In The Northwest: The energy bill would be a hoot if it wasn't so sad

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Friday, November 21, 2003

In The Northwest: The energy bill would be a hoot if it wasn't so sad

By JOEL CONNELLY
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST

If you ever wondered whether Congress was being run by boobs, consider that a tax credit tucked away in the 1,400-page House-passed energy bill will subsidize the opening of a Hooters restaurant in Bossier City, La.

The chain's trademark buxom waitresses will serve up finger food in the $180 million "Louisiana Riverwalk," which is being underwritten by taxpayers to "showcase futuristic energy systems." The Riverwalk's main drawing card will be a live alligator exhibit.

The gators and Hooters girls are a pet project of Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., chairman of the House Energy Committee and one of a tiny group of Republican lawmakers who crafted the energy legislation behind closed doors.

Appropriately, the U.S. Senate is taking up this turkey of a bill just before going on Thanksgiving break. Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., are, to their credit, seeking to stop it.

With un-senatorial pithiness, GOP Sen. John McCain has labeled the energy bill the "Hooters and Polluters" act, and -- rephrasing a presidential cliché about education -- the "Leave No Lobbyist Behind Bill."

Think he's exaggerating? Consider the MTBE bailout.

MTBE, a fuel additive, has been implicated in the contamination of groundwater from California to New Hampshire.

Quietly inserted in the energy bill is a provision that would shield MTBE manufacturers from defective product lawsuits -- and potentially saddle taxpayers with an $8 billion cleanup bill nationwide.

It doesn't stop there. The bill authorizes a $2 billion subsidy to help manufacturers of MTBE absorb the economic blow of ceasing its production.

MTBE would not be banned in the United States until 2014.

Not surprisingly, Louisiana and Texas -- home states of Tauzin and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay -- are where three-quarters of the nation's MTBE gets produced.

The energy bill contains more than $20 billion in tax breaks and subsidies. The vast bulk go to traditional industries long used to living off the taxpayers' teat.

"It would be a crime to ignore a once-in-a-decade opportunity to break free from dirty coal policies of the past and adopt clean technologies of the future," Cantwell said last week.

Well, crime does pay in today's Washington, D.C.

An 11th-hour provision added to the bill authorizes $2 billion to help older coal-burning power plants get in compliance with the Clean Air Act. Of course, the Bush administration has already relaxed compliance standards.

Other subsidies include:

$1.5 billion for "ultradeepwater oil and gas" research and development, primarily benefiting a consortium led by Louisiana State University, Texas A&M and the University of Houston.

$500 million over 10 years for the Denali Commission in Alaska to build energy generation projects. Language in the bill says these projects can be constructed "notwithstanding any other provision" of law -- a broad exemption from environmental laws.

$125 million for something called the Healy Clean Coal project in Alaska, underwriting bonds to retrofit a coal power plant near Denali National Park that has been idle for years.

$1.1 billion for a nuclear reactor in Idaho to test economically questionable hydrogen production technologies.

Oh yes, in order to buy off farm-state Democrats -- including Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota -- the federal subsidy of ethanol production would be substantially increased.

So brazen is the energy bill's corporate welfare that it has raised the ire of free market conservatives.

Criticism of its drafters has even come from the Wall Street Journal's ultraconservative editorial page -- akin to l'Osservatore Romano criticizing the pope. The Journal opined that energy bill authors "have greased more wheels than a NASCAR pit crew."

When you total up the handouts, nearly $15 billion goes to the coal, oil, gas and nuclear industries, compared with $5 billion to support wind, solar power and other renewable energy technologies.

"The lion's share of the bill's tax breaks will go to mature industries that should have been self-sufficient in the marketplace long ago. The old-line fossil fuel industries are like 30-year-olds still living at home sponging off mom and dad," quipped Jim DiPeso, policy director at REP America, an organization of environment-minded Republicans.

Oh yeah, the environment gets the shaft.

The bill exempts all oil- and gas-drilling sites from Clean Water Act requirements on limiting runoff. It allows the Environmental Protection Agency to delay cleanup deadlines for cities afflicted by ozone pollution.

Energy resources on Indian reservations would be exploited by waiving National Environmental Policy Act review for facilities (e.g., refineries) on tribal lands.

As well, the bill throws open sensitive wildlife habitat on the Rocky Mountain Front to gas drillers.

Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., tried to get a moratorium on the 200-square-mile Badger Two Medicine area adjoining Glacier National Park -- prime grizzly bear country and sacred land to Blackfeet Indians. He was defeated by Republicans on a party-line vote.

A couple of final notes:

Vice President Dick Cheney, whose secretive White House energy task force crafted much of the energy bill -- in consultation with industry executives -- is coming to our Washington next month for a GOP fund-raiser.

And curiously, the Senate yesterday debated the energy bill and its subsidies in a virtual media blackout.

Our nation's network and cable TV news operations were wetting themselves over the surrender of singer Michael Jackson on charges of child molestation.

Why don't they pay any attention when taxpayers get molested?

P-I columnist Joel Connelly can be reached at 206-448-8160 or joelconnelly@seattlepi.com

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