FTC Investigation

FTC INVESTIGATION

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I would very much like to work on an energy policy in a bipartisan way. I think we all understand that the only way to get anything important done in Washington, DC, is to work in a bipartisan way. Unfortunately, the same Bush administration that so tragically bungled the response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita has now bungled its way to $3-a-
gallon gasoline. And in particular, I am concerned that all of the evidence showed that this spring we would have these problems.

The administration, for example, has given Congress a variety of reports about how post-Katrina we would have evidence of a supply problem. With respect to the changeover from MTBE to ethanol, all the evidence was available many months ago. The Wall Street Journal was warning about it--that there would be huge logistical problems for service stations and others to make that changeover.

We know that ethanol--and the Senator from Illinois has been one of the leaders in this effort--is going to play an important role in America's gasoline future. Given that, this should have been an all-hands-on-deck approach at the administration trying to watchdog the transition from MTBE to ethanol. This is an administration with enormous expertise in the oil area. For all practical purposes, this is an administration that is almost marinated in oil. One official after another has a history and a background in this sector. Yet where was the Department of Energy? Where was the Environmental Protection Agency? Where was the Commodity Futures Trading Commission at a key time in our country's energy future?

With all the problems overseas--Nigeria, Venezuela, and Iraq producing a tiny fraction of what they were able to produce before the war--we knew that this was going to be a difficult time this spring.

I talked to a gasoline station owner last night. I pulled up and was faced with the prospect of $3.25 a gallon. That station owner said: Nobody gave us any information at all about how to proceed in this significant switchover from MTBE to ethanol.

They have to clean their tanks. There are tremendous logistical problems and a different role for transportation with respect to trucks and rails versus pipelines. Normally, you would have taken a much longer period of time to make this changeover. That wasn't done.

So the administration should have been there working with the service station owners and the oil companies and a variety of parties to try to minimize the problems when you are having this massive transition in the energy area. So we are going to see instances where people try to exploit the situation.

I hope we can get the Federal Trade Commission off the dime and finally go out and take the steps to protect the public from this exploitation.

It was known a year ago that this was a time when we would have a perfect energy storm. We knew we were going to have the equivalent of what amounts to a level 5 hurricane in the gasoline market. Yet the folks in the administration sat on their hands. It did not have to be that way.

I want to work in a bipartisan way to turn this around. Unfortunately, the same kind of bumbling and bungling approach that was taken in responding to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita has driven our gasoline prices over $3 a gallon. We ought to come together. I recommended yesterday in a lengthy speech a variety of steps we could take in the short term--for example, helping the States to make this transition to ethanol easier. We can do it in a bipartisan way. If it were not for the bungling of this administration over the last year and its failure to take the steps that could have prevented much of what we have seen, we would not have to come to this point. That is unfortunate. The American people have been gratuitously hammered again. It didn't have to be.

I yield the floor.

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