[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 105 (Tuesday, June 24, 2008)]
[House]
[Pages H6001-H6007]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
AMERICA'S FAILED ECONOMIC AND ENERGY POLICIES
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. HENSARLING. Mr. Speaker, 18 months ago, there was an election.
The Democrats won. They won fair and square. And for 18 months, Mr.
Speaker, they have controlled the economic policies and the energy
policies of our great Nation. Let's look back and take a look at what
has happened in those 18 months.
Since Democrats have taken control of these policies, the price of
bread, Mr. Speaker, has increased 21 percent; milk, 26 percent; eggs,
34 percent; gasoline, the price that we pay at the pump, has increased
71 percent under the energy policies of this new Democrat majority. As
an aside, in the last 18 months, the value of one's home has decreased
7 percent under their policies.
Mr. Speaker, tonight many of us have gathered to specifically talk
about the energy policies of the Democrat majority and how they differ
so greatly from the policies of the Republican party.
All over America, families are going to convenience stores and they
are having to make a decision: Do I buy a gallon of milk, or do I buy a
gallon of gas? They are having to make decisions about do I take my
children to school, or do I go to work? Families are in pain, having
seen their gasoline prices increase 71 percent.
What has the Democrat majority brought us in the way of an energy
policy? Well, their first policy was to beg. ``Let's beg OPEC. Let's
see if maybe we beg them, they will bring down the price of gasoline at
the pump.''
Well, that didn't work, Mr. Speaker.
What was their next policy? Their next policy was to sue. ``Let's sue
OPEC. If we somehow bring in the trial attorneys, we will lower prices
at the pump.''
Well, Mr. Speaker, that didn't seem to work either.
Well, here is another one they want to try. ``Let's tax. Let's tax
oil producers, and somehow that will bring down prices at the pump.''
Well, something I remember from my eighth grade economics about
supply and demand and cost. You impose another cost on a producer,
well, he is going to do his best to put it in the price of the product.
Well, in fact, that is what will happen. It almost sounds the like the
policies of Jimmy Carter and a Democrat Congress of a bygone era which
made us even more dependent upon foreign oil.
Here is another one: ``Let's try to castigate. Let's bring up people
who produce energy and let's say nasty things about them and their
companies and their families. Surely that will bring down the cost of
energy at the pump.''
Well, that hasn't seemed to work either.
The new one we tried today, the Democrat majority, ``well, let's
outlaw people who charge unreasonable prices. Let's criminalize that
activity.''
What they never have thought of, Mr. Speaker, is why don't we try to
produce more American energy in America? I mean, not only have they not
thought about it, Mr. Speaker, they are moving in the complete opposite
direction. They are passing policies that make it more difficult to
produce American energy in America to bring down the cost at the pump.
In fact, in one of the many non-energy energy bills that this
Democrat majority has brought to the floor, they passed a provision
known as section 526 of Public Law 110-140 that would prohibit Federal
agencies, in this case specifically the United States Air Force, from
contracting, taking in long-term contracts in order to get energy from
oil shale, tar sands, coal-to-liquids, alternative fuels, which is one,
one of the ways that we could make ourselves more energy independent
and quit relying so much on foreign sources of oil that are driving up
the cost of gasoline at the pump.
Because of this section that was introduced in one of the many
Democrat non-energy energy bills, or, as one of
[[Page H6002]]
my colleagues say, the Democrat lethargy bills, myself and the
gentleman from Texas, Mr. Conaway, have introduced H.R. 5656, which
almost has 100 cosponsors now, that would repeal this section, which
would allow the Federal Government to contract for these alternative
fuels to try to bring in more energy independence to help jump-start
some of these alternative technologies, which is a huge part of the
solution in order to bring down the price of gasoline at the pump.
Mr. Speaker, many of us will come to the floor to talk about this
very critical issue to American families, and those who have town hall
meetings know it is the number one issue on the minds of our
constituents, as it well should be.
Mr. Speaker, I am happy to lead this Special Order tonight. At this
time I would like to yield to the coauthor of H.R. 5656, which would
repeal this needless section making it more difficult to enact
alternative energy policies, I would like to yield to the gentleman
from Texas, Mr. Conaway, for his opening comments.
{time} 2200
Mr. CONAWAY. Well, I thank my colleague from Texas, and I want to say
a few things. We'll get to some of our other speakers who are here
tonight before we get into the heart of what you and I intend to talk
about.
Mr. Speaker, the serious business of providing energy for America,
whether that energy is electricity to light the lights in this hall or
to run manufacturing facilities or gasoline, whether it is diesel or
jet fuel to move people and goods and us around, is serious business.
