[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 38 (Thursday, March 30, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1958-S1961]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE GASOLINE PRICE SPIKE
Mr. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I would like to take this opportunity
to advise my colleagues why I think it is appropriate that we address
some relief for the American consumer with regard to the gasoline price
spike that has occurred in this country. I am a cosponsor, with the
majority leader, Senator Lott, and a number of others, of this
important legislation that will give us an opportunity to take positive
action in a meaningful way to put a brake on the ever-rising gasoline
prices that American families face each day.
The American people should have a choice, whether they feel the
priority is such that they should have relief from the gasoline tax. I
emphasize a choice. I emphasize the American people, through their
elected representatives on this floor, have to make a determination
that this is a priority because there is no free lunch around here.
What we are talking about is a combined bill which would waive the
Federal gasoline tax of 18.4 cents. That is a considerable tax. It is
even larger when you add the State taxes to it.
When I said there is no free ride around here, what I meant was we
have agreed if we suspend the Federal gas tax for the balance of this
year, we will also make whole the highway trust fund. That alternative
will require that we find considerable funds. But if we guarantee we
are going to find them, that means they are going to come through the
budget process, from surplus and other areas.
Is this a sufficient priority? There are those who feel very strongly
this jeopardizes the highway trust fund. In this bill itself, it says
we will hold the highway trust fund harmless. That is a mandate, in
effect a promise, to hold it harmless. It does not say where the money
is going to come from to offset it.
We are suspending it only for the balance of this year. I have been
advised by the budgeteers that this will not jeopardize any of the
contracts that are presently let for this construction year or next
year that propose to use highway trust fund moneys because those have
already, in effect, been designated, earmarked, and so forth. I am not
on the Budget Committee, but that is the advice I have been given.
I think Members should understand a little background here. It was in
1993 that the Clinton administration proposed a significant tax on
Btus. There was going to be a big tax increase on all Btus--British
thermal units. It was going to be based on what you use. We debated
this issue at length and we voted down the increased Btu tax that the
Clinton administration proposed. However, there was a 4.3-cent-a-gallon
gas tax that was also proposed at that time. It was hotly debated. That
4.3-cent-a-gallon gas tax was not designated for the highway trust
fund. It was designated for the general fund. That is just where it
went.
Of interest to the Chair, perhaps, is how this happened. All the
Republicans voted against the tax; six Democrats joined us, and we had
a tie vote. Vice President Al Gore sat in the Chair as the Presiding
Officer of this body, where the Senator from Utah sits, and he broke
the tie. The Vice President has to wear the mantle. That is where the
4.3-cent-a-gallon tax came from. He has to wear the mantle. It did
designate the tax would go into the general fund. Later, when the
Republicans took control of this body, we changed the designation from
the general fund and we designated that 4.3 cents into the highway
trust fund.
It should again be noted what this legislation specifically provides
because there is a lot of confusion over it. It says in order for the
18.4 cents to be suspended, and this is regular gasoline, the price has
to average $2 a gallon. Only then will it be suspended, and only for
the balance of this year. And the highway trust fund will be made
whole.
I know there are Members who feel uncomfortable about the highway
trust fund. But all I can do is make very clear what this bill
provides. It provides for full reimbursement of the highway trust fund.
But it is not a free ride. The money is going to have to come from
someplace else.
The point I want to make, and the appeal to my colleagues and our
staffs who are listening, is about the real savings. America's
consumers cannot pass on this price increase. If you buy an airline
ticket, as my friend from Utah and I do occasionally, to go back to
Utah or Alaska, you are paying a surcharge for fuel. You don't know
what the tax is on the ticket because the airlines have so many
confusing fares you can't figure it out, but a $40 surcharge is in
there.
