Over the past several Congresses, there have been ongoing efforts to develop comprehensive energy legislation. Energy bills were debated in the 107 th and 108 th Congresses, but final agreement was not reached in either Congress. The debate over omnibus energy legislation ( H.R. 6 ) continued in the 109 th Congress. On August 8, 2005, President Bush signed the Energy Policy Act of 2005 ( P.L. 109-58 ). The final version of H.R. 6 was enacted with some significant differences from the House- and Senate-passed bills. In many cases, the enacted law and the House and Senate versions treat environmental issues in a similar manner. However, there are several environmental provisions that were addressed by an earlier version of the bill but not the enacted law, or that were treated differently by different versions of the bill. The H.R. 6 environmental provisions addressed in this report are the following: limits on the use of MTBE; a renewable fuel mandate for gasoline; stricter regulation of underground storage tanks; climate change; Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act exemptions for oil and gas exploration and production (related to stormwater runoff and hydraulic fracturing); incentives and R&D funding for alternative fuels and vehicles; hydroelectric relicensing; ozone compliance deadlines; streamlining of environmental regulations; and a renewable portfolio standard. A short discussion of each of the above provisions is included in this report. It should be noted that not all environment-related provisions of H.R. 6 are discussed in this report; it focuses on the major environmental issues in the debate. Title XV of the enacted law contains several provisions addressing the gasoline additives methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) and ethanol. Under the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, reformulated gasoline (RFG) sold in many areas of the country with poor air quality was required to contain an oxygenate (MTBE, ethanol, or other substances containing oxygen) to improve combustion and reduce emissions of ozone-forming compounds and carbon monoxide. A little more than 30% of the gasoline sold in the United States is RFG, and a majority of RFG has contained MTBE. MTBE has been implicated in numerous incidents of groundwater contamination, however, and 25 states have taken steps to ban or regulate its use. The most significant of these bans (in California, New York, and Connecticut) took effect at the end of 2003. The law repeals the Clean Air Act requirement to use oxygenates in RFG, eliminating a key incentive for refiners to use MTBE. The repeal will take effect on May 5, 2006 (270 days after enactment)—except in California, where it took effect immediately upon enactment, August 8, 2005. Both the House and Senate versions of H.R. 6 would also have banned the use of MTBE in motor vehicle fuel nationwide, with some exceptions, in 2014 or 2009 respectively. The enacted version does not contain a ban, however, effectively leaving the matter to the states to decide individually. In place of the oxygen requirement, P.L. 109-58 establishes a new requirement that an increasing amount of gasoline contain renewable fuels such as ethanol. The law requires that motor fuels contain at least 4.0 billion gallons of renewables in 2006, and requires an increase of 700 million gallons each year through 2011, before reaching a level of 7.5 billion gallons in 2012. (In 2004, about 3.4 billion gallons of ethanol were used in motor fuels.) The law also authorizes funds to clean up MTBE contamination in groundwater, as discussed further in the next section below. The enacted law also contains "anti-backsliding" provisions, to preserve the reductions in emissions of toxic substances achieved by the RFG program. The baseline emissions are set as the quantity emitted in 2001 and 2002. The most controversial of the MTBE provisions was dropped in conference: a "safe harbor" that the House bill would have provided for fuels containing MTBE. The safe harbor from liability would have meant that such fuels could not be deemed defective in design or manufacture by virtue of the fact that they contained MTBE. The effect of this provision would have been to protect anyone in the product chain, from manufacturers to retailers, from liability for cleanup of MTBE or for personal injury or property damage based on the nature of the product. (Defective product liability is a legal approach that has been used in California to require refiners to shoulder liability for MTBE cleanup.) If liability for manufacturing and design defects had been ruled out, plaintiffs would have needed to demonstrate negligence in the handling of such fuels to establish liability—a more difficult legal standard to meet. The House version of the bill had set a retroactive effective date of September 5, 2003, for the safe harbor, rather than the date of enactment. This effective date would have protected oil and chemical industry defendants from defective product claims in about 150 lawsuits that were filed in 15 states after that date. In addition to the House bill's safe harbor for MTBE producers, both