President Bush has called on the U.S. Senate to take “quick action” on a comprehensive energy bill when lawmakers begin debate on the measure this week.

“The House has acted, and now the Senate must act. The Congress needs to get [an energy] bill to my desk,” said Bush Monday during a press briefing on the White House lawn. The bill must reflect a “sound comprehensive energy policy” that both boosts domestic production and lessens consumption, he noted.

The United States currently imports in excess of 50% of its oil, or more than 10 billion barrels per day. “This dependence is a challenge to our economic security” because “sometimes we rely upon energy sources from countries that don’t particularly like us,” said Bush, who was flanked by Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and EPA Administrator Christie Todd Whitman.

Since the transportation sector is the biggest consumer of oil in the nation, “any effort to reduce consumption must include ways to safely make cars and trucks more fuel efficient,” the president told reporters. “Hybrid cars…are already in existence. They run on a mixture of gas and electric power. They are several times more fuel efficient than most cars on the road today.”

Fuel cells, which are being developed, “will power cars with little or no waste at all,” Bush said. “We happen to believe that fuel cells are the wave of the future.” He noted that the Bush administration unveiled a $150 million FreedomCAR plan last January to promote the development of hydrogen-based fuel cell technologies.

NASA already “[has] developed fuel cells to generate electricity, heat, and water in space vehicles. Businesses started using them in 1995. That’s why we are optimistic that within a reasonable period of time…fuel-cell technology will become more widespread.”

Bush did not mention one of the easier and less esoteric fixes for the transportation sector, tightening fuel efficiency standards for automobiles and light trucks. The Democratic energy bill to be offered on the Senate floor mid-week contains as a key feature an increase in fuel efficiency standards for all vehicles — including the gas-guzzling sport-utility vehicles — for the first time since 1985. This will be a central focus for debate on the bill.

Without specifically referring to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), Bush also said that “technologies will…enable us to preserve our environment as we explore for natural gas at home.”

In his radio address over the weekend, Bush said the rest of the nation “should listen to Alaskans who support exploring ANWR in a safe and clean way.” New technology “makes this [type of drilling] possible,” he noted, and “our national security makes it urgent.”

The House energy bill, which was passed in August 2001, calls for a small portion of ANWR to be opened to oil and natural gas drilling. The issue is another one expected to be extremely controversial in the Senate, with some Democrats threatening to hold up the entire energy bill if Republicans attempt to insert ANWR drilling into it.

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