Chuck Hagel: “in the midst of the energy challenges facing our Nation lies a very unique opportunity. We have a chance to develop…”

“in the midst of the energy challenges facing our Nation lies a very unique opportunity. We have a chance to develop energy and environmental policies that work together. A clean environment and a strong energy policy need not be mutually exclusive. The forces of reality have brought us to this point. We have an energy problem that we cannot ignore. We also have a new administration which is re-evaluating our environmental policies, as any new administration would do, to ensure that what we are pursuing, and how we are pursuing it, is relevant, realistic, and achievable. In the past, there has been a division of these issues. Energy and environmental policies have been considered separately--and mostly at odds with one another. This has led to an unnecessary gap of confidence in both efforts. We have an opportunity to reverse this division and create integrated policies to pursue both critically important objectives of a steady energy supply and a clean environment. In the next few days, President Bush will release the administration's new energy policy. This policy will provide a balanced approach to meet the supply and demand imbalance we are now facing in this country. It will reflect our absolute need for a wide and deep energy supply portfolio, including the use of renewable energy and alternative energy sources. It would have been easy to defer this challenge, to delay the tough choices. But that's what got us into this mess.”