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A Daily Chronicle of Bush Administration Distortion November 18, 2003

     

Bush Drops Push for Energy Bill Provision That Would Help Solve Long-Term Reliability Issues



President Bush praised Congress for passing his long-sought energy legislation, saying, "America will be safer and stronger with a national energy policy that will help keep the lights on, the furnaces lit, and the factories running."1 But the energy legislation now moving toward final passage is viewed by many experts as "minuscule compared to what needs to be done to have any impact."2

When the legislation was revived in August after the blackouts across the Northeast and Midwest, Bush dropped his insistence on a provision to grant the Federal Electricity Reliability Council (FERC) authority to "improve the reliability of the interstate transmission system and to develop legislation providing for enforcement by a self-regulatory organization subject to FERC oversight,"3 after "broad recognition that voluntary adherence with reliability standards is no longer a viable approach in an increasingly competitive electricity market."4

The provision was one of the seven recommendations related to the power grids offered by Vice President Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force. Bush unveiled his Energy Task Force Report in May 2001 with great enthusiasm, saying, "I've told the people of America...we would address this problem, and we would address it in a comprehensive way."5

Bush now praises the current bill6, which includes a different provision that essentially blocks FERC from implementing a strategy to bring together utilities in independent regional power grids until 2007.7

Just a few years ago, President Bush campaigned for president arguing that, "federal legislation is needed to assure the reliability of the nation's electrical grid."8

Critics of the bill insist that the federal reliability standards with the bill insufficiently address the whole of the problem, "because control and authority is fractured."9

Sources:
  1. Presidential Statement, 11/14/03.
  2. "No Home Runs in Energy Bill," Washington Post, 11/15/03.
  3. "Reliable, Affordable, and Environmentally Sound Energy for America's Future," Report of the National Energy Policy Development Group.
  4. Ibid.
  5. Presidential Remarks at Cabinet Meeting, 5/16/01.
  6. "Legislation Would Set Rules for Grid," Washington Post, 11/15/03.
  7. Ibid.
  8. "George W. Bush Criticizes Clinton-Gore's Energy Policy In Announcing His Own," Foster Electric Report, 10/4/00.
  9. "Legislation Would Set Rules for Grid," Washington Post, 11/15/03.



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