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WASHINGTON — Even as President Bush was signing the new energy bill into law, Sen. Jeff Bingaman was thinking ahead to next year.

Bingaman, the Silver City Democrat who chairs the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said he plans to look at whether the new law needs any fixes and push for two measures that were dropped at the insistence of the White House and Senate Republicans led by Pete Domenici of Albuquerque.

One is the renewable electricity standard that Rep. Tom Udall, Santa Fe Democrat passed through the House to require utilities to obtain 15 percent of their energy from renewable sources like wind, solar and geothermal power.

The second is to extend tax credits due to expire at the end of next year for homeowners and businesses that switch to solar or wind power.

"Those tax provisions are important," Bingaman said in an interview Wednesday. "Investment in those new technologies will dry up if we do not extend those tax credits."

Domenici opposed including the tax provisions, which cost $21 billion over 10 years, because they were paid for by eliminating tax breaks for the oil and gas industry. But he said he would work to extend the solar and wind tax credits by some other means in 2008.

Bingaman and Domenici were both on hand Wednesday as President Bush signed the energy bill at the Energy Department, a sudden switch in locales prompted by an electrical fire at the Old Executive Office Building next to the White House.

Bush joked that Domenici was "there in disguise," referring to the senator's new goatee. "Looking pretty handsome isn't he."

The new law requires that automakers achieve an average of 35 miles per gallon for all vehicles in their fleet by 2020 and that gasoline companies use 36 billion gallons of bio-fuels a year by 2022. It also requires a 70 percent increase in lighting efficiency over the next decade.

"Today is a historic day in our quest to reduce dependence on oil, particularly from foreign sources," Domenici said afterwards.

Bingaman said: "The new law dramatically increases the efficiency of vehicles, home appliances and lighting, while helping reduce our dependence on fossil fuel. It is very good for American consumers and the environment. But it could have been even better."

Some critics do not agree that the bill is good for consumers.

Beef producers complained that the use of corn to make ethanol is driving up the price of corn used to feed their cattle and thus meat and dairy prices.

Rep. Steve Pearce, a Hobbs Republican and the only member of the New Mexico delegation to vote no on the final bill, said it mandates more expensive cars, more expensive light bulbs, more expensive air conditioners, heaters and refrigerators."

Bingaman said it's true that consumers might pay more for light bulbs, but they will be getting a bulb that lasts as long as the lamp.

As for the impact on food prices, Bingaman said, "The price of ethanol has been going down, and the price of corn has been going up. There are a lot of unknowns in the equation."

The law requires that 21 billion gallons of the 36-billion-gallon mandate come from "advanced biofuels" made from wood chips, switchgrass or other cellulosic sources, not corn, but some experts question whether that's doable. Both Bingaman and Domenici had concerns about the final provision as it was modified by the House.

Bingaman conceded that in many respects the law is "a shot in the dark."

"The truth is none of us are smart enough to know the circumstances in 2012 or 2025. We're going to have to closely monitor the situation," Bingaman said.