Stand-Alone Reliability

STAND-ALONE RELIABILITY

Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I rise today to begin the process of placing directly on the Senate calendar stand-alone electric reliability legislation.

As all my colleagues in this body are well aware, devising a comprehensive policy that will help this nation achieve its energy independence is a task that has divided the Energy and Natural Resources Committee on which I serve, the United States Senate and the Congress as a whole for three years now. Regardless, I believe that there is at least one thing on which every Senator can agree-and that is the need to pass legislation giving the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, working closely with regional entities, the statutory authority to put in place mandatory and enforceable reliability standards.

The call for legislation of the kind we are introducing today dates back to at least 1997, when both a Task Force established by the Clinton Administration's Department of Energy and a North American Electric Reliability Council, or NERC, blue ribbon panel independently determined that reliability rules for our nation's electric system needed to be mandatory and enforceable.

In response, the Senate passed stand-alone legislation on this matter, authored by my predecessor Senator Gorton, in June 2000. Since then, under the leadership of both parties, the Senate has twice passed consensus-based electric reliability provisions-most recently, last July.

There is no doubt that this nation's consumers and businesses cannot afford further delay in improving the reliability of the electricity grid. Last August's Northeast/Midwest blackout, which affected 50 million consumers from New York to Michigan, again sounded the wake up call for federal electric reliability legislation.

I would like to quote from a January 1, 2004 letter published in the New York Times from North American Electric Reliability Council President and CEO Michehl R. Gent. Mr. Gent wrote that interim steps NERC has taken to improve grid reliability since last August's blackout does "not reduce the need for federal legislation that would provide authority to impose and enforce mandatory reliability standards. Whether legislation is adopted on a stand-alone basis or as part of a comprehensive energy bill, passage is essential. If reliability legislation had been enacted when first proposed [in 1999], I believe that the blackout would not have occurred."

Mr. Gent reiterated this position in February 24, 2004 testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. I asked Mr. Gent whether in fact it wouldn't be irresponsible of this body not to pass reliability legislation this year, even if we are to pass it on a stand-alone basis. Quite simply, Mr. Gent replied, "I agree."

We are beginning the process of putting this legislation directly on the Senate calendar because we believe American consumers have waited long enough for Congress to take this simple step, putting in place mandatory and enforceable reliability standards to govern operation of the electric transmission grid-the backbone of our nation's economy.

There are those who will argue that we are ill-advised to take this step. They ill argue in favor of taking up and passing last year's failed energy bill conference report (H.R. 6), or S. 2095-the so-called "slimmed down" energy bill introduced this year, which happens to be 100 pages longer than the original. However, I am of the firm belief that we cannot allow these crucial reliability provisions to be held hostage to a flawed comprehensive energy bill.

Now, I know that the distinguished Chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has worked to strip one of the most outrageous provisions of the H.R. 6 conference report-the MTBE liability protection, which many Senators simply cannot abide-from the new version of his energy bill. But I am one of the many who believe that the bill that remains requires very, very substantial revision and thorough debate. With its origins in last year's conference report, there are far too many provisions in the new bill that the Senate Energy Committee has simply never considered. Moreover, if one of our primary policy goals is to improve the reliability of our nation's electricity grid, I am hard-pressed to see how many of the provisions in that bill are relevant.
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How will weakening the Safe Drinking Water Act help keep the lights on?
Will providing MTBE producers with $2 billion in taxpayer-funded "transition" assistance in any way reduce the likelihood of outages?

How would delaying Clean Air Act implementation in our nation's most polluted cities ensure reliable operation of our electricity grid?

Can anyone really argue that exempting oil companies form Clean Water Act requirements will make our high-voltage transmission lines more reliable?

S. 2095 might not subsidize Hooters, but there remain plenty of handouts to the polluters and corporate looters-none of which have anything to do with bolstering the reliability of our transmission infrastructure. And that's before a non-existent conference with the House, the Leadership of which has publicly expressed its complete disinterest in revisiting the provisions of H.R. 6 most objectionable to the Senate. In fact, I ask my colleagues to consider the following passage, published in the February 14, 2004 edition of CQ Today.

"You can't start carving out pieces of a deal you already made," said Frank Maisano, a lobbyist who represents several MTBE producers. 'What the Senate does at this point is irrelevant. This is just a vehicle to get to conference.' " MTBE lobbyists-and perhaps our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol-believe that whatever the Senate does within the context of a debate on the new energy bill is "irrelevant." As the saying goes, "fool us once, shame on you. Fool us twice, shame on us."

So Mr. President, in view of the existing gridlock on comprehensive energy legislation, I believe the only responsible course is for this body to bring up and pass stand-alone electric reliability legislation. I reject the notion that passing comprehensive energy legislation-such as it is-is the sole path to improving the reliability of our nation's electricity grid. We can pass stand-alone reliability legislation. We've done it before. We can-and must-do it again. Good energy policy must not be held hostage to the bad, and I am pleased to begin the process of placing the bill directly on the Senate calendar.