The trucker who comes to Washington, DC, who has a contract for
delivery, maybe he cannot pass it on; and the farmer, it is very
unlikely he is going to pass it on; nor the fishermen in my State who
fuel up their vessels, it is pretty hard for them to pass it on--but
the person who surely cannot pass it on is the American consumer, the
moms driving their kids to the soccer game. The family bought a utility
sports vehicle for convenience. Maybe the SUV does not get too many
miles to the gallon. It might have a 40-gallon gas tank. When mom goes
to the gas station and fills that up at nearly $2 a gallon, it shoots a
pretty good hole in a $100 bill.
The question before us is: Do we want to do something short term, or
do nothing, which is what the administration proposes. My colleagues
heard the President yesterday. He said we have to develop more
dependence on alternative fuels, we have to develop more resources
domestically. He does not tell you he is going to open up low-sulfur,
high-Btu coal in Utah. No, he says he has made that wilderness, for all
practical purposes.
He does not say he is going to encourage exploration on public lands
in the Rocky Mountains so that oil and gas exploration can occur in
those States in the overthrust area where there is a tremendous
potential for oil and gas in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, North Dakota,
Kansas, or Oklahoma, where the small strippers have almost gone out of
production because they simply cannot produce at the low prices. They
only produce a few barrels a day. My colleague, Senator Kay Bailey
Hutchison, addressed that earlier today.
In our long-term package of proposals, there is relief for the
stripper wells. There is relief to encourage exploration in the
overthrust Rocky Mountain area. There is relief to provide OCS areas
for lease--we heard the Vice President say: If I am elected President,
I am going to cancel all the OCS lease programs. He does not say where
he is going to get the oil to replace that produced under the leases.
Think about what this administration's policy is on energy. One does
not have to think very long because there is none. Clearly, our
Secretary was sent over to OPEC almost on his knees to beg for
production increases. OPEC said they were going to have a meeting on
the 27th. He was over there 3 weeks prior to that. The Secretary said:
We have an emergency in the United States. They said: We are going to
meet on the 27th. They met on the 27th. They did not do anything until
the 28th.
I have a chart which shows what they really did. They did this
yesterday. Not many people are aware of the realities associated with
what has happened to oil and the demand for oil in this country.
To the left of the chart in the red is the total global demand for
oil in the world today. It is about 76.3 million barrels per day. To
the right of the chart is the production and where it comes from: 45
percent from non-OPEC, 23 percent from OPEC, 5.6 percent other OPEC.
My point is, actual production is 75.3 million per day, but the
demand is 76.3 million per day. There is a 1 million-barrel-a-day
difference. There is a greater demand than supply. When there is this
kind of situation, we have price spirals.
I want to point out and make sure everybody understands what happened
[[Page S1959]]
yesterday with OPEC. I am really amazed, with the exception of the Wall
Street Journal and a few other folks, the media has not really delved
into this. When OPEC met last year, they decided they were going to
produce 23 million barrels a day. They promptly began to cheat. They
overproduced. They produced 24.2 million barrels a day. The difference
between what they said they were producing, 23 million barrels a day,
and what they were actually producing, 24.2 million barrels a day, is
1.2 million barrels a day. The difference between the 1.2 million
barrels and 1.7 million is 500,000 barrels a day. That is what they are
actually producing.
Here it is. They were cheating 1.2 million barrels a day. As I said
before, they started out with 23 million but were actually producing
24.2. The difference between 1.2 and 1.7 is 500,000 barrels a day, and
that is exactly what we got. That is the actual new production. It is
not 1.7 million barrels a day, it is 500,000 barrels a day.
Let me take it one step further because this really excites me, and
that is, what our share of OPEC oil has been. Our share has been about
16 percent. If we got another 500,000 barrels increase--remember, this
does not go just to the United States, this goes to all the customers
of OPEC all over the world. The U.S. share is about 16 percent. So that
amounts to about 79,000 barrels a day.
With the help of some of my staff and the AAA, we determined the
immediate metropolitan area of Washington, DC, uses 121,000 barrels a
day. This means that with the 500,000 new barrels, we are not even
standing still.