Yet our colleagues on the other side of the aisle are not treating it
seriously. This week's get-out-of-town energy strategy included four
peripheral bills that are not intended to really deal with it or
intended to give cover, political cover, for the folks who voted for
these four bills.
Next week, when we all go home to our constituents, we'll have to
look them in the eye and tell them that, yes, we've done absolutely
nothing to address the cost of gasoline that you're paying. The
interesting thing about gasoline is that we may not buy gasoline every
single day, but as we drive around, we see the price posted all over
town, and I dare say that every single driver looks at the price to
check to see what it is. Even though you may not intend to buy gasoline
that day, you check those prices constantly. So it's constantly in
front of our minds as it is when we have town halls or telephone town
halls.
The get-out-of-town strategy included a price-gouging bill--again,
puffery--because seven DOE and Federal Trade Commission price-gouging
studies over the last decade have shown absolutely no evidence
whatsoever of price gouging. This serious business of providing
gasoline to consumers at prices that they can afford has been reduced
to sloganism: ``Use it or lose it.'' ``We can't drill our way out of
these problems.'' They're casual, offhand, flippant comments that don't
do the seriousness of this issue justice. A 30-second sound bite works
well on a television commercial, but at the heart of the matter, these
are complicated issues that deserve and that should get serious
consideration on both sides of the aisle.
The solutions aren't Republican. The solutions aren't Democratic. The
solutions are what are best for America. To the extent that we can
begin to delve deeper into what the issue might be and into what the
solution might be, the better off we are, but as long as we're just
very cavalier about what we're doing with the get-out-of-town energy
policy or with the sloganism that seems to permeate everything that we
do with respect to energy, we will not solve this issue.
Gasoline prices will continue to rise. Electricity costs will
continue to go up as natural gas prices rise and as we use more and
more natural gas to generate electricity. So we are not about the good
work of trying to find solutions. We are simply about the bad work of
being very casual, very cavalier and very unthoughtful, quite frankly,
about this particular issue.
So I look forward to hearing the comments from the other two speakers
we have with us tonight, and then I look forward to delving a little
deeper into things that I've already talked about.
With that, I yield back.
Mr. HENSARLING. Well, I thank the gentleman for his opening comments,
and I certainly thank him for his leadership and for working with me in
coauthoring this critical piece of legislation to help us really start,
jump start, some of the alternative fuels that will help us bring down
the cost of gasoline at the pump.
At this time, Mr. Speaker, I want to yield time to one of the real
workhorses in Congress, to one of the outspoken advocates of trying to
produce American energy in America. The gentleman from Georgia (Mr.
Gingrey) is recognized.
Mr. GINGREY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for yielding time.
I wanted to, first off, say that I am a very proud cosponsor of the
legislation introduced by Mr. Hensarling from Texas and by Mr. Conaway
also from Texas, H.R. 5656, which he referred to at the outset of this
hour.
I want to talk specifically about that particular bill because it's
so important, but before I get into the discussion about 5656, I want
to make sure that we put it into perspective in regard to the
discussion tonight.
We first heard from our colleague from North Carolina, Ms. Foxx, who
was talking for 5 minutes about the issue of supply and demand. She was
saying that that is a basic economic principle, and I think we all know
that. As she pointed out, Mr. Speaker, our Democratic colleagues cannot
legislate away the basic principle of supply and demand.
So what we're talking about and will talk about during this hour is,
I guess, the opportunity lost if we continue this folly of not going
after petroleum products in our own country. We call it and we refer to
it, of course, as domestic production. A lot of the focus is on ANWR--
that frozen tundra on the North Slope of Alaska, that very small area
where we know, as the geologists have already told us, there are
something like 10 billion barrels of petroleum. At full production, we
would be producing 1.5 million barrels of additional domestic oil every
day from that one source.
That is a small amount compared to what is available if we were not
handcuffing ourselves off of our coasts--off both our east coast and
our west coast--and off the eastern part of the Gulf of Mexico in what
is known as OCS, or the Outer Continental Shelf. There are literally
trillions of cubic feet of natural gas there which is part of our, the
United States', territorial waters on the Outer Continental Shelf for
which we could be drilling. There are tens of billions of gallons of
petroleum. Yet the Democratic majority, Mr. Speaker, continues to
prohibit, continues a moratorium which has existed since, I think,
maybe, back to 1990.
Today, what we're talking about, of course, is the price of a gallon
of regular gasoline. In the year and a half since the Democrats assumed
the majority of not only this House but also the majority of the United
States Senate, the price of a gallon of gasoline has gone from $2.60 to
$4.08. Mr. Hensarling, of course, pointed that out very well at the
beginning of this hour.
