This afternoon, I welcomed the introduction of the American Power Act - an important step toward comprehensive clean energy and climate change legislation.
Senators John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and Lindsey Graham have worked tirelessly to balance a variety of regional, economic, and environmental interests, and I am reviewing their bipartisan work.
This draft bill, combined with the work of Senator Bingaman's Energy Committee and the legislation passed in my Senate Environment Committee, shows the growing momentum for a ‘do it all, do it right' clean energy policy that will create jobs, make us more energy independent, and reduce pollution.
From my first look at the bill today I can see that it creates an important market signal for clean energy investments and focuses on protecting consumers from energy price spikes. It also includes several policies I recommended to level the playing field for natural gas in the electricity market and reduce oil dependence by converting truck fleets to natural gas.
While it's a good start, I think the draft should do more to promote renewable energy and protect forests and watersheds from the impacts of global warming. And many other provisions also require further scrutiny. The most important thing, however, is for the Senate to work on comprehensive clean energy policy this year free of partisan obstruction and delaying tactics.
You can learn more about the bill on Sen. Kerry's website
here
.
To learn more about my "Do it All, Do it Right" energy plan,
click here
.