I do not want to put too much of an arithmetic load on my colleagues,
but there is one more figure they ought to know about, and that is the
little secret of the administration and the Department of Energy they
did not want you to hear. They did not want you to find out what was
written between the lines of the OPEC agreement. Here it is. Buried in
the agreement is what they call a ``price band'' provision to keep the
prices between $22 and $28 a barrel. We have seen prices for oil go up
to $34. A year ago, that price per barrel was at $10 and $11.
This is a unique arrangement, but our friends in OPEC are unique in
their craftsmanship of what is in their best interests. The arrangement
calls for producers to increase output 500,000 barrels--remember where
you heard it. That is the 500,000 that is the actual increase. They
said:
The arrangement calls for producers to increase output
500,000 barrels per day on a pro rata basis if oil prices
remain above $28 for 20 consecutive days.
My friend, I am a businessman. I understand the fine print of an
agreement, but I do not think the folks down at the White House do or,
if they do, they do not want you to know about it. This agreement
further states that OPEC will also cut from production--there it is,
cut from production, cut from their 1.7 million-barrel promise, or
really the 500,000 barrels a day. They will cut from production by that
same amount if prices fall below $22 for more than 20 days. They have
set a ceiling, and they have set, obviously, a cellar.
OPEC or the Clinton administration has made no acknowledgment of this
in their announcements. Isn't that rather curious? We talk about
significant relief. If we have this kind of a deal, I do not know from
where the significant relief is going to come. Under this agreement,
one can easily see that the price of oil is going to hover around $28,
maybe as high as $34 per barrel for extended periods or until OPEC
meets again.
I urge those in the media and my colleagues, and particularly their
staffs who are a little bit curious, to read today's Oil Daily, page 2.
It is all spelled out under the headline ``OPEC Bases New Production
Strategy on Price Band Experiment.''
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this article be printed
in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
[From the Oil Daily, Mar. 30, 2000]
OPEC Bases New Production Strategy on Price Band Experiment
(By Toby Odone and Barbara Shook)
Buried in the furor over Iran's refusal to go along with
other Opec members in raising oil production is a highly
innovative price band mechanism, designed to keep prices
within a range of $22 to $28 per barrel for the Opec basket.
The arrangement calls for producers to increase output by
500,000 barrels per day on a pro-rata basis if oil prices
remain above $28 for 20 consecutive days. They also will cut
production by the same amount if prices fall below $22 for 20
consecutive days.
Opec delegates were hailing the new accord as a
breakthrough that for the first time guarantees minimum
national revenues, making budget-setting and fiscal planning
less hazardous. In addition, it potentially provides the
market with the stability that producers and consumers,
primarily from the U.S., have been calling for loudly in the
past few months.
Nevertheless, should the nine countries that have adopted
the new policy adhere to its terms, the upper limit of the
new arrangement could see the price for West Texas
Intermediate (WTI) rise above $30. On several occasions, the
U.S. has said this level is too high, just as last year's $10
was too low.
Even Iran, which is not party to the new quota accord, says
it would go along at least with the concept of the price band
mechanism. Its production level would be the same volume as
the base for the now rolled-back March 1999 agreement.
Adjustments, however, would be made as Iran reads the market,
not according to the Opec formula.
Opec made no mention of the new price-band mechanism in the
official communique issued early Wednesday after a marathon
six-hour negotiating session.
Word of its proposal was beginning to leak out, however,
even before the session ended, as delegation sources told
EIG's Energy Intelligence Briefing (EIB) that some
``innovative and flexible'' new terms were under discussion.
Several ministers also referred obliquely to a price range
rather than a specific target such as the $21 that has been
on the Opec books since 1990. Saudi Oil Minister Ali Naimi
talked openly of a $20 to $25 price range.
