Social Security reform proposals are much more conspicuous in the general press. But that doesn’t mean Congress is ignoring oil and gas issues.
That’s especially true of authorizing leases on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge’s coastal plain, which has become more prominent the past few weeks than the comprehensive energy legislation that President George W. Bush and congressional Republicans say is years overdue.
The House is keeping the two issues separate. ANWR is being debated within the Resources Committee, while the Energy and Commerce Committee is handling the larger energy bill. Separating the two should keep the strong opposition to opening ANWR to any sort of development from being a millstone around the comprehensive energy bill’s neck-at least initially.
New bill
The Resources Committee hasn’t formally looked at ANWR in a hearing, although it plans to hold one at the end of March or beginning of April. But it is working on a bill similar to what came out as part of HR 6 and the conference report.
The committee passed the measure four times last year. “It’s something the chairman [Richard Pombo (R-Calif.)] strongly supports,” a committee spokeswoman said. She indicated that an ANWR leasing authorization bill probably would be combined with the bigger energy bill on the House floor this year, as was the case in 2004.
Pombo jumped aggressively into the 2005 ANWR battle in early February when he said that two separate polls show most Americans believe Congress should open ANWR for oil exploration and production.
“Environmental special interest groups have distorted the facts about ANWR energy production to raise money and advance political agendas,” he declared. “In fact, ANWR has been a cash cow for their fund-raising for more than a decade. It’s time for ANWR to become a cash and jobs cow for all of the American people, not just a few.”
On the other side of Capitol Hill, Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Pete V. Domenici (R-NM) announced that he and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alas.) would lead a bipartisan congressional delegation of several senators and two cabinet secretaries (Gale A. Norton from the Interior Department and Samuel W. Bodman from Energy) to the North Slope and ANWR Mar. 4-7.
Technology contrast
The itinerary included visits to two major North Slope oil fields, with the idea of contrasting “the gentle impact of the modern technology at Alpine with the larger and heavier technology of 30 years ago at Prudhoe Bay,” according to a committee announcement. It said that the delegation also would visit with Inupiat Eskimos, “the only native people who live in the coastal plain of ANWR.”
In addition to the difference in surface effects between old and new technology, Domenici said, “senators and cabinet secretaries will see ice pads and ice roads that melt by spring, leaving the land unmarred.” ✦
