Sen Maria Cantwell: Conservation Must Be More Than Convenient Slogan

Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and a passionate environmental advocate, delivered today's weekly Democratic radio address. In it, she returned to her familiar themes of conservation, vehicle fuel-efficiency and US over-reliance on fossil fuels for energy.

"Conservation must be more than a convenient slogan," Cantwell said. "Recently, the administration has rejected conservation attempts like more accurate fuel mileage for cars and bipartisan proposals for reducing our dependence on foreign oil by a million barrels a day."

Cantwell said that Democrats want new laws to protect consumers from price-gouging and encourage investment in lightweight materials and alternative fuels. She observed that record-high fuel prices are costing people their jobs, farmers are having a hard time breaking even, and school districts are being forced to choose between hiring new teachers and covering higher energy bills, she added.

In fact, most Georgia public schools were closed for two days last week , to conserve scarce fuel, as well as to save school districts from paying exorbitant fuel prices for a few days. Per USA Today, "Gov. Sonny Perdue asked for the closings..., estimating that closing all of the state's schools would save about 250,000 gallons of diesel fuel by idling buses, plus an undetermined amount of gasoline by allowing teachers, staff members and some parents to stay home."

"These are the terrible consequences of our overdependence on fossil fuel," Cantwell said. "The natural disasters of Katrina and Rita have showed us firsthand how truly vulnerable we are."

And yet, despite the gas shortages and despite the industry's self-proclaimed "need" to increase comsumer gas prices due to shortages caused by hurricanes, US oil companies are posting historic, record-shattering profits. Per watch group Public Citizen...."Since George Bush became President in 2001, the top five oil companies in the United States have recorded profits of $254 billion: ExxonMobil: $89 billion; Shell: $60.7 billion; BP: $53 billion; ChevronTexaco: $31 billion; and ConocoPhillips: $20 billion."

In response, Senator Maria Cantwell and six other senators....Byron Dorgan (D-ND), John Kerry (D-MA), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Jay Rockefeller (D-WV).... have called for a special investigation of allegations that oil companies purposefully increased prices at the gas pump in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. In a letter to the Commerce panel's Co-Chairs, the senators requested that the Committee open a formal inquiry into post-Katrina price gouging allegations.

Read details here, at Senator Cantwells' website, of this Senate call for a special investigation of egregious post-hurricane price-gouging by the US oil companies.
------------------------------
Related article -- Profile of Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington
------------------------------
Technorati Profile