The official communique also made no mention of the future
roles of non-Opec exporters Mexico, Norway, Oman, Angola, and
Russia. Opec simply thanked them for their assistance in
earlier efforts to stabilize markets.
On Wednesday, delegates told EIB that the non-Opec
countries appear to be released from their commitments to
shut in output.
Outside of the Opec Secretariat, Iran continued to express
its irritation with U.S. intervention in the organization's
proceedings.
``Intervention was beyond expectation,'' an Iranian
delegate stated. None of the US's action was needed because
Opec and its allied nonmember exporters were aware of the
market and prepared to respond to increasing demand, he said.
``We were here to accommodate the market. We came here to
increase production,'' he said, adding that he believes the
US has damaged its image by its interference with and
imposition of its position on a group of sovereign nations.
He also suggested that US actions both now and last year
put Opec in a bad light. ``We were discredited,'' he said.
``When we cut the production we were blamed. When we
increased the production we were blamed.''
The Iranian delegate refused to criticize ministers of
other countries directly, but he did indicate strong
displeasure with what he said was a prearranged agreement
formulated by the US. ``We are not here to rubber-stamp
agreements,'' he said.
At the same time, he stressed, Iran is not trying to
undermine Opec as an organization. Iran would have supported
an increase of 1.7 million b/d if it had been accomplished in
two stages, starting with 1.2 million b/d. At the same time,
Iran will not give up any market share by withholding its
barrels. ``We would at least do the minimum that would have
been allocated,'' he said. Output will be adjusted up or down
as the market dictates.
One market that will not influence any Iranian action is
the US. ``The US should not have expected any more than what
we did because Iran does not have an interest in the US
market,'' he declared. ``Had it been a different situation,
Iran might have acted differently.''
Some observers questioned the whole scenario here,
wondering if Saudi Arabia and Iran weren't playing a high-
stakes international version of ``good cop, bad cop.''
They cited the high price range of the Opec basket relative
to WTI as one example of the bad-cop side, with the output
increase as the good cop angle. In the process, Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates could appear to be
cooperating. Iran, which had nothing to lose but the sale of
a few bushels of pistachios, could represent Opec's
continuing independence from outside pressure.
Most Opec ministers and their delegations left Vienna on
Wednesday fully expecting prices to stay firm, despite some
analysts' suggestions that discord in the organization might
herald a sharp sell-off. However, Opec insiders pointed out
that the new price mechanism may forestall countries' normal
inclination to cheat.
NEW OPEC QUOTAS
[Thousands of b/d]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Apr. 1 % chg.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Algeria............................................. 788 7.8
Indonesia........................................... 1,280 7.8
[[Page S1960]]
Kuwait.............................................. 1,980 7.8
Libya............................................... 1,323 7.8
Nigeria............................................. 2,033 7.8
Qatar............................................... 640 7.9
Saudi Arabia........................................ 8,023 7.9
UAE................................................. 2,845 7.9
Venezuela........................................... 2,845 4.6
-------------------
Total......................................... 21,069
Assumed others:
Iran.............................................. 3,623
Iraq.............................................. 2,400
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, now they are experimenting on us with
this price band. That is a pretty dangerous precedent to set, but,
nevertheless, we have become so beholden to OPEC, we are 56-percent
dependent on OPEC.
The occupant of the chair remembers the Arab oil embargo in 1973. We
had gas lines around the block. A lot of people were unhappy. Oil was
more than $30 a barrel. We were excited here. We were concerned. We
said: We will never allow exports to get to a level of more than 50
percent. We created something to ensure that we had some relief. We
created the SPR, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. We wanted to have a
100-day supply. I think we have a 56-day supply in the SPR today.
Now some people say: We have an emergency. Take the supply out of the
SPR. Think about that. It is very dangerous to use your reserve to
manipulate prices. You can only draw about 4 million barrels a day out
of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is located in the salt mines
of Louisiana. If you take it out, remember, you have to refine it. Then
what are you going to do for a fallback in a real emergency?
