GOP energy package calls for more drilling in Alaska
Published Friday, May 2, 2008
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Stumble It!WASHINGTON, D.C. — Senate Republicans on Thursday unveiled an energy package designed to boost domestic production of oil and natural gas by expanding exploration offshore and in Alaska.
Republicans announced their plan — the Domestic Energy Production Act — ahead of Democrats, who are scheduled to release their own package of proposals to combat soaring gasoline prices at the pump today.
Republicans said consumers are tired of waiting for Congress to act to relieve record-high gasoline prices, which averaged $3.62 a gallon nationwide on Thursday. Pump prices around Fairbanks were running as much as $3.82 a gallon on Thursday.
“We believe we have a comprehensive proposal that would actually have an impact (on the price of gasoline),” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Sens. Ted Stevens and Lisa Murkowski are among the 18 cosponsors of the bill, which was introduced by Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee ranking member Pete Domenici, R-N.M.
“This measure will go a long way toward helping us break the cycle of dependence on foreign sources of oil,” Domenici said.
Republicans claim their plan would produce an additional 24 billion barrels of oil, or enough to satisfy U.S. consumption for five years, primarily by allowing drilling in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and offshore along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.
Allowing drilling offshore and in ANWR could reduce the price of oil to between $55 to $63 a barrel, Republicans said.
“Our country has the resources to produce more oil and gas,” Murkowski said. “We just need the policies that will allow us to develop those resources.”
Democrats, who have been preparing their own package to address rising pump prices, blasted the GOP proposal, calling it more of the failed policies of the past.
“When it comes to ideas for helping Americans paying more and more every day at the gas pump, Bush Republicans are running on empty,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said. “Their only answer is to drill for more fossil fuels and drill deeper into Americans’ pockets to line those of Big Oil.”
Several of the Republican proposals have failed to win approval from the Senate in the past and are likely to be rebuffed again. Murkowski remained hopeful, though, that the impact of high energy prices would spur Democrats to vote for some of GOP suggestions.
“It’s a package that has its own areas of controversy,” Murkowski said. “But we’ve never been at the point where we had $120 a barrel oil either.”
Murkowski said she expects gasoline prices to be an issue when voters go to the polls in November if Congress doesn’t take meaningful action soon to increase domestic production.
“American consumers are fit to be tied when they go to the pump,” she said.
The Republican plan relies heavily on tapping new sources of domestic oil and gas, while Democrats are focusing on tightening regulatory oversight of oil companies to discourage price gouging and market speculation. Democrats also want to impose a windfall profits tax on oil companies and use the revenue to fund renewable energy projects.
About the only thing both sides agree on is suspending putting oil into the national Strategic Petroleum Reserve for six months while crude prices remain near historic highs.
The Republican package would also let states petition the federal government to allow drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. In exchange, states would get a greater share of the federal royalties from offshore production.
Alaska, whose areas are not under the moratorium, would be eligible for revenue sharing from production off its coast after about 10 years.
The Interior Department has already begun issuing exploration leases in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas and is considering allowing oil and gas companies to explore in Bristol Bay. Under the revenue sharing, the states would receive 37.5 percent of the royalties from production.
Stevens said Alaska is ready to provide the Lower 48 with domestically-produced oil and gas if Congress will allow more drilling.
Murkowski said technical advances in oil production techniques during the last couple of decades mean that it is possible to develop ANWR and other resource-rich areas in an environmentally friendly way.
“We want to be able to provide more energy to the country,” she said. “We have the resources, we just have to have the policy to allow us to tap those resources.”
Under the Republicans’ plan, about 2,000 acres of ANWR’s coastal plain would be opened to exploration. The proposal also gives the state a 50-percent share of the royalties from production in ANWR. Republicans claim the area would add 1 million barrels a day of crude oil to the nation’s supply.
“There’s no question we have to open (ANWR), and we have to open it now,” Stevens said.
Conservation groups criticized the ANWR proposal, judging it “dead on arrival.”
