A comprehensive energy bill will be “among the most important matters to come before this Congress” in the upcoming months, Energy Secretary nominee Sam Bodman said during his Senate confirmation hearing Wednesday.

“I will look forward to working with this committee…to pass this legislation,” he told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which has jurisdiction over his nomination.

“This country has been for too many years without a sound, balanced energy policy,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), while questioning Bodman about U.S. energy policy. So many people subscribe to the “immaculate conception” notion of energy, she noted. “It just happens.” She urged Bodman to educate the public about energy issues.

Although he has little energy background, Bodman, who has held senior positions in both the departments of Treasury and Commerce, is expected to be easily confirmed by the Senate. “I expect you to be confirmed with a large majority,” said Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, the ranking Democrat on the Senate panel. A number of other committee members echoed that sentiment. He was nominated by President Bush in December (see Daily GPI, Dec. 13, 2004).

Bodman, 66, also said he intended to be an “energetic advocate” for opening the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil and natural gas drilling. He noted that ANWR is at the center of the Bush administration’s energy policy.

ANWR “will come up one way or another” this year, but it won’t be in an energy bill, noted Senate Energy Committee Chairman Pete Domenici (R-NM). As for the chances for passage of an energy bill, Domenici said he was hopeful that the level of cooperation that lawmakers exhibited on other issues in the past “will apply to the energy bill this year.”

Bodman also indicated that he supports domestic oil and gas drilling. “I would rather see it go on in this country” as opposed to overseas, given the superior level of regulation of the industry in the United States, he said.

He admitted that he has much to learn about energy. “I haven’t even yet visited the [Department of Energy] building.”

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