[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 25 (Wednesday, February 28, 2001)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E231-E232]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   INTRODUCTION OF THE MORRIS K. UDALL ARCTIC WILDERNESS ACT OF 2001

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. EDWARD J. MARKEY

                            of massachusetts

                    in the house of representatives

                      Wednesday, February 28, 2001

  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, one of the most magnificant wildlife 
reserves in America has been targeted for oil and gas development. It 
is threatened as never before, and will lose its wild, untrammeled 
character forever if we do not organize to fight this threat. Today, 
Rep. Nancy Johnson and I are introducing the Morris K. Udall Arctic 
Wilderness Act of 2001, with more than 120 cosponsors, Republican and 
Democrat, all united in their goal to preserve this precious wilderness 
in its current pristine, roadless condition for future generations of 
Americans.
  We have a bipartisan legacy to protect, and we take it very 
seriously. It is a legacy of Republican President Eisenhower, who set 
aside the core of the Refuge in 1960. It is a legacy of Democratic 
President Carter, who expanded it in 1980. It is the legacy of 
Republican Senator Bill Roth and Democratic Representative Bruce Vento 
and especially Morris Udall, who fought so hard to achieve what we 
propose today, and twice succeeded in shepherding this wilderness 
proposal through the House. Now is the time to finish the job they 
began--now is the time to say ``Yes'' to setting aside the Coastal 
Plain as a fully protected unit of the Wilderness Preservation System.
  Every summer, the Arctic coastal plain becomes the focus of one of 
the last great migratory miracles of nature when 130,000 caribou, the 
Porcupine caribou herd, start their ancient annual trek, first east 
away from the plain into Canada, then south and west back into interior 
Alaska, and finally north in a final push over the mountains and down 
the river valleys back to the coastal plain, their traditional birthing 
grounds. This herd, migrating thousands of miles each year and yet 
funneling into a relatively limited area of tundra, contrasts sharply 
with the non-migratory Central Arctic herd living near the Prudhoe Bay 
oil fields.
  The coastal plain of the Refuge is the biological heart of the Refuge 
ecosystem and critical to the survival of a one-of-a-kind migratory 
species. When you drill in the heart, every other part of the 
biological system suffers.
  The oil industry has placed a bull's eye on the heart of the Refuge 
and says ``hold still. This won't hurt. It will only affect a small 
surface area of your vital organs!''
  Nevertheless, the oil industry has placed a bull's eye on the very 
same piece of land that Congress set aside as critical habitat for the 
caribou. The industry wants to spread the industrial footprint of 
Prudhoe Bay into a pristine area. Let's take a look at the industrial 
footprints that have already been left on the North Slope. Look at 
Deadhorse and Prudhoe Bay. They are part of a vast Industrial Complex 
that generates, on average, one toxic spill a day of oil, or chemicals, 
or industrial waste of some

[[Page E232]]

