The carbon legislation introduced by Sens. Boxer and Kerry "doesn't have the votes to move forward." That is what Tom Kuhn, president of the Edison Electric Institute, told the Annual State of The Energy Industry briefing in Washington this week. Other, less dramatic initiatives may soon come forth... I am sure that Tom will provide an up-to-the-minute update on all this when he appears at the March 1-2 EnergyBiz Leadership Forum in Washington.

The briefing for six years has been superbly orchestrated by Barry Worthington, leader of the United States Energy Association. It has become a fixed must-attend event every year just as the Potomac starts to develop a thin skin of ice in mid-January. Almost every major energy association is there, along with consultants, lobbyists, leading energy journalists and staffers of energy committees on the Hill.

The power industry faces a bind of "negative cash flow," caught between the jaws of recession-related drops in energy sales and rising demand for infrastructure investment. That view was put forth by Jeffrey Holzchuh, vice chairman of Morgan Stanley.The magnitude of the challenge? Power, gas and water utilities face a capital expenditure bill of $6.5 trillion over the next decade, Holzchuh said. That is DOUBLE what they now have in rate base.

One outcome, he said: M&A in the utility world, which was fallen off since 2007, is expected to accelerate in 2010 and 2011.

Make know mistake, the banker said. America is facing a cultural change as energy efficiency, renewables and carbon policies slowly are rolled out. It took a generation for an environmental frame of mind to sink in in Europe, Holzchuh said.

Impressed by all the new found natural gas resources? It will take 30,000 to 52,000 miles of new pipelines, said Donald Santa, president of the Interstate Natural Gas Association. The price tag will range from $110 billion to $160 billion. THIS is such a huge deal that I had already invited Santa to write about it in the March/April issue of EnergyBiz - so watch for it.

Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association, related how 6,500 megawatts of new solar generation are coming - through 14 separate projects.

Denise Bode, who is also on the EBLF program, said that there are 31,000 megawatts of wind generation - tipping the scales at 2 percent of all generation and well on the way to the nirvana of 20 percent by 2030.

Nuclear power is coming, with 4-8 new plants possible by 2017, according to Paul Genoa, of the Nuclear Energy Institute. From there, "We can ramp up fairly rapidly."

Perhaps the most striking voice at the briefing was David Parker, president of the American Gas Association. Despite all the flurry of activity lately about carbon caps and a flood of federal spending on smart grid, energy efficiency and economic stimulus, there still is not a clear vision of where the energy sector is headed.

"We don't have a central energy voice," Parker said. The energy secretary doesn't speak for the energy industry but portions of it."

John Shelk, president of the Electric Power Supply Association, put it this way. There is now a cacophony of voices, "everybody pushing their fuel and technology," he said.

"Let everybody compete and not predetermine the outcome."