[Congressional Bills 110th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 401 Introduced in House (IH)]
110th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. CON. RES. 401
Expressing the support of Congress for enhancing energy independence
through the usage of existing resources and technology.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
July 31, 2008
Mr. Aderholt (for himself, Mr. Cantor, Mr. Thornberry, Mr. Pence, and
Mr. Pitts) submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on Natural Resources, and in addition to the
Committee on Energy and Commerce, for a period to be subsequently
determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such
provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned
_______________________________________________________________________
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
Expressing the support of Congress for enhancing energy independence
through the usage of existing resources and technology.
Whereas the price of oil has tripled in the past 6 years;
Whereas the price of gasoline has almost tripled in the same time period;
Whereas the United States currently imports over 60 percent of all crude oil
consumed;
Whereas the price of oil and gasoline today is determined by expectations of
future market conditions;
Whereas 90 percent of the world's oil reserves are controlled by governments,
not private companies;
Whereas Congress has restricted access to key energy supplies, including the
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), the Offshore Continental Shelf
(OCS), oil shale, heavy oil, and oil sands;
Whereas ANWR is believed to contain 10,400,000,000 barrels of oil, a figure
which may be a very conservative estimate;
Whereas the daily oil production from ANWR could be greater than the amount of
oil the United States imports from Saudi Arabia;
Whereas exploration of ANWR could create 500,000 American jobs;
Whereas the exploration would be conducted on only 2,000 acres of the 19,600,000
acres that constitute the refuge;
Whereas the United States currently allows drilling in 11 other national
wildlife refuges;
Whereas environmentally-friendly techniques can be used to minimize
environmental impact;
Whereas the portion of ANWR proposed for exploration is a barren tundra, devoid
of trees and frozen most of the year;
Whereas exploration in ANWR could create $150,000,000,000 in Federal tax
revenue;
Whereas exploration in ANWR could lower gas prices from $0.75 to $1.60 per
gallon;
Whereas production of the oil in ANWR would add about $1,400,000,000,000 to our
Nation's wealth, assuming a price of oil of $140 per barrel;
Whereas drilling is currently banned on 85 percent of the Offshore Continental
Shelf (OCS);
Whereas the United States is the only country in the world to restrict access to
its OCS energy resources;
Whereas Cuba is currently leasing land for oil exploration off the Florida
coast;
Whereas the parts of the OCS closed to exploration are estimated to contain
16,600,000,000 barrels of oil and 59,310,000,000,000 cubic feet of
natural gas;
Whereas historically, estimates of reserves have been understated by about 50
percent;
Whereas 63 percent of oil seepages in American waters are from natural causes,
32 percent are from cars and boats, only 4 percent are from oil tankers,
and fewer than 1 percent are from drilling;
Whereas the OCS extends 200 miles from the coasts of the United States, and most
energy proposals only propose exploration beyond 20 miles, the limit of
what is visible with the human eye;
Whereas modern offshore drilling rigs are so hurricane-resistant that even
Hurricane Katrina failed to cause any significant spillage of oil from
rigs in the Gulf of Mexico;
Whereas exploration in the OCS could lower gas prices by $0.90 to $2.50 per
gallon;
Whereas production of the oil contained in the OCS would add about
$2,300,000,000,000 to our Nation's wealth, assuming a price of oil of
$140 per barrel;
Whereas the United States has an estimated 2,000,000,000,000 barrels of oil in
the form of shale oil, 1,000,000,000,000 of which is recoverable;
Whereas by comparison, Saudi Arabia only has 250,000,000,000 barrels of crude
oil reserves;
Whereas our shale oil reserves make the United States the country with the
world's largest oil reserves;
Whereas America's recoverable shale oil reserves are equivalent to the sum of
the rest of the world's crude oil reserves;
Whereas most of the recoverable shale oil in the United States is located on
Federal lands in Colorado and Utah;
Whereas the land containing the most shale oil deposits in Colorado was
specifically set aside for shale oil production by executive orders
between 1912 and 1927;
Whereas environmentally sustainable production methods that extract the oil
without digging up the shale are in development;
Whereas such environmentally-friendly production methods will preserve the
ground water by freezing a wall of water around the drill site;
Whereas commercial-level production will likely be possible by 2015;
Whereas oil prices will probably fall before 2015 in anticipation of the
increased production;
Whereas production of the oil contained in America's recoverable shale oil
deposits would add about $140,000,000,000,000 to our Nation's wealth,
assuming a price of oil of $140 per barrel;
Whereas the Bureau of Land Management was blocked by Congress in 2007 from
issuing shale oil production regulations;
Whereas the United States has the world's largest reserves of coal, estimated at
275,000,000,000 recoverable tons and nearly 4,000,000,000,000 identified
tons;
Whereas America's recoverable coal reserves could last an estimated 250 years;
Whereas the process of converting coal to oil was invented by Germany during
World War II and is currently profitably used by South Africa for a
large percentage of its fuel needs;
Whereas Americans are ready to begin building coal-to-liquid plants in the
United States, but are held back by regulatory uncertainty and concern
about global warming legislation;
Whereas the fuel produced from coal burns much cleaner than fuel produced from
oil;
Whereas much of the carbon dioxide produced by coal-to-liquid plants could be
stored underground and used to increase recovery from oil wells;
Whereas the United States has not built a new oil refinery in over 30 years;
Whereas America currently relies on imports for over 12 percent of our gasoline
supply;
Whereas our dependence on imported gasoline has been increasing each of the past
10 years;
Whereas building more refineries could lower gas prices by $0.15 to $0.45 per
gallon;
Whereas more refineries have not been built in part due to the extreme
difficulty in obtaining government permits;
Whereas imported oil, gas, and other petroleum products are currently the
largest part of the United States trade deficit, accounting for
$317,000,000,000 out of a total deficit of $815,000,000,000 in 2007;
Whereas imported oil and gas are consuming an ever-increasing share of our trade
deficit;
Whereas the massive transfer of wealth from the United States to the Middle East
for oil imports is harmful to our Nation's security;
Whereas our military uses 132,000,000 barrels of oil per year and supports the
development of American sources of fuel;
Whereas a provision was added at the last minute before passage of H.R. 6, the
ironically-titled Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, that
would prohibit Federal agencies from purchasing fuel from American
sources like shale oil and coal-to-liquid plants, and require more
Middle Eastern oil to be purchased;
Whereas America has the capability to become much more energy independent, using
today's technology without a huge taxpayer expenditure by simply using
the resources available; and
Whereas the provisions in this resolution could add over $143,000,000,000,000 to
our Nation's wealth over time and lower gas prices by $2.00 per gallon,
not counting the impact of coal-to-liquid: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring),
That it is the sense of Congress that a set of laws should be enacted
that--
(1) make more American energy available for exploration and
production, including in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge,
the Offshore Continental Shelf, and Federal lands onshore,
including for shale oil and coal-to-liquid production; and
(2) streamline the permitting process for building American
refineries and allow the construction of refineries on Federal
lands.
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