown all have brandnew electricity generating plants going in. They are being constructed as we speak. There is one in Las Cruces, NM. There is one in Deming, NM. There is now going to be one in Lordsburg, NM. In each case, it is very interesting--and two of those are by one company; one is by another company--they are gas-fired generating plants. And that is typical. Ninety-five percent of the new generation which is being constructed in this country for meeting future demand is gas-fired generation. That is great. That is very good for my State because we produce a lot of gas in New Mexico. We can sell that gas, so we are very happy about it. If you look at this chart, you get a little concerned because when you go from 2000 out to 2020, you can see that our dependence upon natural gas as a source for energy electricity generation grows and grows and grows. Whereas today we are 69-percent dependent upon coal and natural gas to generate electricity in this country, and by 2020 we are going to be 80-percent dependent upon those two fuels, unless we adopt the Bingaman amendment to try to add some diversity to the different sources of power upon which we can rely. People might say: Why am I concerned about the fact that we are getting more and more dependent on natural gas? As I say, my State benefits from that. The reason I am concerned is, No. 1, we are not producing as much natural gas as we are consuming, and we are not expected to in coming years. Accordingly, there is going to be a shortfall, and we are going to start either finding more expensive natural gas somewhere or we are going to start importing more and more of our natural gas in the form of LNG from the Middle East and other places. So that as we are now dependent upon foreign sources of oil, then we will be dependent not only on foreign sources of oil but also foreign sources of natural gas in order to generate electricity in this country. So that concerns me. The other reason is the price. The price of natural gas today is low. Everybody is happy because their electric bills are low. But I can remember 18 months ago when the price of natural gas was $8 and $10 rather than the $2.50 or so that it is today. We have provisions in this comprehensive energy bill that encourage more production of nuclear power. We have provisions that encourage the coal industry in this country by funding substantial additional research as to how we can use coal in an environmentally acceptable way. We have natural gas provisions that encourage more natural gas production. All of that I support. All of that is important for our future. But as well as that, we need to also have provisions that encourage more use of renewables. That is what we have. We have this provision in here that tries to say to these utilities: Fine, do all these other things, but, at the same time, start giving some serious attention to the need to develop renewable energy sources. This is not a heavy lift. We are saying, in the year 2005, we think each utility in the country ought to produce 1 percent--1 percent--of the power they generate from renewable sources of one kind or another. And then we say, in the year 2006, it ought to be maybe 1.6 percent. So it goes up in a very modest way. And we have all sorts of flexibility so they can trade with others if they are having difficulty in meeting their requirement. The truth is, a great many utilities will meet the requirements of this bill very soon. They will have no problem at all. The truth is, a lot of States have not gotten their act together to do anything. They should have. This will prompt them to do something. My State is one of those. We are listed as one of the top States in the country for wind energy as a resource because we have a lot of wind in New Mexico, particularly this time of year, in the spring. The reality is, though, we have no wind farms in New Mexico. If this becomes law, we will have wind farms in New Mexico. Frankly, the power produced from those wind farms, in my view, will likely be cheaper than the power produced from some of these gas generating plants if the price of gas goes up where I think it is likely to go over the next 10 to 15 years. All of these estimates about how much this is going to cost, and that it is going to cost these enormous amounts, all assume a very low price for gas. If you think the price of gas is going to stay below $3 per MCF, then you have no problem with using natural gas from now on. I am concerned, though, when the price of natural gas goes to $5, goes to $6, goes to $8, where it was before. In those circumstances, people are going to be very glad they have some alternative sources for energy so they can moderate the increase they will see in their utility bills. That is what we are trying to do. There are great environmental benefits from using renewable energy sources. We all know that. Also, I think it is just smart. We are having a lot of debates about Enron and pensions. We had a hearing this morning in the Health and Education Committee. Everybody said: Everyone knows you ought to diversify your investments, you ought to diversify your portfolio, that you should not put all your eggs in one basket. That is common sense when you are making investments. It is also common sense when you are looking for a portfolio of energy sources. It is common sense to say: Let us diversify so we are not too dependent upon any one source of power. That is exactly what we are trying to do with this amendment. I think my underlying amendment is a good one. The Kyl amendment just takes the guts out of it. The Kyl amendment is very simple. I cited this earlier in my comments. This is classic. It says: Each electric utility shall offer to retail consumers electricity produced from renewable sources, to the extent it is available. I favor that. That is what they are doing today. They are offering it to the extent it is available. The Kyl amendment is just a prescription for the status quo. What we are saying is, let's make it available, and let's make it available in large quantities. There are a lot of Americans who would like to buy more power from renewable sources. Let's make it available. That is what our renewable portfolio standard tries to do. The Kyl amendment would undo that. For that reason, I oppose it strongly and urge my colleagues to oppose it.

Mr. BINGAMAN. How much for the proponents?

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, how much time remains in opposition to the Kyl amendment?

Mr. BINGAMAN. I ask, why does my colleague, who sponsored this amendment, mention how much it will cost Entergy to comply with the underlying Bingaman amendment; why are they supportive of the Bingaman amendment and strongly opposing the Kyl amendment if this is going to be expensive for them?

Mr. BINGAMAN. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. BINGAMAN. They have a provision that requires 4.3 percent of all sales be from renewables in the year 2009, which is where their bill stops going forward. Our provision calls for 3.4 percent by the year 2009 and has the same exclusions they have in Texas. If the Senator has any contrary information, I want to----

Mr. BINGAMAN. That is exactly right.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I yield to my friend from Oklahoma.