To provide the critical stability for our domestic energy production in the face of world price uncertainty, I will request legislation to authorize and require tariffs, import quotas, or price floors to protect our energy prices at levels which will achieve energy independence.

Increasing energy supplies is not enough.  We must take additional steps to cut long-term consumption.  I therefore propose to the Congress:  legislation to make thermal efficiency standards mandatory for all new buildings in the United States; a new tax credit of up to $150 for those homeowners who install insulation equipment; the establishment of an energy conservation program to help low-income families purchase insulation supplies; legislation to modify and defer automotive pollution standards for 5 years, which will enable us to improve automobile gas mileage by 40 percent by 1980.

These proposals and actions, cumulatively, can reduce our dependence on foreign energy supplies from 3 to 5 million barrels per day by 1985.  To make the United States invulnerable to foreign disruption, I propose standby emergency legislation and a strategic storage program of 1 billion barrels of oil for domestic needs and 300 million barrels for national defense purposes.

I will ask for the funds needed for energy research and development activities.  I have established a goal of 1 million barrels of synthetic fuels and shale oil production per day by 1985 together with an incentive program to achieve it.

I have a very deep belief in America’s capabilities.  Within the next 10 years, my program envisions:  200 major nuclear powerplants; 250 major new coal mines; 150 major coal-fired powerplants; 30 major new refineries; 20 major new synthetic fuel plants; the drilling of many thousands of new oil wells; the insulation of 18 million homes; and the manufacturing and the sale of millions of new automobiles, trucks, and buses that use much less fuel.

I happen to believe that we can do it.  In another crisis—­the one in 1942 President Franklin D. Roosevelt said this country would build 60,000 military aircraft.  By 1943, production in that program had reached 125,000 aircraft annually.  They did it then.  We can do it now.

If the Congress and the American people will work with me to attain these targets, they will be achieved and will be surpassed.  From adversity, let us seize opportunity.  Revenues of some $30 billion from higher energy taxes designed to encourage conservation must be refunded to the American people in a manner which corrects distortions in our tax system wrought by inflation.

People have been pushed into higher tax brackets by inflation, with consequent reduction in their actual spending power.  Business taxes are similarly distorted because inflation exaggerates reported profits, resulting in excessive taxes.

Accordingly, I propose that future individual income taxes be reduced by $16.5 billion.  This will be done by raising the low-income allowance and reducing tax rates.  This continuing tax cut will primarily benefit lower-and middle-income taxpayers.