I want to ask my colleagues to just take a look at this one poster
that I want to show you. I think it's very important. I think it's very
instructive. This basically is the courtesy of Representative John
Peterson from Pennsylvania, who is retiring this year. He is a great
Republican Member of this body who has spoken so well on this issue of
giving us the opportunity to go after that natural gas and oil in the
Outer Continental Shelf off of our coastline.
On this poster, it shows here that, off the Pacific coast, the amount
of oil in the Outer Continental Shelf is 10 billion barrels. The amount
of natural gas is estimated to be 18 trillion cubic feet. That's off
the Pacific coast. Off of the Atlantic coast, the amount of oil is 2.3
billion barrels, and the amount of gas is 28 trillion cubic feet. The
eastern part of the Gulf of Mexico is also off limits: Oil, 3.58
billions of gallons. Natural gas, 12 trillion cubic feet.
Mr. Speaker, that's bad enough, but now lets get to 526. I want to
just take a little time before I yield back to my colleagues, who are
the real experts on this.
Last year, the Democratic majority passed a bill. They called it the
Energy
[[Page H6003]]
Independence and Security Act of 2007. It doesn't give us independence,
and it darn sure doesn't give us security. What they did in that
particular bill is they put in a section, section 526, that the
Hensarling-Conaway legislation, H.R. 5656, would repeal that section
526.
Why is that important?
Well, section 526 literally prohibits our Government, any agency of
our Federal Government, from contracting for any petroleum product that
is not conventional fuel if that product, that nonconventional
petroleum source, yields one scintilla--by the way, my colleagues, a
``scintilla'' is a very, very small amount--of an increased carbon
dioxide footprint.
Now, ladies and gentlemen of the House, that may have made sense when
the price of gasoline was $2.60 a gallon and when we had this
expectation and this hope that it would drop down to $1.50, but on June
24, 2008, when the price of gasoline has now gone up 75 percent--not
down--and it's $4.08 a gallon, does it make any sense to prohibit our
Federal Government from contracting for other sources of petroleum?
They are in this country in abundance.
The reason I have this poster is I want to point out to my
colleagues--and it doesn't show the exact spot, but in the western
States, in the Rocky Mountain States--and there are about five of
them--there is this rock product called shale, S-H-A-L-E. It is
estimated by the geologists, by the experts, that within that rock is
1.3 trillion barrels of petroleum. Yet our Federal Government is
prohibited from mining that shale and from getting this petroleum
source because it might, just might, result in a little bit more carbon
dioxide.
To put it in perspective, Mr. Speaker, the Federal Government
actually uses 380,000 barrels of refined product every day, and most of
that is used by the Department of Defense, and 75 percent of their
usage is by the Air Force in jet fuel. Just think about that and the
cost. Well, I'm going to tell you exactly what it is.
For the year 2008, this year, it's estimated that our Air Force will
spend an additional $9 billion on jet fuel at the cost of $135 a barrel
of petroleum. Yet all of this oil and natural gas and this petroleum
that we could get from shale in the Midwest, in the Rocky Mountain
States, sits there, and there it remains trapped in rock because of
this senseless section 526 that the Democrats passed last year in their
energy bill, in their so-called Energy Independence and Security Act.
It is time, as Mr. Hensarling, as Mr. Conaway and as the many other
cosponsors, including myself, have said, to say, look, that doesn't
make any sense today. We're all concerned about global warming--of
course we are--and about the environment and about clean air, but we're
not going to die tomorrow from that. We are about to starve to death,
and this country is about to go bankrupt when people can't get to work
and when they can't get to the grocery store. When they get to the
grocery store, they can't afford to buy food because of this senseless
ethanol conversion from corn to ethanol. That's a whole different
issue. I'm just here tonight to weigh in with my colleagues. I thank
them for giving me the time.
I sit on two committees--on the House Armed Services Committee and on
the Science and Technology Committee. This year, of course, we
reauthorized the National Defense Act of 2009, and we reauthorized the
NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Act. Both of
these agencies of the Federal Government utilize a lot of jet fuel. I
tried to take the Hensarling-Conaway bill and make it as an amendment
to strike that section or at least to grant a waiver from that
restriction of 526.
This Democratic leadership refused to even make those bills in order
so that the men and women, the commonsense men and women on both sides
of the aisle in this Chamber, would have an opportunity to vote up or
down in these trying economic times when we're losing jobs and when
people can't even afford to go to work.
So I thank the gentleman for letting me join with the Texas
delegation, if you will--my three classmates--who know so much about
this issue and about the many other issues of supply and demand as Ms.
Foxx said earlier. So I look forward to the rest of the hour.
I yield back to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling).
