We’ll say this for energy industry lobbyists: they’re persistent. No matter how many times you knock ‘em down, they just get up and come right back at you. This week, the energy bill, already a two-time loser, is on the floor of the House, making its third run at a win. Congress has rejected this bill before and needs to reject it again. This legislative beast threatens to drain the U.S. Treasury with its package of special interest handouts and tax breaks for energy companies.

Despite the bill’s proponents' claims to the contrary, bigger isn’t always better when it comes to legislation. In April, legislators in the House of Representatives began circulating a new draft of the energy bill, titled the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which contained nearly $50 billion in federal authorized spending and $7.7 billion more in tax breaks. In the weeks that it took for the bill to find its way to the floor, the cost grew to nearly $90 billion.

With a $90 billion price tag, Americans have every reason to be concerned about this bill’s effect on their pocketbooks. The bill contains $5.8 billion for the ethanol industry, $1.8 billion for the deceptively named Clean Coal Power Initiative, and hundreds of millions of dollars for the research and development of the next generation of nuclear reactors, part of the Bush administration’s deeply misguided Nuclear 2010 program. It is a virtual wish list for the energy industry, which has funneled $175.7 million into campaign coffers since 2000 in order to make this dream a reality.

Here are some of the most egregious provisions in the legislation:

• Wastes $1.8 billion on the notorious Clean Coal Power Initiative. Clean Coal has been cited time and again by the Government Accountability Office for mishandling taxpayer money. The energy bill rewards Clean Coal’s record of shoddy performance by giving the program another $1.8 billion.

• Breaks the bank with billions in tax breaks. At a time of record oil prices, the energy bill provides tax breaks to oil and gas producers that will cost the U.S. Treasury $3.275 billion over ten years.

• Establishes a $2 billion slush fund for impractical oil and gas research. The bill creates a special fund for ultra-deepwater oil and natural gas research outside of the appropriations process. Many energy companies already engage in this type of drilling, so the ultra-deepwater fund will merely distort natural market forces while wasting taxpayer dollars on duplicative R&D efforts.

This legislation is not the comprehensive energy strategy that the Bush administration promised; rather, it is a package of pork projects stitched together in a calculated political attempt to secure passage. In many ways, the bill is a major step backwards for America’s energy policy: by throwing billions of federal dollars at unprofitable power sources, Congress is undermining natural market forces and stifling the innovation necessary for the U.S. to overcome the current energy crunch.

And while the energy bill will add another huge burden to our growing federal debt, it is not going to provide the nation with the energy security and price stability it needs. The Energy Information Administration, the research arm of the Department of Energy, has found that the energy bill would do little to slow our growing dependence on foreign sources of energy, and would actually raise the price of gasoline. Even Sam Bodman, the usually reticent new Secretary of Energy, said at a recent hearing that the energy bill is “not going to have any short-term impact on energy prices that’s meaningful.”

We also agree with the President when he alluded last week that there was really no need for many of these subsidies, “I will tell you with $55 [per barrel] oil we don't need incentives to oil and gas companies to explore. There are plenty of incentives.”

Let’s see if Congress agrees.