James M. Jeffords: “the Daschle-Bingaman substitute amendment, also known as the Energy Policy Act of 2002, includes portions of a bill that…”

“the Daschle-Bingaman substitute amendment, also known as the Energy Policy Act of 2002, includes portions of a bill that was reported favorably last year from the Committee on Environment and Public Works. That bill, the Federal Reformulated Fuels Act, S. 950, was approved with the committee's understanding that further action by the full Senate would be necessary to solve the delicate problem of eliminating MTBE from the fuel supply to protect water resources, while maintaining air quality and stimulating renewable fuel use. The substitute amendment before the Senate now does a good job of resolving that problem and balancing many political and environmental concerns. This language does not represent the perfect solution for my State or the Northeast. However, without it, MTBE contamination of water resources will continue unabated. With it, at least we can be assured of greater protection of air and water quality. If States proceed to ban MTBE without clear Federal authority provided in this amendment, air quality could suffer as RFG areas would be forced to use ethanol in a very inflexible way due to the existing oxygen content requirement in the Clean Air Act.”