Mr. HENSARLING. I thank the gentleman from Georgia for joining us,
and I certainly appreciate his illuminating comments.
Mr. Speaker, I hope people listened very carefully to what the
gentleman had to say.
First, again, since the Democrats took over the Nation's energy
policies 18 months ago, the price of gasoline, as almost every working
family in America knows, has increased, roughly, 70 percent in just 18
months. How does that impact working families in America?
Well, Mr. Speaker, I have the privilege of representing the Fifth
Congressional District of Texas, and I go out of my way to make sure
that I reach out to my constituents and understand the challenges,
their hopes and aspirations, and I hear from them frequently.
I have recently heard from the Thomas family in Mesquite, Texas. They
wrote to me.
``Dear Congressman, to make up for the rising prices, we calculate
the use of the car to make the gas last a week. Some things we no
longer can buy. We have had to cut back on our groceries. We rarely
have three meals a day anymore.''
{time} 2215
Mr. Speaker, I know they don't mean to do it. I know there are men
and women of good intentions, but under the Democrat energy policies,
people in Mesquite, Texas, can no longer have three meals a day. That
is the result of these policies.
Again, as they have tried to beg, castigate, tax and criminalize
their way into lower gas prices, they have failed each and every time.
What they want to do is produce American energy in America. As the
gentleman from Georgia pointed out, under their policies, Mr. Speaker,
85 percent, 85 percent of our deep-sea resources are put out of bounds,
out of bounds. And 75 percent of our onshore resources, out of bounds.
The Arctic area of Alaska where more than half of America's proven
energy reserves reside, no, can't produce American energy there. Why
wouldn't you want to do that when people are suffering?
Now there are so many different things that we need to do, but the
most important thing that we need to do, Mr. Speaker, is produce
American energy in America. I just read today where there was a huge
discovery of petroleum off the coast of Brazil. In Brazil, they
celebrated. What a wonderful thing, we have these huge new energy
reserves. America must be the only country in the world that when we
discover great energy reserves, it is a cause for mourning. Oh, no, we
have oil. Oh, no, we have natural gas. Quick let's go out, let's make
sure nobody can touch it. It is a point of shame. We can't have these
natural resources helping working American families.
I mean, what a fouled-up policy, Mr. Speaker.
I am very happy that we have been joined tonight by the gentleman
from Texas (Mr. Carter) who knows all too well what the Democrat
majority has done to put all of this energy out of bounds and who will
speak to us more about what needs to be done in leasing our deep-sea
resources and the Arctic area of Alaska. I am very happy to yield time
to Mr. Carter.
Mr. CARTER. I am honored to be here with my colleagues from Texas. As
I start, I am sure there is someone somewhere who is saying, yes, there
are three Texans on the floor from the largest petroleum-producing
State in the Nation, and of course they want to talk about oil and gas.
Well, of course we do.
Also, I think most of us who are here tonight have lived with this
industry in our homes and our hometowns in our State. And there seems
to be some kind of mystery about terminology that our colleagues on the
other side of the aisle I assume are confused about but I don't think
that they would intentionally use sloganism to misadvise the American
public. But they are in charge of the House, and it is their
responsibility to know what we mean when we say lease space for
production of oil and gas.
Now the concept of leasing is not a tough concept. This House is full
of lawyers, but it doesn't take a lawyer to
[[Page H6004]]
talk about a lease. Most Americans know what a lease is. Most Americans
some time in their life have leased a home or leased an apartment. Some
Americans have leased a house for their family or they have leased a
car over a period of time.
Now when they lease, let's say, a car, they say I will pay you so
much money for the ability to have this car in my possession and use it
as I see fit for a period of time. And I am going to use it for
transportation. But they don't have to use it for transportation. They
can park it in the garage if they want to, but they would be
economically stupid to park it in the garage when they are spending
good money for the right to use that leased car. But they certainly
would be entitled to do that. If they were doing it for business
purposes, they certainly would lose money on that business.
There is no difference, really, between an oil and gas lease and any
other sort of lease. The concept is the same concept. A company goes
and bids to lease from the Federal Government a certain amount of land
for the production of oil and gas and petroleum products. And they pay
money to the Federal Government for the right to be able, for a period
of time, 5 or 10 years, to explore and ultimately drill for and produce
petroleum on that land. If they haven't done that within the period of
time of that lease, then the lease is void and goes back to the
government. I suppose the government can lease it to somebody else.
Now, we have a term that has come out ``use it or lose it'' which is
nebulous, to say the least, because every single oil and gas lease that
I have ever heard about from the Federal Government is a use-it-or-
lose-it lease. The terms of the lease say you have the right to explore
for and produce on this property for a set period of time, say 5 years.