the House and Senate versions of the bill contained a safe harbor for producers of renewable fuels, such as ethanol. This provision was less controversial, since there was no pending litigation that would have been affected, but it was also dropped from the enacted version. [This section prepared by James McCarthy, Specialist in Environmental Policy.] As part of the legislative effort to address drinking water contamination by MTBE, P.L. 109-58 (Title XV, Subtitle B) amends Subtitle I of the Solid Waste Disposal Act (SWDA) to allow funds appropriated from the Leaking Underground Storage Tank (LUST) Trust Fund to be used to enforce UST leak prevention regulations, and authorizes appropriations from the fund specifically for remediating gasoline tank leaks involving MTBE and other oxygenated fuels (including ethanol). The subtitle adds several leak prevention provisions and new requirements for states, EPA, and tank owners, and makes other changes to the underground storage tank (UST) regulatory program. To address a nationwide groundwater contamination problem caused by leaking underground storage tanks, Congress created the UST leak prevention, detection, and cleanup program in 1984 (Solid Waste Disposal Act, Subtitle I). In 1986, Congress established the LUST Trust Fund to help EPA and states pay the costs of cleaning up leaking petroleum USTs where owners fail to do so, and to oversee LUST cleanup activities. While much progress has been made in the program, several issues remain. A major issue has concerned the discovery of MTBE at thousands of LUST sites across the country. This gasoline additive, which has been used to reduce air pollution from auto emissions, is very water soluble. Once released, MTBE tends to spread further than conventional gasoline; consequently, these leaks are more likely to reach water supplies and are more costly to remediate. Another issue is that state resources have not met the demands of overseeing the UST regulatory program, which is aimed at preventing leaks. States have sought larger appropriations from the trust fund to support the LUST program, and some have sought flexibility to use LUST funds to enforce the UST leak prevention regulations. Subtitle B, which is based on the House bill, adds several leak prevention provisions to the UST program. It requires EPA or states to conduct compliance inspections of USTs every three years; prohibits fuel delivery to ineligible tanks, directs states to develop training requirements for persons responsible for operating and maintaining tanks and responding to spills; clarifies and expands UST compliance requirements for federal facilities; and requires EPA, with Indian tribes, to develop and implement a strategy to address releases on tribal lands. The subtitle further requires that, when determining the portion of cleanup costs to recover from a tank owner or operator, EPA or a state must consider the owner or operator's ability to pay for cleanup and still maintain basic business operations. It also allows EPA and states to use LUST funds to conduct inspections and enforce UST release prevention and detection requirements. To further protect groundwater, the enacted law requires states to do one of the following: (1) require that new tanks are secondarily contained and monitored for leaks if the tank is within 1,000 feet of a community water system or potable well; or (2) require that UST manufacturers and installers maintain evidence of financial responsibility to pay for corrective actions, and require that persons installing UST systems are certified or licensed, or that their UST system installation is certified by a professional engineer or inspected and approved by the state, or is compliant with a code of practice or other method that is no less protective of human health and the environment. This subtitle authorizes appropriations from the LUST Trust Fund, for each of FY2005 through FY2009, of $200 million for cleaning up leaks from petroleum tanks generally, and another $200 million for responding to tank leaks involving MTBE or other oxygenated fuel additives (e.g., ethanol). It also authorizes to be appropriated from the trust fund, for each of FY2005 through FY2009, $155 million for EPA and states to administer the LUST cleanup program and to enforce the UST leak prevention requirements. From general revenues, it authorizes $50 million to be appropriated for each of FY2005 through FY2009 for EPA and states to administer the remainder of Subtitle I. [This section prepared by [author name scrubbed], Specialist in Environmental Policy.] Title XVI of P.L. 109-58 establishes a voluntary national program designed to accelerate demonstration and deployment of less-carbon-intensive technology to encourage voluntary reductions in greenhouse gases. The sections of this title attempt to support actions focused on reducing U.S. carbon intensity (the ratio of greenhouse gas emissions per unit of gross domestic product). The enacted law does not establish a requirement to reduce emissions. This title also establishes a program to encourage exports of carbon intensity-reducing technologies to developing countries.