Jeff Bingaman: “First of all, why are we even proposing this amendment? Why does my underlying amendment that Senator Kyl would propose…”

“First of all, why are we even proposing this amendment? Why does my underlying amendment that Senator Kyl would propose to eliminate--why does my underlying amendment try to move us in the direction, as a country, of using more renewable energy to produce electricity? Why is that a priority for the country? I have essentially the same chart as that to which my good friend from Ohio referred. and it has the same basic information on it. This chart points out that when you look ahead--we do now depend primarily on coal. We do now depend heavily on nuclear. We do now depend heavily on natural gas. And renewables are not a major part of our energy mix, particularly the nonhydro renewables are not a major part of our energy mix. One of the purposes we have in this energy legislation--and in this particular renewable portfolio standard provision--is to diversify the sources from which we generate power, so when we get to 2020 the chart I show you in this Chamber does not look exactly like it looks now as I am pointing to it here.”