OPEC is watching what we do. If we pull down our Strategic Petroleum
Reserve, we become that much more vulnerable and, as a consequence,
more likely to be held hostage.
As we address what we are going to do this afternoon, again, I
reiterate, is the priority here for a short-term fix for the American
consumer not at the expense of the highway trust fund but at the
expense of making it up through the budget process some other way? I
think that is a legitimate question.
When you pit what we are attempting to propose on this side of the
aisle, which is some kind of relief, to that proposed by the other side
of the aisle, which is no immediate relief, the difference is clear.
The Administration suggests only that we develop alternatives, and that
we have conservation, all of which are worthwhile. But those goals are
not going to help mom today on her way home with the kids from the
soccer game when she has to fill up the sports utility vehicle and it
is going to cost her $80. It is not going to help the farmer. It is not
going to help my fishermen. It is not going to help the truckers. They
want relief today to stay in business.
We have that opportunity. We are going to make that choice. It is a
choice. It is a legitimate choice. It is a matter of determining where
the priorities of this body are.
We have a lot of options. We have some specific proposals for the
short term and the long term that I think deserve consideration.
Because if you look at the other side and the administration proposals,
it is pretty hard to find anything this specific.
The American people are saying: Hey, we have a crisis. We have a
problem. The difficulty I have, to a large extent, is where we are
seeking relief. We are not only limited to petitioning OPEC.
Let's take a look at our friend, Saddam Hussein, in Iraq. I have a
chart that I think shows and tells more than I can say in a few words.
This shows the Iraqi oil exports to the United States. There is
virtually nothing in 1997.
But we all remember in 1991 we fought a war over there. We sent young
American men and women. We had 147 casualties in that war--147. We had
423 who were wounded. We had 26 who were taken prisoner.
That war was in 1991. But what about the American taxpayer? What
happened? You remember, we have been enforcing the no-fly zone over
there. We have troops stationed around there. We have the fleet. We
have been keeping Saddam Hussein fenced in, if you will. The cost to
the American taxpayer has been $10 billion. That is what it has cost in
the last 9 years. The administration does not factor that in.
When we look at our fastest growing source of imported oil coming
into the United States, it is coming from our good friend, Saddam
Hussein. Incredible. I am indignant over it. I don't know about you and
my colleagues.
Last year, we imported 300,000 barrels a day from Iraq. This year we
have imported 700,000 barrels a day.
The day before yesterday the Department of Commerce issued a release
on sanctions for some of the technical parts that are needed within
Iraqi refineries to increase their production by an additional 600,000
barrels a day. We are certainly cooperating with Saddam Hussein. Where
do the profits go? We suspect they probably go to the Republican Guard
who have something to do with keeping Saddam Hussein safe. It is
questionable if funds really go to the people of Iraq.
I was looking at some figures the other day. As we rely on the
Mideast, I think we should be reminded that what is happening here is
we are enriching the Mideast, the Arab oil empire.
As I said, in 1973 we were 36-percent dependent. Today we are 56-
percent dependent. But the startling reality is--and you may not
believe history teaches anything; some people say it does not teach
much--but the forecast that the Department of Energy has publicly put
out is that we will be importing 65 percent of our oil by the year 2015
to 2020.
Currently, we receive 46-percent of our oil from OPEC; that is, on
the 11 OPEC nations. Are these countries that we can depend on? How
stable are they? What is the risk to Israel as a consequence of the
difficulties and distrust in that part of the world?
The U.S. has economic sanctions on 8 of the 11 OPEC countries. What
for? For human rights abuses, drug trafficking, terrorism, weapons of
mass destruction. On the other three countries of OPEC, to name two,
Algeria and Indonesia, they are certainly among the least stable
nations in the world.
Are we through there? I don't think so. Six OPEC nations even have
State Department-issued travel warnings against them. I ask you, if it
isn't safe for Americans to travel there, is it safe to rely and
entrust our energy security to those countries?
