Jeff Bingaman

I have also been informed that the administration supports this amendment. I advise my colleagues that is the case as well. Once again, I thank my cosponsors and urge my colleagues to support the amendment.

President Obama suggested one last week; he cited a cozy relationship between the Minerals Management Service, or MMS, and the industry it was regulating.

Regulatory failure is one of the 3 key interlocking failures that I believe are at the heart of this problem.

I hope the Department of Interior will make the full drilling plan available for peer review by other industry experts.

There definitely needs to be a concerted effort made to develop and test equipment, new technology, and procedures in a realistically simulated deepwater environment.

I think it is critical that everyone understands that blowout preventer systems as designed today will never be able to overcome poor well design or faulty operational decision making.

The sobering reality is that, despite the losses and damage that have already been suffered, we do not yet know what the full impact of this disaster will be.

We owe it to them to see that disasters like this never happen again.

This amendment has a straightforward goal. It is to protect the existing legal structures that ensure that electricity and natural gas rates consumers pay will continue to be just and reasonable and free from manipulation.

We're seeing an increased demand for a finite existing supply of water, and how we manage that supply is a very important question for all of us today.

I thank my colleague, Senator Udall, for his very eloquent statement. Obviously, the Udall family has a great deal of which to be proud: his father's great public service, his uncle's great public service, and, of course, he is carrying on…

I am disappointed that the Interior Department currently limits these funds to coal reclamation.

Beginning to untangle fire suppression costs from the rest of the USFS budget is a critical step to let USFS focus resources on forest health.

I support it. It is a bill that would ensure States could use abandoned mine land payments for both coal and non-coal reclamation.

S. 2830 is an important bill that I have introduced and that Senator Udall is co-sponsoring with me.

Your leadership is critical to the preservation of this First Colony site.

This legislation holds historic significance not only to Japanese Americans, Californians, but for Americans nationwide.

We look forward to working with Senator Casey, Senator Barrasso, Chairman Bingaman and the rest of the Committee to advance CCS in the context of comprehensive climate and energy legislation.

I would like to thank Chairman Bingaman and Ranking Member Murkowski.

The topic of reducing greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide emissions, remains of great concern to this committee and to myself.

Thank you for your leadership.

We appreciate the committee's commitment to finding solutions that address our Nation's economic and energy challenges.

I'm told Senator Murkowski will be here very shortly.

I was very glad to work with Senator Murkowski last year and all members of the committee to report bipartisan energy legislation last summer.

Buildings are a large source of greenhouse gas emissions. They account for as much as 39 percent.