The American Chemistry Council (ACC), Arlington VA, is lauding the National Governors Association (NGA) and the House of Representatives for its efforts in support of the president's energy plan.
ACC supports the governors' resolution that developing a national energy policy is "imperative," and that the policy "must provide the affordable energy services that a healthy economy needs while reducing our dependence on foreign sources of energy and protecting the environment," according to council information.
ACC feels that HR 4, recently passed in the House of Representatives, would help achieve many of the 10 principles espoused by the governors' association in its Comprehensive National Energy Policy.
"We hope the Senate will move quickly as the NGA and the House have when Congress returns from its August recess, and that the President will be able to sign a national energy policy bill before year's end," the council states.
The lack of a national energy policy has been starkly brought home to the business of chemistry, which has seen its trade surplus slashed by 60 percent, a decline of 12,000 production jobs, and manufacturing capacity for a number of its highest volume chemical products idled, according to ACC.
The industry uses energy, especially natural gas, as both a fuel and a raw material, converting some $20 billion of energy inputs into more than $200 billion in products.
The governors' association believes that the solution to the country's need for energy requires increased conservation and energy efficiency, as well as exploration for new energy supplies, according to ACC.
"ACC couldn't agree more," the council states. "The business of chemistry is among the nation's most efficient energy users. Since 1974 it has reduced the amount of energy consumed per unit of output by 41 percent, and has invested more than $20 billion in cogeneration technology, which uses fuel twice as efficiently as conventional electric utility power. Chemical products also make other industries' products more energy efficient. Refrigerators, automobiles and homes are all more efficient thanks to products from the business of chemistry."