After that period, if you haven't done that, if you haven't explored
and you haven't produced, the lease goes back because that's the
purpose of your using this land. You either use it for that or after 5
years, the terms of the lease that you paid for, you lose it.
Now the oil companies spend billions of dollars for these leases
because there is something peculiar about oil, and I think most people
in this country understand this. The peculiarity is that it is not
everywhere. It is sometimes in your backyard, and sometimes the nearest
place is five States away. So the oil companies are speculating based
upon sort of known concepts, but they use very highly technical
equipment and procedures to give them an indication of whether or not
there is oil or gas underneath a piece of property.
For my lifetime they have been using seismic measurements to
determine whether or not there is the possibility of a formation below
the ground that would be producing oil or gas. This seismic thing is
not really fancy. It is vibrations through the earth and they use
explosives to make it. Now from the time when I was a kid when I tried
to get a job on a seismic crew, that was pretty old-fashioned
technology. Today I am sure it is digital and high tech and much better
than it was in those days. And I just recently learned they are using
some kind of magnetic survey that the big companies are working on that
give them other indications where it might be. But the bottom line is
it is either there or it is not, and they have to look for it and spend
money to see if it is there. So they lease large parts of the country
or the offshore area, and they go out and they spend lots of money to
look and see if there is oil. And you know what, if they don't see any
good indications for production that will pay for itself, they are in
the business of oil and gas. So just like you wouldn't lease something
you wouldn't use, they won't continue to lease a lease that they can't
produce on.
But to say use it of lose it for the leases that are out there,
believe me, every oil company that is in the business of producing
petroleum products is going to utilize the money they spent on those
leases to try to make discoveries to find oil and gas products.
So to come up this slogan that means nothing because it is already in
the contract, it doesn't make sense. It is not a good way for us to
stand up for the American people. The Democrats are in charge of this
House. They have to be willing, as we were when we were in charge, to
take the heat for the things that are happening in this country. And
quite frankly, the heat right now is the price of gasoline. It has gone
up $1.75 or so since they got in office, and they have to take the
heat.
What we Republicans are saying is basically what we have been saying
since 1990: America has the potential to produce its own energy in
multiple forms and we support all those forms that are clean, can be
produced environmentally safely, and oil and gas falls within those
parameters. And we should be using American energy that we can produce
in America.
I would like to tell you, there is an issue about ANWR. ANWR is the
frozen tundra area in the far north part of Alaska. You can probably
see the pictures of those pristine mountains in the distance if you use
a telescopic lens to make it look like they are in your backyard. But
most pictures you see of actual ANWR, it kind of looks like this table
but it is marshy and frozen.
And this is a good example so you know what we are talking about. I
think every American knows what a football field looks like. If they
don't, they know what a soccer field looks like. If you take a book of
matches and toss it out on the football field, that book of matches
would represent the area that is being sought to drill the well to
produce in ANWR, and the football field would represent ANWR.
So when they are talking about destroying the wildlife preserve, we
are talking about a tiny bit of a place the size of South Carolina.
That's what we are looking to drill on, that is what we are looking to
produce on. And the track record is undisputable as far as drilling is
concerned. Drilling is environmentally safe and almost spill-proof.
Last year we spilled one tablespoon of oil in the drilling process.
Remember, I said the drilling process. So one tablespoon of oil
worldwide producing oil through drilling. So yes, there is a little
spillage, but that ain't bad. That is pretty good, and I think we could
do that without even spilling a drop in ANWR.
So these issues that are making so much noise come down to basic,
sound principles that we can't afford $4 or $5 or $6 a gallon gas until
we start making some common sense about American policy towards oil and
gas.
I don't even want to mention because I happen to be blessed to live
down in a State where at least in my part of the State it doesn't get
real cold in the wintertime. But I have been in Congress long enough to
know that the minute it starts getting cold up here in the northern
clime, people start getting real cold when they don't have heating oil
to heat their homes. And then they start running to Congress and asking
us to give them money to supplement their heating bills because the
price of oil is through the roof. Well, they haven't seen the price of
oil through the roof until they look at this $138 or $139 a barrel
price for crude oil. And the heating cost that is going to be hitting
the northeast and the midwest and the far west and the mountain areas
of this country come cold weather time is going to make this problem
with driving our automobiles look like a walk in the park for people in
that cold weather.
