Energy secretary got earful from industry, met no environmentalists

Tuesday, March 26th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

WASHINGTON (AP) _ The White House firmly defended Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham on Tuesday as newly released documents showed he held at least eight private meetings with industry leaders while the administration crafted its energy plan.

``News flash: it's no surprise to anybody that the secretary of energy meets with energy-related groups,'' White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said.

The meetings between Abraham and the energy industry executives were disclosed in thousands of papers made public Monday related to agency participation in Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force in early 2001.

Critics of the administration's energy policies have long argued that industry had an open door to top-level administration policy makers, while those advocating conservation, energy efficiency improvements and renewable energy sources were given largely lip service.

Abraham said in a statement that the 11,000 pages of documents _ everything from daily schedules to congressional testimony _ ``will further confirm'' that the administration sought out a wide range of views, including that of environmentalists.

The papers document no top-level meetings with advocates of energy efficiency or renewable energy sources such as wind or solar power.

The department took pains to note that the documents also catalogue 23 requests that were denied for meetings mostly with industry representatives to discuss the energy plan. Among those turned down were Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skillings of Enron Corp.

While documents included reams of energy policy statements including some from environmental groups such as the Wilderness Society, it was the industry executives who had the access to Abraham, a key member of Cheney's task force.

Three dozen energy executives and lobbyists participated in eight meeting with Abraham from mid-February to late April of 2001. The Cheney energy report was released in May.

He met with a top executive of the American Coal Co.; officials of the Independent Petroleum Association of America; the chairman of Utilicorp, a major power company to discuss electricity deregulation; and with a half dozen utility executives and other oil and gas industry leaders.

A ``drop-by'' session to ``discuss nuclear energy's role'' in the Bush energy plan lasted 30 minutes on March 20 and included the head of the Nuclear Energy Institute, chairman of Westinghouse and the chief executives of a half dozen major nuclear power utilities.

Industry's access was shown in other papers among the 3,000 Energy Department documents and 4,000 documents also released Monday by the Environmental Protection Agency.

In one e-mail to Joe Kelliher, the DOE's point man on the Cheney task force, an official of Southern Company, the Atlanta-based power conglomerate, offers reasons why the administration should revamp a clean air regulation known as ``New Source Review'' which is at the heart of a series of ongoing lawsuits against Southern and several other utilities.

``I hope this is helpful,'' the utility official, Michael Riith, wrote Kelliher, adding, ``I look forward to lunch on Tuesday.''

The Cheney task force called for the EPA to review the clean air regulation.

Among the papers also were EPA documents revealing an oil industry push to ease state regulation of so-called ``boutique'' gasoline blends and auto industry pressure to ease federal fuel economy rules.

One of the oil companies, Citgo, urged the administration ``to exercise federal authority to prevent states'' from establishing separate fuel standards. The Cheney task force urged EPA to deal with the boutique fuels issue.

Also among the Energy Department and EPA papers was a three-page memo from the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers declaring that the federal auto fuel economy rule, known as CAFE, ``is an ineffective energy policy.''

The alliance instead supported consumer tax credits for advanced technology vehicles, and urged development of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The task force report supported such tax benefits, refrained from urging higher fuel economy requirements and urged development of hydrogen-powered vehicles.

The documents, many with large portions marked out, were ordered released by two federal judges as part of lawsuits brought by private groups trying to determine who influenced the administration's energy plan.

The disclosed papers stem from Freedom of Information lawsuits filed by Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, and the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group.

The Energy Department withheld 15,000 pages, citing exemptions for information related to internal agency practices, deliberations and personnel.

The administration also faces a similar lawsuit by the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress. That lawsuit was not involved in Monday's releases.