William Tauzin: “Mr. Chairman, I will close in opposition to the amendment. I happen to believe, with the gentleman from New York (Mr.…”

“Mr. Chairman, I will close in opposition to the amendment. I happen to believe, with the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert), that we should believe the National Academy of Sciences. They say that if the Boehlert amendment passes, Americans will die in increasing numbers on the highways because the automobile industry will have no choice with this extreme, radical change in CAFE numbers but to lighten up the vehicles and downweight them. The National Academy of Sciences just said that. They said to the gentleman, if they take the gentleman's plan and spread it out over 10 or 15 years, that might not happen. The gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert) wants to enact his plan in a short 4 years, a 46 percent increase in CAFE standards in 4 years, leading, as the National Academy of Sciences says, to increased death on our nation's highways. We ought to stand against this amendment. The debate is not about raising CAFE standards. The bill raises CAFE. It saves 5 billion gallons of gasoline in the 6-year period. That is equivalent to parking a whole year's production of SUVs and minivans for 2 years, parking them, not running them on the highways. It is equivalent to saving $100 billion pounds of CO2 emissions. That is what the bill does without this extreme amendment. This is the history of CAFE: regular, orderly, responsible increases.”