Kristen Miller, of the Alaska Wilderness League, said Republicans only seem capable of recycling the same proposals over and over again. She said lawmakers would be better off focusing on improving energy conservation and increasing production of renewable energy sources.
Northern Alaska Environmental Center spokeswoman Pam Miller challenged the assumption that drilling would only occur on a limited portion of the coastal plain, and said the first barrel of oil wouldn’t be produced from ANWR for at least a decade.
“With any development bill, it opens the entire 1.5 million-acre coastal plain,” she said. “There would be exploration across the entire area.”
Pam Miller said she doesn’t see Democrats agreeing to support the ANWR provision, regardless how high the price of oil climbs.
“I think there are some places that are so special that the American people want to see them protected,” Pam Miller said. “And the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is one of them.”
But Stevens said the combination of opening parts of ANWR and construction of a natural gas pipeline would provide a major boost to the state’s economy, as well as lower energy prices for cash-strapped consumers across the country.
“Oil companies estimate they will spend between $45 billion and $60 billion to develop (ANWR),” he said. “Combined with the construction of the ... pipeline, which is expected to start soon and will cost about $40 billion dollars, these resources would deliver a massive influx of jobs and capital investment in the U.S.”
Community Discussion
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ANWR is an area of 19 million acres. I think that exploration and drilling can happen on 2000 acres. The caribou, insects, and birds still have plenty of range.
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the Democratic proposal will be new taxes on oil companies (guaranteed to raise the price of fuel), more study of alternate energy sources, and more conservation.
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the Republicans proposal will be lower taxes on oil companies (guaranteed to raise the price of fuel), fake and underfunded studies of alternate energy sources, and less conservation.
Yes democrats don't care about the price of fuel and gas, if they did they would have allowing for drilling and exploration over 10 years and would have cited with current president Bush to all to open ANWR and other locations. This is the only way for American to reduced it oil dependencies. Yes, it's a small footprint for the new drilling location on a vast frozen tundra, and every measure to protect the area will be made. Plus a bonus to the Wildlife is a more protective corridor around the drilling location for safer breeding. Example, are other areas that has pumps are protect, by no hunting allowed. It's even a win win situation for the wildlife. Drill now, don't wait till we hit $125 a barrell or higher.
If ANWR is so special to the American people, why don't they just get in thir little cars and come see it? Our hands are still tied and so we continue to support Saudi Arabia. Wake up Washington!!!
I listened to the entire press conference. Ted and Lisa and most of the Republicans sounded so foolish.
The best way to reduce the price of oil is to reduce demand. The federal government is buying millions of barrels of oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve- a reserve that is almost full.
Why?
The idiots in DC have not figured out yet that we have a crisis- today.
If we stop putting oil into a nearly full reserve the price of oil will begin to fall immediately. This is yet another example of how Bush- the most unpopular president in history (according to today's news) is damaging this country.
Yet Ted and Lisa babble on about ANWR- have they not figured out that their pals over at Exxon do not want that supply opened? Limiting supplies ensures high prices.
If the idiots in DC really wanted to help- they should make sure tax credits for renewable energy are not allowed to expire this year. They should also make federal grants available for the design of better batteries that will ensure that electric cars are an even better alternative than they are now.
Let's see Electric Cars....So how do we produce this electricity? Not Hydro, Not Coal, Not Nuclear. Oh I know, cover more farm land with solar panels and wind farms. The rest of the farms can produce corn for ethanol even though it has already caused the price of food to go up. This way when the economy is completely in the toilet the wonderful government led by the democrats can come in and save us all....SWEET!!
Oil companies can produce less, have less expense, charge more. What other business can do that. No wonder their profit line is so high. What a country! As always, a few making it hard for the rest of us.
Ramster21: "This is the only way for American to reduced it oil dependencies."
Incorrect. More correct to say, as 5050 did, that the best way is to reduce our demand.