kind that seeps into the tundra or sits in toxic drilling mud pits. It 
is one big Energy Sacrifice Zone that already spews more nitrogen oxide 
pollution into the Arctic air each year than the city of Washington, 
DC.
  Allowing this industrial blight to ooze into the Refuge would be an 
unmitigated disaster. It would be as if we had opened up a bottle of 
black ink and thrown it on the face of the Mona Lisa.
  But why invade this critical habitat for oil if we don't have to?
  The fact is, it would not only be bad environmental policy, it is 
totally unnecessary. Here's why:
  1. Fuel economy. According to EPA scientists, if cars, mini-vans, and 
SUV's improved their average fuel economy just 3 miles per gallon, we 
would save more oil within ten years than would ever be produced from 
the Refuge. Can we do that? We already did it once! In 1987, the 
fleetwide average fuel economy topped 26 miles per gallon, but in the 
last 13 years, we have slipped back to 24 mpg on average, a level we 
first reached in 1981! Simply using existing technology will allow us 
to dramatically increase fuel economy, not just by 3 mpg, but by 15 mpg 
or more--five times the amount the industry wants to drill out of the 
Refuge.
  2. Natural Gas: The fossil fuel of the future is gas, not gasoline, 
because it can be used for transportation, heating and, most 
importantly, electricity, and it pollutes less than the alternatives. 
The new economy needs electricity, and it isn't looking to Alaskan oil 
to generate it. California gets only 1 percent of its electricity from 
oil; the nation gets less than 3 percent, while 15 percent already 
comes from natural gas and its growing. Alaska has huge potential 
reserves of natural gas on the North Slope, particularly around Prudhoe 
Bay and to the west, in an area that has already been set aside for oil 
and gas drilling called the National Petroleum Reserve. Moreover, we 
have significant gas reserves in the lower 48 and the Caribbean. The 
Coastal Plain of the Refuge has virgually none.
  3. Oil not in the Refuge: The National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska 
has been specifically set aside for the production of oil and gas. It 
is a vast area, 15 times the size of the Coastal Plain, and relatively 
under-explored by the industry. Anything found there is just as close 
to Prudhoe Bay as the Refuge, but can be developed without invading a 
critical habitat in a national refuge. In fact, just last October, BP 
announced the discovery of a field in this Reserve that appears to be 
as large as Kuparuk, the second largest field on the North Slope. While 
the potential for oil in the Refuge still appears larger than in the 
Reserve, the Reserve holds much greater promise for natural gas, so 
that every exploratory well has a greater chance of finding recoverable 
quantities of one fuel or the other.
  Our dependence on foreign oil is real, but we cannot escape it by 
drilling for oil in the United States. Energy legislation introduced 
this week in
  We consume 25 percent of the world's oil but control only 3 percent 
of the world's reserves. 76 percent of those reserves are in OPEC, so 
we will continue to look to foreign suppliers as long as we continue to 
ignore the fuel economy of our cars and as long as we continue to fuel 
them with gasoline.
  The public senses that a drill-in-the-Refuge energy strategy is a 
loser. Why sacrifice something that can never be re-created--this one-
of-a-kind wilderness--simply to avoid something relatively painless--
sensible fuel economy?
  The latest poll, done by Democratic pollster Mark Mellman and 
Republican pollster Christine Matthews, shows a margin of 52-35 percent 
opposed to drilling for oil in the refuge.
  The public is making clear to Congress that other options should be 
pursued, not just because the Refuge is so special, but because the 
other options will succeed where continuing to put a polluting fuel in 
gas-guzzling automobiles is a recipe for failure.
  Sending in the oil rigs to scatter the caribou and shatter the 
wilderness is what I Call ``UNIMOG energy policy.'' You may have heard 
about the UNIMOG. It is a proposed new SUV that will be 9 feet tall, 
7\1/2\ feet long, 3\1/2\ inches wider than a Humvee, weight 6 tons and 
get 10 miles per gallon.
  That's the kind of thinking that leads not just to this refuge, but 
to every other pristine wilderness area, in a desperate search for yet 
another drop of oil. And it perpetuates a head-in-the-haze attitude 
towards polluting our atmosphere with greenhouse gases and continuing 
our reliance on OPEC oil for the foreseeable future.
  Now that our energy woes have forced us to think about the 
interaction of energy and environmental policy, it is a good time to 
say no to a UNIMOG energy policy and yes to a policy that moves us away 
from gas-guzzling automobiles to clean-burning fuels, hybrid engines, 
and much higher efficiency in our energy consumption.
  If we adopt the UNIMOG energy policy, we will have failed twice--we 
will remain just as dependent on oil for our energy future, and we will 
have hastened the demise of the ancient rhythms of a unique migratory 
caribou herd in America's last frontier.
  We have many choices to make regarding our energy future, but we have 
very few choices when it comes to industrial pressures on incomparable 
natural wonders. Let us be clear with the American people that there 
are places that are so special for their environmental, wilderness or 
recreational value that we simply will not drill there as long as 
alternatives exist. The Arctic Refuge is federal land that was set 
aside for all the people of the United States. It does not belong to 
the oil companies, it does not belong to one state. It is a public 
wilderness treasure, we are the trustees.
  We do not dam Yosemite Valley for hydropower.
  We do not strip mine Yellowstone for coal.
  We do not string wind turbines along the edge of the Grand Canyon.
  And we should not drill for oil and gas in the Arctic Refuge.
  We should preserve it, instead, as the magnificent wilderness it has 
always been, and must always be.

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