I was looking at some material which I think I have here. It is kind
of startling because I think we had some reference by Senator Lott who
is concerned about our increasing support of Iraq and the realization
that Iraq is creating a missile capability. I wonder for whom those
missiles are designed. Mideast countries? Israel? Who is to say? But we
are enriching and we are making possible the cash-flow that Saddam
Hussein has; otherwise he would not have the cash-flow.
As we look at that energy policy that I talked about, although it is
pretty hard to identify. It certainly is to import more. It does not
suggest we develop domestic resources in this country. We have the
technology to do it safely. We know that.
There is a great hue and cry by the administration against opening up
the Arctic Coastal Plain. In my State of Alaska, we have been
contributing 20 percent of the total crude oil produced in the United
States for the last 23 years. We have a pipeline that is 800 miles
long. It has withstood earthquakes and it has withstood dynamite, shots
fired at it.
We have an area in Alaska that I can show my colleagues on a chart
relative to the location and a brief description of where it is,
because it is important that you understand a few things.
This morning I had an opportunity to speak on C-SPAN. One of the
callers asked: Senator, you would like to open up the Coastal Plain,
but why don't you put the rest of it in a wilderness or put it in a
refuge or something?
I will shortly have a chart to show you we have already done that. We
have 19 million acres in what we call the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge. This is an area that alone is 19 million acres. It is about the
size of the State of South Carolina. We have already put 8 million
acres in a permanent wilderness, 9.5 million acres in a refuge
permanently. But we left for this body to determine whether we could
safely initiate exploration in what they call a 1002 area, which is 1.5
million acres. That is all. The question is, Is this the time to bring
in the environmental community to work with us to open it safely
because we have an abundance of
[[Page S1961]]
capacity? This is the area I am talking about specifically. This is the
19 million acres. This is the refuge, 9.5 million acres; this is the
wilderness, 8 million acres; this is the Coastal Plain, 1.5 million
acres. The footprint would be 2,000 acres, if the oil is there. We have
the pipeline right over there. The President vetoed this in 1995. If he
had approved it, we would have production today. We have an
availability of 1 million barrels a day in this pipeline right now. We
have the overthrust belt, as I have indicated. We have OCS. We have the
Rocky Mountains. But there is no effort by the administration for
domestic production.
For those who wonder what it is really like up there and have never
been there but are experts on it, who speak on the floor with profound
knowledge and have never been to Alaska, let alone the Arctic, this is
the Arctic Slope of Alaska. This is a rig. This is what it looks like 8
months of the year. This is winter. It is a long winter. It is pretty
dark. This is an ice road. This is an ice pad. They build it up with
water and ice so the footprint is minimum. Here is the same picture in
the summer. The summer should be 4 months, but it is really only about
3. This is the tundra. That is the footprint. That is reality. It is
awful hard to get people to come up and look at it and recognize it for
what it is.
We are concerned about some of our friends, legitimately so. These
are legitimate friends. They are going for a walk. Where are they
walking? They are walking on the pipeline. It is warm. They don't get
their feet cut. Here are three bears, right at home. That is not a
prop; that is real.
We have a few more friends; we are concerned about these friends.
Here are some of our friendly caribou. There you have it. That is
Prudhoe Bay. That is technology that is 30 years old. No guns allowed;
you can't shoot them. You can't run them down with a snow machine. When
we started Prudhoe Bay, we had 3,800 caribou. Now we have a herd of
more than 18,000. I don't know whether that convinces anybody that we
have a sensitivity about the environment, that we can work with our
technology and do it right. If we get an opportunity for people to
objectively take a look at the job we have done, the technology we have
developed over the years, and the opportunity we have to contribute to
the energy security of this country as opposed to more dependence on
imports, they usually agree with us.
