Bush energy program short on efficiency

WASHINGTON — President Bush's new energy program banks on new technologies with a long-term payoff in improving the nation's energy picture, such as expanded ethanol production, hydrogen cars, more powerful batteries, nuclear power and renewable fuels.

Yet Bush's own budget shows that programs to increase the energy efficiency of buildings, appliances and vehicles, which their advocates say represent the only way to reduce energy demand in the short run, are being cut back sharply.

In addition, these advocates say, the president could reduce the nation's gasoline demand more swiftly by dramatically strengthening fuel-economy standards for gas-guzzling vehicles, but the administration is unlikely to make more than modest changes in the mileage standards this year.

Bush has long been cool to raising fuel-economy standards. Energy Department spokesman Craig Stevens said it would likely entail lighter vehicles, and "American consumers have spoken out that they want safer vehicles."

As Bush conducted a two-day blitz to promote his new energy program by highlighting the promise of new technologies, he left himself open to criticism that he is doing too little in the present to curb what he calls America's "addiction to oil."

Congress authorized more than $1.8 billion for key energy-efficiency programs in last year's energy bill, but the president's budget for fiscal 2007, which begins Oct. 1, called for only $638 million in spending on these programs, with funding in most cases at levels less than in fiscal 2006.

Programs to toughen building codes and appliance standards would have to operate with less federal support, as would many state energy programs that receive federal funds.

One politically sensitive program due to be cut would help low-income families weatherize their homes. The 2005 energy bill authorized spending $500 million in fiscal 2007 for this program. But Bush recommended only $164 million, far short of the $242.5 million being spent in fiscal 2006 to weatherize homes.

Stevens said the president thinks "we are on the cusp of new technology" that will have a significant impact on the nation's energy supplies in the next 10 to 20 years and decided to marshal greater resources for this goal.

Kateri Callahan, president of the Alliance to Save Energy, an umbrella organization of efficiency organizations, praised the long-term approach proposed by Bush, but she added that the administration was being "penny-wise and pound-foolish" by de-emphasizing energy-saving steps in the short run.

These proposed cutbacks still will have to pass Congress, and there is bipartisan support for the efficiency programs.

The office of Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., issued a statement Tuesday saying that Bush's rhetoric on energy does not match the reality of the proposed reductions in efficiency programs, noting that when Bush signed the energy bill last year, he said it "makes an unprecedented commitment to energy conservation and efficiency."

In a visit Tuesday to the National Renewable Fuels Laboratory in Golden, Colo., the president made it clear that he is focusing the energy budget on making breakthroughs in production of alternative and renewable energy sources and in developing a hydrogen-fueled car in the early 2020s. He cited "unbelievable opportunities" and said the country is close to making big advances in these areas.

Bush came to the lab only a day after the administration, seeking to avoid a public-relations embarrassment, announced it was shifting $5 million to the lab so that 32 workers who recently had been laid off could be put back on the payroll.

Democrats had criticized the layoffs, saying Bush was cutting a key organization that could be instrumental in achieving energy breakthroughs.

Taking note of this controversy in his talk at the lab, Bush cited some "mixed signals when it comes to funding. I think we've cleaned up those discrepancies" by shifting $5 million to keep the workers on.

Bush outlined what he called a "comprehensive strategy" to end the nation's reliance on petroleum.

But he acknowledged that it would take awhile for new technologies to save energy.