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Show 1 barn oaio ml energy Bill io unaeGGponiG ulation to the intrastate market. mar-ket. "Why anyone thinks that extending federal regulation will solve our problems is beyond me," said Gam. "It is the regulated interstate inter-state market that is in trouble, not the intrastate market. Why should we afflict af-flict the healthy patient with the disease that has almost x UJS. Senator Jake Garn i predicted that unless Senate - is House conferees drop cer- L: tain provisions from propos - 1;. ed energy legislation, there t "will be no energy bill at ill this year." In a speech s prepared for delivery on the is Senate floor, Garn said that il: it least three major parts le: of the propsed energy bill to ire completely unacceptable. rs "It is currently being pro - S( Posed that a bill be report - I ed containing intrastate regulation reg-ulation of natural gas, "b federalization of utili- ; ties, and a tremendous crude oil tax," said Senator Garn. . ' 1 cannot believe that the Senate would accept such legislation and I will do what I can to see that they do not. We may be lucky and have a mild winter this year. I hope we do. But if we do not, all the laws in the world wiU not produce the energy we need. Nothing but the marketplace ever has." Senator Garn said the compromise being considered consid-ered for natural gas has two things wrong with it: It does not allow deregulation of gas and it extends federal reg- killed the sick one? We must understand that government gov-ernment decrees will not call gas out of the ground. And why do some people object to paying American oil and gas companies more than .$1.75 per thousand cubic feet .iivihile insisting on paying the -'Algerians $4.50 per thousand. for their gas? We are also importing gas from Canada and Mexico and paying as much as $3.50 for it. President Pres-ident Carter says he is con- cerned about the balance of payments deficit and attributes at-tributes a good share of it 'to our im ports of oil and gas. Yet his energy proposal, as well as that being consider- . ed in conference, does no-thing-to decrease those im-pors, im-pors, (Continued on Page 2) there will be no reduc imports. "Of the three major of the energy program discussed, not one If ceeding in an acceptaK Regulation of the inti gas market is unaccei the destruction of the pendence of the electri ity industry and the us tlon of the States' ro unacceptable; and th tremely burdensome oil tax of doubtful uti unacceptable. "I am only one Se but I represent apra state and I understanc tie about the econom energy production. Th gress, the Federal Go ment must butt out a the marketplace dete our energy policy." encouraged by the peace initiatives in-itiatives between Israel and Egypt but we must be realistic; real-istic; it is conceivable that Egypt will be ostracized from the Arab League. It is even conceivable that there will be war between Egypt and one or more of the other Arab States. As President Carter noted in his news conference, we must reduce our dependence on foreign oil. And yet, his proposals don't do it. He relies on a higher price of oil to discourage consumption consump-tion and thus produce the conservation that is going to reduce the gap between production pro-duction and consumption. The fact is, the already high price of crude oil is producing conservation. It is also a fact that his proposed pro-posed crude oil equalization tax would do little, if anything, any-thing, to reduce oil Imports. Under the proposed tax, the producer has no incentive to get out and find more oil. If there is no additonal incentive, in-centive, there will be no additional ad-ditional production. If there is no additional production, HERE'S MORE ABOUT GARN REPORTS "The utility rate regulation regula-tion section of the -bill is equally unacceptable, for what it does is federalize the electric utility industry. It is clear that anytime Congress Con-gress wants to, it can order or-der specific pricingpolicies. There are too many differences differ-ences among states, too many local conditions to be taken into account for us to accept federalization of the industry. It is unnecessary and unwise. "As for oil, we are importing im-porting very close to 50 percent per-cent of our needs. At the same time, the Middle East situation is explosive. I am |