So let's start dealing with this issue now so that we can, as we show
the courage to do what is right and not block what is right, then those
people who are speculating, and also just bidding in competition with
us on the futures that are available in the oil market, will realize
that America is serious about producing its own energy. And when they
see us serious, they will know that we won't be the big players to
drive up the market, and I believe they will start to dump those
holdings they are holding now. As they dump those holdings into the
market, the price will go down. It is the argument that everyone has
said here today, the law of supply and demand. Right now we are short
on supply, certainly short on domestic supply. As we show the will to
seek domestic supply, our competitors will realize we are going to have
our own supply which will make that international trading in the market
less valuable to them and they will start to dump their oil before they
start to lose money on their speculations. So I think this is common
sense. This is easy. This is economics 101. I hope that everybody will
remember that leasing is just exactly what it is.
[[Page H6005]]
There is nothing magical about an oil and gas lease. It is paying money
for the use of land for a period of time. That's what we are talking
about here. So this use it or lose it idea is really strange.
In addition, there are some facts that have been thrown out that I
want to mention, and then I will yield back my time.
Democrats are saying that 4.8 million barrels of oil per day and 44.7
billion cubic feet of natural gas per day may be extrapolated from the
oil company's Federally leased land that they already hold today. This
is not true.
{time} 2230
No Democrat, not Speaker Pelosi, Hoyer, Rahm, any of them can give us
one source where they got that number, and it's been specifically
requested by the Republicans in the Natural Resources Committee to ask
them where they got that number and how they extrapolate it, and
there's been nothing forthcoming. I can't imagine that they just made
it up.
But the reality is if it is there, it has got to be found. If it has
got to be found, there's going to be hundreds of millions of dollars
spent to find it. And believe me, they're not going to waste their
money. If it's there, they're going to go get it. And so this is simple
stuff. And I hope the American people and the Members of this Congress
know it's simple stuff.
Mr. HENSARLING. I thank the gentleman from Texas for joining us this
evening. I thank him for the valuable leadership that he provides us in
the Republican Congress, and I particularly appreciate his comments,
his illuminating comments on leasing and what it is that we can do as a
Nation to provide more American energy in America.
Again, Mr. Speaker, elections have consequences. Since the Democrats
took over the energy policy of this Nation 18 months ago, when they
took it over, gasoline was selling at a national average of $2.33 a
gallon. Today we know, Mr. Speaker, it is well over $4 a gallon in just
18 months. I'm not sure if history shows us any greater increase in the
price at the pump in such a short period of time under the policies,
again, of this Democrat majority.
Now, that's having a devastating impact, Mr. Speaker, on working
families. And yet the Democrat majority refuses, refuses to do anything
to produce more energy in America. And I think sometimes, Mr. Speaker,
they forget about how their policies are impacting hard working
American families.
Again, I have the privilege of representing the Fifth Congressional
District of Texas. And I hear from my constituents often about the
challenges they're facing having to pay this Pelosi premium, having to
pay all of this extra money for gas. I recently heard from the Forest
family of Mesquite, Texas. And they wrote to me, Dear Congressman, we
cannot continue to operate this way. We have now canceled our life
insurance policies, canceled our cable, scaled down our automobile
insurance, and buy only the necessities at the grocery store. No movies
or other luxuries. My son and his daughter have had to move in with us
because he can no longer pay rent, day care, buy food, and pay for his
auto insurance and gas to go to work.
Again, Mr. Speaker, I know they don't mean to do it, but the Democrat
majority has got to wake up on how their no energy, no production
policies are hurting working Americans.
People in Mesquite, Texas, are having to cancel their life insurance
policies and take in their adult children back into their homes because
they refuse, refuse to produce any American energy in America to bring
down the cost of gasoline at the pump. That is a travesty, Mr. Speaker,
a travesty.
And for further comments on the energy policies that we need in the
Nation, and the need to repeal this Section 526 that for all intents
and purposes will make it almost impossible to develop oil shale, tar
sands, and coal-to-liquid technology, I once again want to yield to the
coauthor of H.R. 5656, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Conaway).
Mr. CONAWAY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for hosting this
night's hour. I hope that it helps some of our colleagues learn a
little bit more about the oil business. One of the things that is true
in almost every area is that before you begin to regulate something,
before you begin to try to control something, you really ought to
understand it first. And the lack of understanding, not malicious, but
it's not in their professional background. But the lack of
understanding of most of our colleagues about the oil business and how
it happens is--most of that information is limited to the ``Dallas'' TV
show and J.R. Ewing, which was anything but the truth.
The interesting thing about Section 526 is that it basically says the
Federal Government can't buy fuel from unconventional sources unless it
can be proven that the lifecycle greenhouse emissions are less for the
unconventional source than under the conventional source.
What this mechanically does is it takes a tremendous buying power of
the Federal Government out of the development phase of getting to
unconventional and new sources of ways to drive our cars that are
better. The Federal Government has great capacity to buy and buys great
quantities, particularly the Department of Defense, and we've now
pushed that market aside in terms of being able to use that market to
be able to develop these alternatives.
