Chamber Fights for Energy Policy

 

As Congress takes up comprehensive energy legislation, the U.S. Chamber is advancing policies to increase energy efficiency and conservation, ensure affordable and reliable supplies, and promote economic and national security. Here are the Chamber's positions on the key components of pending energy legislation:

 

Renewable and alternative fuels. The Chamber supports making renewable and alternative fuels a bigger part of the energy mix but not through government-imposed mandates. The Senate-passed energy bill moves in the wrong direction by requiring the use of 36 billion gallons of ethanol by 2022. However, the Chamber was successful in convincing the Senate to remove a mandate requiring utilities to generate 15% of their power from renewable fuels by 2020.

 

Fuel economy. The Chamber supports higher Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards, but the Senate bill's requirement that the combined fuel economy standards for cars and light trucks be raised by 40% to 35 mpg by 2020 is unachievable.

 

Taxes. The Chamber opposes punitive taxes on oil and natural gas companies to pay for unproven and not yet economically viable alternative energy technologies. The Chamber successfully lobbied the Senate to omit a $32.1 billion tax package on oil and gas production.

 

Infrastructure. The Chamber supports incentives for the construction of new refineries, pipelines, and transmission lines, including funding for a "national interest" transmission corridor program to relieve electricity bottlenecks.

 

Production. The Chamber opposes provisions that would roll back the landmark comprehensive energy bill of 2005 by effectively raising barriers to increased energy production.