[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 134 (Tuesday, October 9, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H6431-H6433]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     URGING SECRETARY OF ENERGY TO FILL STRATEGIC PETROLEUM RESERVE

  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and 
agree to the resolution (H. Res. 250) urging the Secretary of Energy to 
fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, as amended.
  The Clerk read as follows:

                              H. Res. 250

       Whereas the United States is engaged in military activity 
     as a result of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001;
       Whereas such acts continue to pose an unusual and 
     extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign 
     policy of the United States, including the security of 
     important energy supplies;
       Whereas our Nation imports more than half of the crude oil 
     it consumes from other nations;
       Whereas Congress found in the Energy Policy and 
     Conservation Act that the storage of substantial quantities 
     of petroleum products will diminish the vulnerability of the 
     United States to the effects of a severe energy supply 
     interruption, and provide limited protection from the short-
     term consequences of interruptions in supplies of petroleum 
     products;
       Whereas a severe energy supply interruption would have an 
     adverse impact upon American consumers and the economy;
       Whereas the Strategic Petroleum Reserve has an authorized 
     capacity of 1,000,000,000 barrels of crude oil, a current 
     storage capacity of 700,000,000 barrels of crude oil, and 
     approximately 545,000,000 barrels of crude oil currently in 
     storage; and
       Whereas marginal wells in the United States provide an 
     important base of domestic crude oil production, make an 
     important contribution to our workforce and economy, are 
     particularly sensitive to price fluctuations, and are 
     difficult and costly to reopen: Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That the House of Representatives urges the 
     Secretary of Energy to increase the capacity of the Strategic 
     Petroleum Reserve to 1,000,000,000 barrels of crude oil, to 
     fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its capacity as soon 
     as practicable, and to consider purchasing from marginal 
     wells that would otherwise cease production, consistent with 
     current law.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Barton) and the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Baldacci) each 
will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton).


                             General Leave

  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all 
Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend 
their remarks and to include extraneous material on the resolution, H. 
Res. 250, as amended.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Texas?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, today the House is going to consider a very important 
resolution dealing with our energy security. This is a bipartisan 
effort; and I would like to publicly thank the ranking member of the 
subcommittee that I chair, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Boucher), 
the full committee ranking member, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. 
Dingell), and of course the full committee chairman, the gentleman from 
Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), for their excellent support on this resolution.
  This is a nonbinding resolution, so it does not require the Secretary 
of Energy and the President of the United States to move to fill the 
Strategic Petroleum Reserve; but it is my intent and my hope, and in 
working with the administration officials the last several weeks, that 
we will begin to do that.
  The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is an important national asset. It 
was created in the 1970s, after the last Arab oil embargo that was 
imposed on the United States and the Western democracies by OPEC, the 
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. We made a decision as a 
Nation to begin to stockpile oil so that never again would our economy 
be held hostage to oil imports. Since that time, we have accumulated as 
much as 600 million barrels of oil in the reserve. Today, we have 
approximately 545 million barrels.

[[Page H6432]]