That is where we are. I will conclude with a short rundown of the
long-term and intermediate relief that we have proposed within our
caucus to provide an opportunity to Members of this body to address
what kind of relief they want. I have spoken to the gas tax. I have
enunciated quite clearly that we do not have at risk the highway trust
fund. That will be made whole. I have explained in detail that this
measure would suspend the tax until the end of this year only, that it
would come on only if the average price of gasoline got to $2 a barrel,
and that the 4.3-cent-a-gallon tax originally did not go to the highway
trust fund, it went to the general fund.
I conclude with what we are going to present to this body in our
legislative package, which is some kind of a relief for the Northeast
on crude oil storage, for not only crude but heating oil. They have
been hit very hard, and they are going to be hit harder when they
generate electricity this summer. A lot of it is going to be generated
from fuel oil. They are going to be paying perhaps a third to two-
thirds more for electricity because that is what comes on the line
last. As a consequence, the costs associated with all other forms of
energy raise up to the last energy source that contributes to the power
pool, and that will be fuel oil.
We are also going to look at an effort to address the difficulty with
the stripper wells by establishing some kind of a bottom price level
where, when oil gets very low, they can still stay in existence. Make
no mistake about it, the strippers make a tremendous contribution. We
can't afford to lose them. They are all over Oklahoma. They are in
Kansas, in many States. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison has legislation to
address their survival.
We have legislation for delay of rental payments, to allow expenses
for geological and geophysical costs, percentage depletion legislation,
NOL carrybacks, marginal and inactive well tax credits, language to
address opening within the overthrust belt on public lands.
Obviously, we are interested in coal because coal can play a major
role in the power source needs of this country. This administration
proposes to close eight coal-fired plants. They claim the management of
those plants is going to be held criminally liable because they have
intentionally extended the life of these plants that were
grandfathered. That is the full employment act for the lawyers. They
have no idea of where they are going to pick up the power to substitute
for these plants.
We can address coal through technology, given the opportunity. The
administration doesn't have a plan for coal. What are they doing with
nuclear? Nothing. They won't address the problem of what to do with the
waste. On the West Coast, they will not do anything about hydro. They
are proposing to take the dams down. I don't know how many hundreds of
trucks a day are going to be on the highways of Oregon if they take
those dams down. Grain will be moved by truck rather than barge,
contributing to more gas usage and more pollution.
The Administration says, we are going to move to increased use of
natural gas. If you read the National Petroleum Institute figures, we
are using 20 trillion cubic feet of gas now. In the next 15 years, we
would be up to 31. We don't have the infrastructure to deliver it. We
will have to invest $1.5 trillion for that infrastructure. But, the gas
is not available for exploration because they won't let us have access
to public lands. So gas is not the answer.
If you look at what we are attempting to do as opposed to what the
other side has proposed, which is what? Alternative energy,
conservation, some tax breaks--I am all for those things. But we have
to do something right now. We have a plan. And if it is a priority and
deemed a priority by this body, then you have a choice. You have a
choice of whether to vote for the gas tax suspension for the balance of
this year, if you feel that is a priority or you don't. It will not
jeopardize the highway trust fund. Again, it is no free ride. We will
have to find that money someplace else.
I could go on at length, but I felt it necessary to make this
presentation to ensure that we had a fair understanding of what we are
proposing in our caucus for immediate, interim, and long-term relief
options against what you are hearing from the other side. I wanted you
to know what we can do domestically to relieve our dependence on
imported oil. And, I wanted to point out what the administration says
we got the other day compared to the reality of what we got when we
read the fine print.
It appears that our negotiators got the short end of the so-called
stick because that increase, again, was only 500,000 barrels a day. It
has a floor and a ceiling: a $28 ceiling; a $22 floor. If you think we
will see oil cheaper than that, it simply is not going to happen.
If any Members would like to discuss with me just what is in this
highway tax bill, please don't hesitate to do so.
I yield the floor.
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