In addition, we've said that rather than buying fuel from tar sands
in Canada, which no one can prove whether or not the lifecycle of
greenhouse gases is more or less under those circumstances, we can't
buy that fuel, but we can buy fuel and crude oil from countries that
are, at best, not our allies.
In fact, we have recently passed on the floor of this House,
hopefully it won't get any further in the Senate, the opportunity for
Americans to sue OPEC to increase OPEC production. Again, an example of
how the wrongheaded energy policy has become under the leadership that
currently runs this House.
On the one hand, we will sue OPEC to increase production, on the
other hand, we say it is not in our best interest to have oil and gas
production from stable sources like the Outer Continental Shelf of the
United States or the Rocky Mountains of the United States. We don't
want to produce those resources, but we want to sue OPEC to force them
to produce more crude oil that we would, in fact, buy.
I'm also anxious to see how OPEC is going to respond to that by
allowing--setting in place the mechanisms to allow their citizens to
sue America to force America to produce its own energy. And the reason
they would do that, of course, is that crude oil is a worldwide market,
and to the extent that America is withholding her crude oil from the
market, she is, in effect, pushing up the price of crude oil worldwide.
So on the one hand, we want to sue OPEC, force them to produce their
barrels, but on the other hand, we don't want to produce our own
barrels which would go into the worldwide supply and would help bring
down that cost.
Now, I suspect there is some crafty Federal Trade Commission lawyer
that would look at America as creating some sort of a tort within that
system by withholding specifically supplies off the market in order to
push up the price of crude oil. I think that you could be arguing with
that.
I wanted to walk through the energy work that we're going to take up
this week.
One of them we've already taken up was the price gouging bill. Price
gouging is an interesting phenomenon. There's no real good definition
for it. It's pretty vague and in the eye of the beholder. But the price
gouging bill that we took up today would have penalized gasoline
retailers for trying to adjust their prices during a time of emergency
to equalize supply shortages and demand circumstances in those
shortages. The market is the best allocator of that resource, and it
happens to be on price.
So what we were setting our retailers up for, must of which are mom-
and-pop shops or small convenience store chains, or corporations like
Valero, which is simply a refiner and also a retailer of gasoline, for
the fall of this deal because if this bill had passed today, the
Federal crime that would have been committed was ill-defined.
And I want to read briefly from a CRA international study done back
in 2007 talking about price gouging.
[[Page H6006]]
It says, Under legislation that threatens to punish acts that are
defined vaguely and ambiguously, the behavior of the enforcing agencies
is inherently unpredictable. And businesses potentially affected by the
legislation could form expectations of prosecutorial conduct that could
discourage the efficient functioning of markets. Excessively harsh
penalties for setting the wrong price could give pause to market
decisions that are critical to alleviate shortages, especially if
individuals, unsure about the actions of the enforcers, were to adopt
very conservative behavior so as to ensure compliance with the law.
The result would be exactly the opposite to the good intentions of
the legislation's authors, disincentives to provide additional . . .
the waste occasioned by gas lines and the failure to allocate supplies
to those who benefit the most.
And then finally, this FTC study is in fact only the most recent
assessment of claims of gasoline price gouging. In the last decade, the
United States Department of Energy and the FTC have investigated all of
the numerous incidences of regional price spike--gasoline price spikes.
Their conclusion in every case has been that gasoline prices
increases--gasoline price increases were due to the operation of supply
and demand in light of an interruption of supply and that the magnitude
of price increases was consistent with the magnitude of the loss of
supply. There has never been a finding that gasoline price increases
were caused by manipulation of the markets.
And yet we continue to hammer away at price gouging, the second time
at least that this bill has come up, and it failed again today.
There is also a title of a bill that will deal with speculators in
the market. And as of early this afternoon, we've not seen the actual
language of that bill. But it is an attempt to go after speculators.
Now, it's interesting that the ag committee that I serve on, the full
committee had a hearing today in which Walter Lukken, who's the acting
chairman of the CFTC, the Commodities Futures Trading Corporation,
which oversees the speculative market in crude oil, among other things,
testified today that while he is constantly on the lookout for
potential manipulation by speculators and/or other participants in the
market, that they have seen no evidence that those speculators are
having undue influence on the price of crude oil. And then in fact the
price of crude oil is set by supply and demand as best they can tell
it.
But they are on the lookout every single day. And again, Mr. Lukken
feeds his family trying to protect markets from manipulation like the
speculators might have an impact on.
