The New York Times
Saturday 23 June 2007
Washington - Automakers had to know they were in serious trouble when Senator Barbara A. Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat with deep blue-collar roots, announced that she had lost patience with their annual objections to higher gas mileage rules.
"When automobile manufacturers told me they could not meet the increased standards, I listened," said Ms. Mikulski, who said she had always been swayed by the potential loss of middle-class manufacturing jobs. "I listened year after year, and now I have listened for more than 20 years. After 20 years, I firmly do believe it is time for a change."
Bolstered by such converts as Ms. Mikulski, the Senate just before midnight Thursday approved an energy bill that would for the first time in more than two decades require auto companies to produce cars and trucks that get substantially more out of a gallon of gas.
But that was about the only industry it took on. The measure, approved on a bipartisan 65-to-37 vote, essentially spared oil and gas companies and major utilities and fell short of goals initially set by supporters in areas like renewable fuels.
Still, lawmakers treated the traditionally insurmountable opposition of the auto industry as little more than a speed bump on the way to the bill's passage. That amounted to a cultural shift in the Senate, where an alliance of union-backed Democrats, lawmakers of both parties from auto-producing states and business-minded Republicans had always pulled together to hold off increases in fuel efficiency rules, also called the Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, standards. They traditionally argued that the technology for higher mileage was not available, car costs would rise and Detroit would be forced to make lighter and smaller but more dangerous cars.
But with gasoline at $3 per gallon, the industry hemorrhaging jobs and foreign manufacturers producing cars that get better mileage, advocates of increasing the mileage standards were able to stitch together a potent coalition behind an increase.
"The time has come for us to speak for the American people and not the car manufacturers," Senator Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada and the majority leader, said earlier in the week as he inspected new plug-in, hybrid electric cars in a park adjacent to the Capitol.
If the Senate bill becomes law, new cars, light trucks and SUVs will have to get an average of 35 miles per gallon by 2020, compared with roughly 25 m.p.g. today. Automakers had sought not only more time to reach the higher standard, but they had also lobbied, unsuccessfully, for a separate, and more relaxed, SUV requirement of 30 m.p.g. by 2025. SUVs now must achieve an average of 21.3 m.p.g.
The outcome left industry allies in Congress scrambling Friday to try to head off a similar result in the House, where the influence of the automotive industry is declining as well. They acknowledged a very real image problem for the car industry but said moving too quickly was unfair to American industries that had higher labor and benefit costs than their foreign competitors. And they said oil industry allies had purposefully put the Senate spotlight on automobiles to protect oil and gas companies from new regulation.
"The reality is that Big Oil would like to keep the focus off of them," said Senator Debbie Stabenow, Democrat of Michigan.
Backers of the bill suffered two major defeats. Republicans blocked a proposal to impose about $32 billion in new taxes on oil and gas companies to subsidize production and research of renewable energy sources. Lawmakers also prevented a vote on a plan to require utilities to produce 15 percent of their electricity with renewable fuels by 2020.
But Democrats promised on Friday to continue to pursue those initiatives and said they had the votes to prevail eventually. And they hailed the bill that passed as a major step forward, pointing to new energy efficiency standards for appliances and the federal government as well as a requirement for the annual use of 36 billion gallons of alternative fuels like ethanol by 2022.
"Beyond petroleum has to be more than a television commercial," said Senator Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat who played a central role in securing the votes for the measure.
Some interest groups criticized the bill as not doing enough while Republicans said it could drive up the price of gasoline at the pump while doing nothing to promote more domestic oil and gas production.
"This is really an anti-energy bill," said Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader.
But the chief development by far was the approval of the automotive mileage changes over intense lobbying by the auto industry. Lawmakers and Senate officials said they quickly heard from angry representatives of the major car manufacturers and unions, who complained that the mileage rules gave Nissan, whose fleet already comes close to meeting the new mileage standard, an advantage. This helped pick up the votes of senators from Tennessee, where Nissan has plants.
At the same time, auto industry allies said provisions on flexible-fuel vehicles that favored domestic companies were watered down, removing a potential competitive advantage by Detroit over its foreign rivals.
Ms. Stabenow said members of the Michigan Congressional delegation met Friday to plot strategy for the upcoming House energy fight and to try to win improvements in the mileage rules and perhaps some help for the industry.
Representative John D. Dingell, Democrat of Michigan and the senior member of the House, has long been able to thwart efforts to increase mileage standards. But Mr. Dingell and Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California have bumped heads on the issue, and momentum is building in the House for an aggressive package of energy initiatives.
Mr. Reid, the majority leader, predicted Friday that the House and Senate would be able to reconcile their differences quickly, allowing Congress to deliver a final bill to the president in the near future.
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