                              {time}  1445

  These reserves are in four sites on the Gulf Coast, two in Texas and 
two in Louisiana, and each of them has somewhere between 80 and 160 
million barrels of oil.
  The reserve is authorized to have a capacity of 1 billion barrels. It 
does not have that capacity in place. It has capacity to actually store 
about 700 million. As I said earlier, there are 545 million barrels 
currently in the reserve.
  We import about 12 million barrels a day. Some of that oil comes from 
nations that are not friendly to the United States of America; Iraq is 
a nation that comes to mind. There is a distinct possibility in the 
next several months as the President pursues terrorists and those that 
harbor them, we may need to take military action against some of these 
nations that we are receiving oil imports from, so it would behoove us 
to have in place the ability to use this reserve and to begin filling 
the reserve to its full capacity.
  We could put approximately 155 million barrels of oil in the capacity 
that we have. The negotiations and the work that we are doing right now 
with DOE officials and Bush administration officials would be to take 
oil in kind from the Federal OCS. We could receive approximately 
170,000 barrels per day and put that oil into the reserve. There would 
be no out-of-pocket cost to the U.S. Treasury if we did that; and in 
doing that kind of swap, we should be able to get to 700 million 
barrels without any extraneous expense.
  If we want to go to the 1 billion barrels, if the reserve is 
authorized, we will need to appropriate funds to build additional 
capacity, and we may need to appropriate funds to purchase oil.
  Mr. Speaker, the resolution before us indicates if we need to 
purchase oil we give preference to marginal wells or stripper wells, as 
they are called in the Southwest. These are wells that produce less 
than 10 barrels a day.
  The last time we had an oil price collapse several years ago, we lost 
between 500,000 and 1 million barrels of stripper well production that 
will never come back.
  This resolution would encourage the Secretary of Energy to give 
preference to marginal well purchases. It is authorized by law that we 
purchase marginal well domestic oil. This would give preference to 
those purchases.
  We think if we could purchase some of this oil, we could buy it at a 
very inexpensive price. The acquisition cost in the reserve today is 
about $27 a barrel. The world oil market price is around $20 a barrel. 
When stripper well prices fall below $15 or $16 a barrel, they begin to 
be shut down. If we subtract the royalty and the taxes that they are 
paying, the severance taxes, stripper well prices are already at that 
$15 a barrel price. It is not demanded by this resolution that we 
purchase oil for the reserve from marginal wells, but it is given a 
preference.
  Mr. Speaker, I feel very strongly that it is in our national interest 
to have the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in a state of readiness. I can 
state to the Congress, I toured one of the sites at Big Hill down by 
Beaumont, Texas last week. Their security was excellent. Their 
operational capability was 100 percent. They told me that they could 
begin pumping within a day of the President giving the order to do it, 
perhaps within hours if given the order to do it.
  Ironically, they said that they would not be able to start drawing 
down the oil that quickly because of the paperwork requirements. 
Because of senior officials in the DOE and the need to do a bidding 
process, it might take 14 to 15 days before they could actually draw 
down the oil. But operationally, they could draw it down immediately.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a very, very good resolution. It has passed the 
Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality with the full support of all 
members on both sides of the aisle. The gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. 
Tauzin) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) have agreed to 
bring it straight to the floor without going to the full committee 
because of the cooperative nature of the resolution. I hope that we can 
adopt this by unanimous consent.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BALDACCI. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  (Mr. BALDACCI asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks, and include extraneous material.)
  Mr. BALDACCI. Mr. Speaker, I want to point out earlier this year in 
September I sent a letter to the Secretary of Energy suggesting to him 
that he also be able to look at this, and I am pleased the gentleman 
from Texas (Mr. Barton) has brought this forward and the committee has 
brought this forward, especially today considering the prices on the 
spot market.
  I support H. Res. 250, which urges the Secretary to fill the 
Strategic Petroleum Reserve. We worked very hard to establish a heating 
oil reserve, which I am pleased to report is at capacity. But the 
Strategic Petroleum Reserve does have additional capacity.
  In the War Powers Resolution that we passed just a few weeks ago, we 
found that acts of terrorism continue to pose an unusual and 
extraordinary threat to national security. Part of that threat is to 
the security of our energy supplies, particularly those that we procure 
from the Middle East and other areas of the world.
  This is perhaps even more salient now that we are engaged in military 
action in Afghanistan. The bill the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton), 
the subcommittee chairman, and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. 
Boucher), the ranking member, authored and the Subcommittee on Energy 
and Air Quality reported acknowledges this concern and urges the 
Secretary of Energy to take some very prudent steps to help guard 
against a disruption of energy supplies by using his existing authority 
to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its current maximum capacity 
of about 700 million barrels of oil.
  At this time the reserve contains only about 545 million barrels of 
oil, so we could increase our Nation's insurance against an oil supply 
shock by nearly 40 percent if we fill the reserve to capacity.
  This is also a very opportune moment in fiscal terms for the 
Secretary to fill the reserve. Prices for crude oil and gasoline at the 
pump have fallen a great deal in the last month, so it will cost the 
taxpayer less now to fill the reserve than it would have a month ago. 
For instance, the day before the attack on our Nation spot prices for 
crude averaged slightly more than $25 a barrel. Today, the spot price 
for the same product has fallen below $20 per barrel, a 20 percent 
decrease in price. We should act now, because any supply disruption, 
even if it does not threaten our security, could end up increasing the 
cost to our constituents of filling the reserve.
  The resolution also urges the Secretary of Energy to expand the 
reserve to its fully authorized capacity of 1 billion barrels. This is 
an important long-term position that is supported by Members on a 
bipartisan basis. By fully realizing the potential of the Strategic 
Petroleum Reserve, we could nearly double our protection against a 
severe supply disruption from what we have today.
  Finally, the resolution urges the Secretary to consider purchasing 
oil for the reserve from marginal wells that would otherwise cease 
production in a manner consistent with current law. Marginal wells are 
an important resource, and there is strong bipartisan support for 
ensuring the continued operation of these wells.
  Although this resolution does not carry the force of law, it does 
send an important message to the administration and others that there 
is strong support for filling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its 
maximum authorized capacity, and it does it in a way that is respectful 
and consistent with both current law and the War Powers Resolution we 
recently passed.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the legislation.

