The Senate energy committee is looking to move a broad energy bill it passed last year to the floor soon, holding hearings this week and next to inform lawmakers in the hope of quick action on the legislation, according to the panel’s chairwoman.
“I’m working to ensure that bill gets to the floor, hopefully, as soon as possible,” said Energy and Natural Resources Committee chairwoman Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, at a hearing Tuesday on energy commodities.
“We did some good work in the committee … in 2015. And I think in the Senate itself we saw the return of regular order … a little,” she said, appearing optimistic that a vote could come in the coming weeks. “We laid the foundation to modernize the strategic petroleum reserve, we lifted the ban on oil exports, and we passed out, with an 18-4 bipartisan vote, the Energy Policy Modernization Act that moved out of this committee.”
Murkowski says her hope is that Tuesday’s hearing on energy price forecasts, and others the panel will hold later this week, will help show the chamber why it is a critical time for energy policy, and the need for a comprehensive energy bill to pass soon.
Congress managed to move a spending bill last month that lifted the 40-year-old ban on oil exports to lend more flexibility to U.S. drillers that are faced with a global oil glut making the price for oil so low it has become uneconomic to continue producing.
The spending bill passed and was signed by the president. The energy committee’s bill contains measures to complement the spending bill’s action, with measures to expedite the export of natural gas from the United States, while creating new ways of protecting the electricity grid from cyber attack through increased public-private partnerships.
The bill seeks to improve energy efficiency in manufacturing while providing $350 million for residential weatherization programs.
The bill also includes new vehicle research and development priorities and funding for the Department of Energy, including provisions that seek to improve heavy-duty truck efficiency and performance.
The Senate committee is holding a hearing Thursday “to examine the status of innovative technologies within the automotive industry.” The panel will hear from the Department of Energy along with representatives of the battery-electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicle industry and automakers.
The committee will also hold a hearing on nuclear energy next week. The legislation addresses next generation reactors, while directing the Energy Department to conduct a study on nuclear fusion and fission reactor designs.
The panel is also readying for the release of the administration’s new fiscal 2017 budget proposal in February. It has already scheduled hearings through March to discuss the administration’s coming proposals going into President Obama’s final year in office.
Hearings on the budget are slated for Feb. 23 on the Department of Interior’s fiscal 2017 budget proposal. That will be followed by a March 3 hearing on the Energy Department’s proposed budget, and a March 8 hearing on the Forest Service’s budget proposal.
