For Immediate Release
Contact: Justin Kitsch
202-461-2365
July 15, 2010
EC Applauds Energy Security Legislation
WASHINGTON – The Electrification Coalition (EC) today applauded energy security legislation introduced by Senators Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Tom Carper (D-DE), Tom Udall (D-NM), and Michael Bennet (D-CO). Among other provisions, the Oil Independence Act of 2010 would improve fuel economy standards and transportation infrastructure, create a National Energy Security Council in the Executive Office of the President, and fund the electric vehicles deployment community program set out in the Electric Vehicle Deployment Act of 2010.
“I would like to thank Senators Merkley, Carper, Udall and Bennet for introducing this important energy security legislation,” Robbie Diamond, president of the EC, said. “This bill is comprised of a serious and wide-ranging set of policies that, taken together, represent a major effort to combat our nation’s dangerous dependence on petroleum. Particularly important are the provisions to fully fund the bipartisan Electric Vehicle Deployment Act, of which Senator Merkley is also a cosponsor. Electrification of our cars and trucks remains the only way to fundamentally end our oil dependence in the long term.”
On May 27, Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate introduced legislation designed to advance the wide-scale deployment of electric vehicles and to develop the infrastructure needed to support them. The Senate bill, entitled the “Electric Vehicle Deployment Act of 2010” was introduced by Senators Byron Dorgan (D-ND), Lamar Alexander (R-TN), and Jeff Merkley (D-OR). The House legislation, entitled the “Electric Drive Vehicle Deployment Act of 2010,” was cosponsored by House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming Chairman Ed Markey (D-MA), Rep. Judy Biggert (R-IL), Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA), and Rep. Jerry McNerney (D-CA).
The legislation echoes recommendations put forward by the Electrification Coalition, a nonpartisan, not-for-profit group of business leaders committed to promoting policies and actions that facilitate the deployment of electric vehicles on a mass scale in order to combat the economic, environmental, and national security dangers caused by our nation’s dependence on petroleum. The EC’s Electrification Roadmap, released in November 2009, proposed a set of policies in which geographic areas would compete to be selected as electrification deployment communities: specific areas in which targeted, temporary financial incentives are employed so that all of the elements of an electrified transportation system are deployed simultaneously.
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