Washington ? Four years after President Bush called for an overhaul of the nation’s energy agenda, Congress presented him with a mammoth plan he said he was eager to sign – even though it costs twice as much as he wanted and won’t open an Alaska wildlife refuge to oil drilling.

The Senate passed the mammoth legislation with broad bipartisan support, 74-26, ending years of congressional stalemate over energy. It will funnel billions of dollars to energy companies, including tax breaks and loan guarantees for new nuclear power plants, clean coal technology and wind energy.

It had breezed through the House a day earlier.

Some senators said the bill, despite its broad sweep, does nothing to reduce the high cost of energy, especially at the gasoline pumps, and will not reduce the country’s heavy reliance on oil imports. Its supporters maintained that in the long term it will refocus the country’s energy priorities and promote cleaner energy and more conservation.

“I look forward to signing it into law,” Bush said in a statement, calling the legislation “critically important to our long-term national and economic security.”

A task force led by Vice President Dick Cheney called for a new vision for the country’s energy priorities four years ago. Congress came close to providing it but was stymied repeatedly by regional conflicts and environmental disputes.

The bill approved Friday represents the first broad overhaul of energy policies in 13 years.

Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., the chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee who led Senate negotiations on the bill with the House, acknowledged that it will not lower gas prices or even affect oil imports in the short term.

Domenici maintained that the bill’s myriad of measures – from tax breaks and loan guarantees to new appliance efficiency requirements – will benefit the nation “not tomorrow but for the next five or 10 years.”

For the first time it would require utilities to comply with federal reliability standards for its electricity grid, instead of self-regulation. It’s hoped that will reduce the likely repeat of a power blackout such as the one that struck the Midwest and Northeast in the summer of 2003.

For consumers, the bill would provide tax credits for buying gas-electric cars, make energy improvements in new and existing homes, and beginning in 2007 extend daylight-saving time by one month to save energy.

The bill’s price tag – $12.3 billion over 10 years – is twice what the White House originally had put forward and raised caution among some senators.

“This bill digs us deeper into a budget black hole. : The costs of this are staggering,” said Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., who tried to block the legislation on grounds that it violated the Senate’s own budget rules. The effort failed 71-29.