Reid: Renewable electricity mandate still lacks 60 votes

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) Tuesday reiterated his assessment that there are not enough votes to include a renewable electricity production mandate in a slimmed-down oil-spill and energy strategy.

“The numbers that we have indicate that those votes are not there,” Reid told reporters. “I know there are some people saying that, but I’d like them to give me the names, and I’ll be happy to check them off.” Reid did not include a renewable electricity standard, or RES, in a draft summary of a broader spill and energy plan he unveiled Tuesday and that the Senate is expected to vote on before senators leave town for the summer.

Renewable energy advocates — including former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) – have argued this week that there are more than 60 votes for an RES that was included in a bill approved by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee with bipartisan support last year. 

“We have 60 votes for an RES amendment and will continue to push for its consideration in this bill,” said Denise Bode, head of the American Wind Energy Association, in a statement. Bode said the wind energy “is in distress” and that an RES “is a critical component to ensure the U.S. wind industry thrives.”

Reid, though, is expected to avoid amendments he deems controversial to the oil-spill and energy plan, and may not allow any amendments at all in order to finish the spill and energy package in a tight legislative calendar before the summer break begins in early August.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) — a member of the Senate energy panel — said Tuesday that he hasn’t given up. “I am hopeful that we get something through here that will have an RES,” he said. While Dorgan has called for a tougher standard than what the energy panel approved, he concedes a stronger mandate won’t fly. “I think it is unlikely to be in the bill,” he said.

The Senate energy panel language would require electric utilities to produce 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources like wind, solar and biomass by 2021. A quarter of that requirement could also be met through energy efficiency activities. 

—Ben Geman contributed