Pete Domenici: “Now, let me say we have a similar situation to the one we had here in the last 2 or 3 days on the 15-percent wind…”

“Now, let me say we have a similar situation to the one we had here in the last 2 or 3 days on the 15-percent wind mandate--RPS. We have two amendments out here, and all of a sudden we find out neither of them is going to have the votes. I am afraid what has happened here is we have two amendments and neither is going to get the votes if the Senate doesn't consider the difference between these two bills and vote for the one that is most apt to accomplish the purpose we set out in a coal-to-liquid amendment. The Tester-Bingaman amendment, No. 1614, in this Senator's opinion is only a long shot that we are going to get a lot of incentives for coal to liquid. There is $10 billion in direct loans. That is nice for everybody. We are going to have $10 billion to loan, but it is loanable on a number of things beyond coal to liquid. I predict the money is going to go to those other things because it is so hard to reach the calibration required in this amendment of coal to liquid. In the Bunning amendment, there is a long time to work on it, until 2016, and a given amount of that liquid will be purchased and they can get ready for it to be purchased. But the standard is clearly achievable because it is the same 20 percent we are going to require of ethanol and of the other programs we are achieving, and we are saying do the same thing.”