No bill is better than this one

No bill is better than this one
Dallas Morning News: Supporters of the massive energy bill that is passing through its final stages in Congress are billing it as the United States' ticket to energy independence. It is not. If it were, it would promote a crash project to wrest the country from its dependence on unstable and hostile foreign petroleum suppliers. If it were, it would do more to exploit the country's vast potential in renewable and clean forms of energy and to reap the manifest benefits of energy conservation.
The bill fosters the misimpression that the United States could disentangle itself from the likes of Saudi Arabia and Venezuela by drilling on environmentally sensitive public lands, such as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and increasing subsidies for corn-based ethanol. In truth, the United States couldn't possibly drill or hoe its way out of its petroleum dependence.
If the bill were a serious vehicle for energy independence, it would launch an implacable search for a petroleum substitute, such as hydrogen. It would include a substantial and mandatory increase in the average fuel efficiency of cars and trucks. It would require that a significant percentage of U.S. electricity be generated from renewable sources -- sun, wind, hydro, biomass -- by a date certain, as Texas did in 1999 and New York plans to do. As presently written by the House and Senate negotiators trying to reconcile their competing versions, it would do none of these things.
What it does
Instead, the bill appears to be mostly a gigantic giveaway for traditional energy producers. It would provide about $19 billion in subsidies for coal, petroleum (including natural gas) and nuclear. It would protect manufacturers of MTBE from civil liability when the malodorous gasoline additive contaminates reservoirs. It would permit seismic tests in coastal areas that now are off limits to drilling. And it would force taxpayers to pay the tab for many petroleum clean-ups -- even when the polluter is known and financially solvent.
The bill isn't a complete wreck. It seeks to protect the country's electrical grid from blackouts like those that struck in August. It would increase security at nuclear power plants. And it would provide some incentives for renewable forms of energy.
However, on balance, it is so larded with special-interest favors and environmentally retrograde policies that it deserves to die.