By keeping gas taxes low, we (and I mean, we as a nation, collectively and historically) have financed our spatial expansion, so that a large part of the population lives on large lots accessible only by roads (not streets) and highways. With oil so cheap (by comparison, many European countries are paying over $8 per gallon) we become confident in our ability to live ever farther away from our daily needs of food, work, and people. Now afraid of neighbors, we make the personal automobile our lifeline to the world.
It was not always this way in the U.S., and it is not this way everywhere today.
There are places where people live in complete neighborhoods, where work, play, residence, and all kinds of civic life are available within a short walk. There are places where neighborhoods are served by frequent buses and trains, connecting them to other neighborhoods and city centers. There are places where a person might never own a car yet still live a life of convenience and dignity.
As a nation, we have turned our back on centralization, shared transportation, common space, neighborhoods, pedestrian life, and human-scaled living in favor of personal space, isolation, and the often-overworked virtues of privacy and individualism. Cheap gas has made it possible.
If we want not to have our lives crippled by the "high" price of gasoline -- for the long haul, not just until ANWR is sucked dry -- we must reduce the importance of gasoline to our lives. We need to reclaim small-scale, pedestrian-friendly, transit-oriented living.
Let's see Nuclear waste...anyone want some? Can't eat the meat and fish, too many hazardous materials in them already? Yes, corn is the reason for high prices, how about a little less corn syrup in your food? Wind, solar and bio-fuels...yup I will take them. ANWR is a blip on the downward slide of this great nation? So glad we didnt develope it, and dry it up back when Oil was $40.00 a barrel! Hey, you Neo-Cons had 6 great years to do something for this country! What did we get for it? NOTHING!!!!
I know it hurts people but THIS IS WHAT OSAMA WANTED!!!! If we let foriegn countries continue to control our lives the way the BUSHCO Admin. allowed then we are going down the hill and fast. Wake up, put the HUMMER out in the pasture get off your high "GAS HOG" horses and realize that we were DUPED!!
Now, lets get something done that is positive for this great country and produce our own food, energy and REAL PATRIATISM!! I am not saying no to any of these alternatives just NO to the people who are running our country into the ground right now!!
Your right about oil companies not wanting to open ANWR. If ANWR was opened the price of oil on the world market would drop. Everything the environment movement has done benefits big oil. Drilling within ANWR is stopped. Follow the money trail. Look at the profits made by oil.
Conspiracy? Big oil started the environment movement? When money is involved anything is possible.
Reduce your demand for oil. Oil companies will reduce supply of oil. No reduction in price, oil will rise in price.
Is'nt CONFUSION great!!! Look what it gets us. YouMustBConfused
Have you ever heard of an unconformity?
The one in ANWR makes all this a comedy
The rocks that make Prudhoe Bay
Have all long eroded away
Go ahead, learn for yourself, it's no conspiracy
There is that possibility that the solution to our current problem may require much more than a one part answer. The infrastructure in place will not allow us to say so long to oil and hello to renewable resources today. We may need to consider producing oil domestically while integrating conservation and renewable energy solutions. Why must it be one or the other. We have put these issues on opposite sides of the aisle, however we are talking about an ENERGY issue and should look at solutions through a comprehensive ENERGY standpoint.
Fuel is cheaper than milk.
Fuel is cheaper than buying water in a store
Neat trick to blame someone else (Democrats, environmentalist, Nader, foreign countries). Any one but themselves
Our rulers represent the wealthy. That is their true base. These ultra-rich do not have the best interest of us or any nation in their hearts. That is the point from which any discussion of public policy must start. Next, is that good, bad, or irrelevant? Different people will feel differently.
But we must keep in mind that a billionaire does not want to stop being a billionaire. Most of the rich see themselves as needing not only to ensure their wealth but to increase it. Even when a philanthropy is set up they make sure they control it because wealth is not just money but power.
We average people are lucky if we can occasionally control our own life. There is no real solution except to do our best to live our lives while contributing as little as possible to their egomaniacal schemes. No matter ANWR or the continental shelf we will be paying high oil prices. No matter wind, solar, or nuclear power the quickest and most effective method to save on energy costs is conservation. Use less.
