In the wake of the Gulf oil spill, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is pushing for a new, potentially wide-ranging energy bill. Before the accident, legislative handicappers were giving long odds on the Senate’s passing an energy measure this year. The desire in Congress to take action to prevent future offshore oil disasters now has improved those odds.
Brad Penney, the Alliance to Save Energy’s government-relations director, says, “We’ve experienced a national tragedy with the catastrophe in the Gulf, and out of that tragedy there appears to be a positive ... the increased likelihood of the Senate doing a meaningful clean-energy bill this summer.”