Energy Policy Recommendations to the President and the 110th Congress

Since the National Commission on Energy Policy (NCEP) released its December 2004 report, Ending the Energy Stalemate: A Bipartisan Strategy to Meet America’s Energy Challenges, energy issues have remained at the top of the nation’s domestic policy agenda.

Over the last two years, the Commission has continued to explore options for closing that gap. This document summarizes the results of those efforts and seeks to update the Commission’s previous proposals in light of recent developments, while identifying a subset of high-priority policy options that merit immediate and focused attention from political leaders. In brief, this short list of priority items calls for addressing the demand as well as the supply side of the oil security equation; advancing a timely and meaningful response to the problem of global climate change; expanding on current efforts to promote both increased energy efficiency and a greater diversity of domestic energy supply options; and substantially increasing federal investment in energy technology research, development, demonstration, and early deployment. Going forward, the Commission intends further work in all of these areas as part of an ongoing effort to refine its understanding of key issues and to continue informing the public policy debate.

It must also be stressed at the outset that the focus of this document is on specific areas where the Commission (a) believes that additional policy interventions, or in some cases an expansion or extension of current commitments, are called for and (b) we have new or additional recommendations to offer. Thus, we do not attempt here to review the full suite of topics and proposals included in our 2004 report. Nevertheless, we believe that all of the needs identified in that report remain extremely important.