You need more then ANWR to have a good conspiracy.
No Nukes
No Dams
No new power plants
No Coal plants
No new refineries
No drilling
Wind mills (will kill the birds and makes noise). Wind mills will work were you have wind but you still have to install power lines. People won’t like seeing power lines.
Solar cells, Arco was the biggest producer in the 70’s. Keep the price high. Today prices are still high. (Arco oil company controlling solar cells).
Solar domestic water heating, this will work in Fairbanks. You will get about nine months of use.
Solar can help heat your home but during the biggest fuel consumption time not much help. You can get a small percentage of savings.
Heat pumps UFA did a study on them in the late 70’s or early 80’s I don’t remember when exactly. One to Two year study using two heat pumps in an Atco building. UFA might still have the study.
UAF not UFA sorry
caseyinfairbanks,
Being right and convincing someone are not the same.
Do you know how much oil The state of Alaska has in the ground?
I don't know who's facts to beleive.
The big oil, people who post here, Alaska facts? Blogs you find on the internet? Who's telling the truth.
Two people blamed the Democrats and two people blamed the Republicans. 50% to 50%
I blame both the Democrats and the Republicans. Greed will make them rich.
I lived for over ten years without elec. And almost 15 years using an outhouse and I’m not going back to that. At one time if you use less oil it would force the price down. Today they will just lower the pump out put and raise the price.
Wow, thought this was the Juneau Empire from some of the Environmental Terrorist comments posted here. They will probably vote for people just like Bill Clinton. Seems like he vetoed the ANWR drilling bill which had passed Congress some time ago.
caseyinfairbanks - i am speechless. This is not just about the price of fuel we put into our "big junker SUV's" You need to go drive your new subaru to your job at UAF or the other governement agency i am sure you work at and hug another tree. Oh, but that is funded by the State, which over 87% of the it's Revenue comes from the oil companies. I am sure you would not want to receive anything from the oil companies. Maybe if you hug those trees hard enough you might find some fuel to run your new subaru.
good luck
We need a 500 mw gas fired electrical generator on the North Slope and a transmisson line down to Fairbanks. Then we need to expand the Railbelt Energy Grid to connect all of our communities across Alaska.
We also need a Alaska State-wide Energy Policy and Plan so that all Alaskans can benefit from OUR oil and gas.
Our Alaska State Royalty Oil can be sold to us at a discounted rate and have that oil refined at Flint Hills and gasoline, heating fuel, diesel, aviation fuel, and propane can then be sold to us for no more than $3.00 a gallon.
We need help now. We can't wait for the gas line or development of alternatives that will help us move away from being dependent on petroleum products in the long term.
AND finally, we need our communities across the state to each declare energy disasters because so many of our communities are getting hit hard with ever increasing electricity and fuel costs. We must get our governor and state legislature to expand the upcoming AGIA special session to include lowering the cost of electricity and fuel.
If I ask 10 five year olds how much candy they would like how many would say lots and lots and lots, and how many would use thier arms spread as wide as they can?
Although I am in favor of development, the reality is that the environmentalists will get their way. All 3 presidential candidates are of that opinion. Even today, McCain compared ANWR to drilling in the Grand Canyon. Completely stupid, but true. Clinton and Obama are not going to risk the ire of their constituents, many of whom we can see their thoughts in their posts here today. And the Dems in Congress are true believers, or at least bought and paid for by true believers. It sucks, but the deal is done.
So we'll just go along, pretending that conservation and alternative energy are the answer, ruining our economy, possibly starving millions worldwide, getting greener and greener and greener. It will be Utopia right here in the good old people's republic of the USA. Kind of like North Korea, or Cuba. We can only strive to be like the Sudan.
Wow Glacierless? I am just, well, no, I expected that from you but WOW! You are really out there ar'nt you, WOW! I just have to say WOW! YouMustBConfused
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