Tom Harkin: “we have before us today an opportunity to chart a new course for the Nation's energy future. The energy bill includes…”

“we have before us today an opportunity to chart a new course for the Nation's energy future. The energy bill includes vitally important measures to boost renewable energy and energy efficiency, to improve our electricity grid, and to protect consumers from bad corporate actors like Enron. I am very pleased that it includes the lion's share of the renewable fuels standard bill I introduced earlier this year with Dick Lugar and many of my colleagues. This is an accomplishment of historic proportions. Oil refiners will be required to blend 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol and biodiesel annually by the year 2012--more than twice the current rate. This RFS is 2.5 billion gallons higher than what was in the House bill. Obviously, this is great news for farmers, biofuels producers, and the rural economy in Iowa and throughout the country. It is the single most important provision in the bill, certainly in the near term, to displace ever increasing amounts of foreign oil that we import into this country. The RFS is a big step in the right direction and I am very proud to have helped get it done. I am also excited that the ``bioeconomy'' amendment I authored with Senators Lugar, Obama, Coleman, and Bayh was included in the bill. It gives a real boost to biomass R&D to expand the production and use of biobased fuels, chemicals and power. It provides grants to small biobased businesses to get their products into the marketplace.…”