Thomas Daschle: “headlines in daily papers all across the country underscore our economy's vulnerability to foreign oil. Today, a new…”

“headlines in daily papers all across the country underscore our economy's vulnerability to foreign oil. Today, a new generation is learning what many Americans have known since the 1970s--our economic security and our national security depend on our energy security. Today I, along with a number of my colleagues, am introducing the Fuels Security Act of 2003. This bill responds directly to our Nation's unhealthy reliance on imported oil by establishing greater flexibility in our gasoline regulations, and by tripling the use of domestic, renewable fuels over the next 10 years. This legislation is identical to the fuels agreement included in last year's Senate-passed energy bill. Based on the experience we have gained over the last seven years with the reformulated gasoline program, the Fuel Security Act bill makes a number of important changes in Federal law. It bans MTBE in 4 years, authorizes funding to cleanup MTBE contamination and fix leaking underground tanks, allows the most polluted states to opt into the reformulated gasoline program, and provides all States with additional authority under the Clean Air Act to address air quality concerns. It eliminates the oxygen requirement from the RFG program, a change that is very important to states that are planning to remove MTBE from their gasoline supplies in the near future.”