                                    Congress of the United States,


                                     House of Representatives,

                               Washington, DC, September 28, 2001.
     Spencer Abraham,
     Secretary, Department of Energy, Independence Avenue, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Abraham: I am writing to encourage the 
     Department to take steps to fully stock the Strategic 
     Petroleum Reserve. At this time of low oil prices, it makes 
     sense to ensure that we have a full Reserve to protect us 
     from potential instability in the future.
       It is my understanding that the SPR currently holds about 
     544 million barrels of oil and that its capacity is 700 
     million barrels. I believe we should take advantage of the 
     relatively low oil prices we are enjoying to fill the Reserve 
     to capacity. As you know, these reserves can be used to 
     protect our nation

[[Page H6433]]

     against interruptions in petroleum supply. In these uncertain 
     times, I believe that we should have the maximum possible 
     reserve supply to ensure that we are able to meet our 
     nation's energy needs under a variety of contingencies.
       While prices are low, I realize that purchasing the 
     additional oil will require additional resources. I would be 
     willing to support increased appropriations for the 
     Department of Energy to be dedicated to this purpose.
       Thank you for your consideration of this matter.
       With best wishes,
           Sincerely,
                                                 John E. Baldacci,
                                               Member of Congress.

  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, we have no other speakers so I am going to wrap this up 
quickly. I thank the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Baldacci) for his 
excellent work in the last Congress on the Refined Products Reserve. 
That reserve is in place. We have checked with DOE officials, and it is 
full. It is ready to be utilized if there is a shortage of fuel oil 
this winter in the Northeast. Hopefully there will not be. It is 
another example of the fine bipartisanship that we have on this 
subcommittee and the full committee. The gentleman from Massachusetts 
(Mr. Markey) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Boucher) worked with 
the gentleman from New York (Mr. Fossella) and the gentleman from New 
York (Mr. Sweeney), and others on the Republican side to move that 
legislation in the last Congress.
  Mr. Speaker, I do not want to belabor the point on the Strategic 
Petroleum Reserve. Suffice it to say it is another tool in our 
country's arsenal as we go after terrorists. We do not want to give any 
terrorist anywhere in the world the idea that they can blackmail us 
economically by shutting off our oil supply.
  We have invested so far in the reserve approximately $15 billion in 
1998 dollars. For a very small incremental cost, we can fill the 
reserve to its full 1 billion barrel capacity, and it will be available 
to be used by the President of the United States if he sees fit to 
utilize it to protect our economy.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope we can pass this with all yeas and no nays, to 
send a very strong signal to our potential enemies around the world 
that we are not only ready to fight terrorism diplomatically and 
militarily, but we are also ready to use our economic might if we have 
to.
  Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back 
the balance of my time.
  Mr. BALDACCI. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Petri). The question is on the motion 
offered by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton) that the House suspend 
the rules and agree to the resolution, H. Res. 250, as amended.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Petri). In the opinion of the Chair, 
two-thirds of those present have voted in the affirmative.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be 
postponed.

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