The cost of fuel - to our wallet and our climate - has reached a breaking point.  Pump prices have almost quadrupled since 1999.  Yet by some measures transportation still accounts for about 2/3 of our petroleum use in the U.S.  Roughly 99.5% of our fuels are polluting, overpriced, and non-native. 

 

Continuing the failed policies of big oil subsidies and unregulated market speculation do not help.  Nor will tapping our last reserves.

 

Instead we must invest aggressively in updating our freight and passenger rail system.  We must increase vehicle fuel efficiency, and research alternatives such as electric, hydrogen, and wood-biofuel engines.  Such measures will benefit our environment, our economy, and our security.

 

I am proud to have helped bring the Downeaster to the Brunswick area in 2010, a move expected to generate millions in new revenue and help create hundreds of needed new jobs.  From Brunswick, further rail expansions are possible to the north and east. 

 

With a single gallon of diesel, a train carries one ton of freight or passengers an average of 423 miles.

 

Additional measures, such as new incentives for vehicle fuel efficiency and further research into wood-based biofuels, are also needed.  I am working hard on measures like these, and since May of 2008 I have been part of a Governor's task force to seek long and short-term solutions to the rising cost of transportation fuels.  I look forward to bold action:  a Maine-made Marshall Plan for an independent transportation economy.

 

While seeking to reduce costs, we can not neglect our roads and bridges.  Because gasoline is taxed at a fixed amount (number of pennies) per gallon, there is less money from this tax for our roads when people use less fuel.  Using less is a welcome outcome -- but it leaves our state Highway Fund in dire straits.  We must find alternate funding mechanisms.

 

Energy has become a critical issue in Maine politics, national politics, and in the world.  Tranportation must be part of the solution.