Nursing a Fragile Energy Bill (MTBE Sticking Point)

[cthrumatrix]

Nursing a Fragile Energy Bill
Protection for Fuel-Additive Makers a Sticking Point in Senate
By Dan Morgan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, November 24, 2003; Page A05


Just hours after opponents of a $31 billion energy bill narrowly blocked Senate action on the measure Friday, Sen. Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.) met with several dozen lobbyists in a hearing room in the Dirksen Building in an effort to keep hopes for the bill alive.

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A case in point, they said yesterday, is a controversial provision that provides protection from lawsuits for makers of the fuel additive methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MTBE), which has been found to contaminate groundwater in several states.

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What Daschle overlooked, however, was the formidable lobbying power of MTBE's makers, many of which have close ties to Texas, home state of President Bush and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R).

DeLay quickly made it clear that he would not budge, saying the MTBE provisions were part of a "true compromise that will become law."

The largest domestic producer of MTBE, Lyondell Chemical Co., formerly Arco Chemical, is headquartered in Houston, part of which is represented by DeLay. This year Lyondell's political action committee has contributed $10,000 to DeLay's 2004 campaign and $5,000 to a campaign fund he controls.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8791-2003Nov23.html

I'm shocked that Delay is involved ...

[Best_man23]

1. Why shocked?

Delay is a whore for big oil and repug contributors.

[Justice]

2. So What You are Saying Is

Delay would rather the entire bill fail than remove a provision that members of his own party find offensive.

He rather take care of his special interest than take care of Americans. Hmm.

But the story never gets told that way in the media does it?

If two demcratic senators vote for a republican measure, the press and the republicans call it bipartisan.

But as the energy bill is failing at the moment, who gets blamed for that -- ahh - the democrats! Even though members of the republican party are against it as well.

[salin]

3. Make calls - defeat this - not just because of MTBEs

1) further deregulation (more power to FERC taken away from states - who hindered California's efforts to stave off the makert manipulation/"energy crisis" - and later stepped in to make it harder for the state (and tax payers/rate payers) to recoup losses even after hard evidence was in hand about the market manipulation.... ergo - FERC doesn't believe in holding energy companies accountable for grand-scale cheating in ways that would prevent future scams {if I, at company X can scam an extra 2 billion dollars but risk a 2 million dollar scam... I will run the scam - even if caught I end up 1.98 billion richer.... (made up numbers to exemplify the point)}.

2) further deregulation part 2: closing down PUHCA - rule changes under bush one moved Enron and energy trading OUT of PUHCA and SEC oversight. This allowed NO oversight over their building vertical monopolistic structures (they bought from one division and sold at jacked up rates to another) - which was just one part of their many scams. This part of the bill would let ALL energy companies escape from oversight - and revert back to the pre-FDR era price gouging of consumers by energy companies that could do much more inside dealing/gouging within the company (eg Company Q has a subsidiary company pipeline and buys pipeline laying services from this subsidiary (itself) at 200% of the market price - jacking up the delivery price. With collusion harder to detect (see deregulation part 1) to set prices among energy companies (remember the "even trades" of Dynergy, Reliant and others - they claimed it was not really cheating - but what it did was validate and set the "going market rate" even though the only ones initially paying at that rate - were each other... but they thus raised the "going fair market price" of energy).... the companies could jack up their costs through subsidiaries - other companies go along at the new rates because they can ALL make much more money at the higher rate and consumers, for the most part, don't have the ability to just NOT use the product.

3. Tax give-aways and public subsidies for HUGE corporations that undercut "competition" market forces. There are huge subsidies that do things like - open govt owned lands to drilling - and have the government foot the bill of transporting the drilled energy source (oil, gas, etc.) for the company. Get it? NO overhead for the company in terms of buying land or landrights; NO overhead for cost of transporting the energy (WE foot that bill with NO benefit - it is a perverse sort of socialism where the costs are socialized with NO benefits... but huge benefits to those (favored) companies that get the contracts (look at Iraq to see how "fairly" those contracts tend to be distributed) - and that makes it impossible for other companies to compete... because they would have much higher overhead for the same energy production as the public wouldn't be footing the bill.)

4. Unprecedented power of 'Eminent Domain' (land taking) FERC has the power - on behalf of corporations - to take land (force selling of private land for under market values) for energy transportation lines (wires/pipelines). Get it? Essentially the government works as an agent for the company - Enron claims the need for land for a new pipeline... FERC uses govt power to FORCE citizens to sell their land at cheap rates... so much for private property!

5. Very little within the bill encourages investment in renewable/self-sufficient energy sources. Money goes to short term fixes of US sources of oil and natural gas that a) take a while to hit the market - leaving us still dependent on foreign sources for quite a while, and b) in the end only provide a temporary "fix" (when they finally come to market) as they are limited sources and will be depleted. There is little that leads to energy independence in this bill - which is necessary for long-term national security reasons.

There are many more reasons - feel free to add them. But call and remind your senators who supported the fillibuster before that even if this one "fix" gets made to the bill (MTBEs) - the bill is still not in our national self-interest and should NOT be allowed to be enacted.

[Gin]

4. MTBE was listed in a NAFTA lawsuit against Califonia ....chapter 11

in NAFTA allows foreign countries doing business in the US to sue the US government (directly)(Fed Gov. then passes the cost on to the states) with no recourse in a secret 3 panel court for lost income if we stop using their products. That additive was part of a lawsuit that I have not heard anymore about until this come to light.

Wonder if it's all connected?

[Tracer]

5. Yesterday, while getting gas ...

... for the first time, I noticed a sticker on the gas pump that said "MBTE".

I couldn't tell if it was an "advertisement" or a "warning".