The other bill is a ``use it or lose it'' that my colleague from
Texas has already talked about. One of the other facts--it's
interesting. If we say facts around here, if you say a wrong fact often
enough, and often enough as we clearly do, it becomes legend; and that
68 million acres is tossed about by every member of the Democratic
leadership, 68 million acres. We have asked how they came up with that
number. The Bureau of Minerals Management can't figure out how they've
come up with it. The Department of Interior can't figure out how
they've come up with it. And we've gone to the leadership and said, We
don't know if that number is right or wrong. Tell us how you got to
that number. And much like the extrapolated production numbers that our
colleagues just talked about, they won't tell us.
All they'll say is that the majority staff of the Natural Resources
Committee came up with this number. Now, we don't know if it's good or
bad without knowing what it is. So we're having to defend against a
number that may have just been flat-out made up. But our colleagues
across the aisle won't come forward with their methodology to help us
understand what they've done.
And it's a pretty clear statement. If you're going to beat us about
the head and shoulders with a number of 68 million acres, then you need
to prove to us what that is and how you came to it and whether or not
we should be beat about the head and shoulders with it.
And then the final bill which we take up is something referred to as
the Saving Energy Through Public Transportation Act of 2008. This is an
attempt to help Federal employees cope with these higher commuting
costs through public transportation and reimbursements for that, which
is not a bad thing, but it clearly shows how tone deaf our colleagues
across the aisle are.
They will listen to their employees who are saying we're having a
hard time getting to and from work and we need help to reimburse that,
but not being able to understand that that is going on across the
United States, that that's not limited to just Federal employees.
So they've taken the position that it's a good thing to try to help
Federal employees help deal with and cope with these higher gasoline
prices, but let's ignore the rest of America who are actually paying
the taxes that would have to be used to pay for those commuting costs.
So looking forward to my colleagues' continued comments on these and
other issues, the 526 bill, Section 526 repeal is important. We've made
several attempts at it. We've included with that a refinery siting bill
that would ask the President or require the President to locate no
fewer than three potential unused military bases for sitings of
refineries, go through all of the proper evaluation and permitting
processes, and the governor of the States involved would have a veto.
But nonetheless, an attempt to say, Here are some places we can build
refineries to help alleviate the strategic vulnerability that this
country has. And so far, we've just been shut out on any attempt to
move towards actual more and new production of crude oil and natural
gas that would, in fact, deal with this issue of higher prices.
{time} 2245
Mr. HENSARLING. Again, I thank the gentleman from Texas for his
leadership. I thank him for working with me and co-authoring, I think,
a very important piece of legislation.
Again, Mr. Speaker, since the Democrats took control of the energy
policy of this Nation 18 months ago, the price of gasoline has
increased 70 percent to over $4 a gallon, having a terrible impact on
working families all across America and the Fifth District of Texas
that I represent.
I recently heard from the Gardner family of Dallas who wrote me:
``Dear Congressman, I am the proud father of an Eagle Scout. I know you
are an Eagle as well. I have a younger son in the Scouting program. In
order to afford sending our youngest to summer camp, we have had to
cancel any summer family trips in order to afford the increased cost of
fuel of sending our youngest to camp in Colorado.''
Mr. Speaker, I salute this family for their commitment to Scouting,
their commitment to their son, but under the Democrat energy policies
that have seen gasoline go to over $4 a gallon, families all across
America are having to cancel their summer vacation plans.
Mr. Speaker, what's the answer? Well, I wish there was just one magic
button or one magic wand that we could wave to get this done. There is
not, but it has a lot to do with, again, producing American energy in
America, and it is not just oil and gas. It is renewables. It is
alternatives.
I am proud to say that our Republican Party has constantly,
constantly supported renewable energy. In the Energy Policy Act of 2005
was almost $4 billion for the hydrogen fuel cell program, with the goal
of launching hydrogen fuel cars by the year 2020; $3 billion dedicated
to developing affordable, efficient and renewable energy technologies.
We supported extending the renewable electricity production credit, the
H Prize that would offer cash prizes for achievements in the
development of hydrogen energy technologies, millions for biomass
research, millions for solar research. Renewables are part of the
equation.
Mr. Speaker, before I came to Congress, I was an officer in one of
the Nation's leading retailers of green electricity. I'm committed to
it. Mr. Speaker, I'm the father of a 6-year-old daughter and a 4-year-
old son, and I hope one day that they are driving in hydrogen-powered
cars. I hope that one day they will have solar cells on their roofs and
no longer be tied to the electricity grid.
But in the meantime, Mr. Speaker, every day in America somebody needs
to drive to work today. Every day in
[[Page H6007]]
America somebody needs to take an elderly parent to see a doctor.
That's today. Somebody has to take their child to school. That is
today.
There are wonderful renewable technologies, but I can tell you as one
who has worked in the industry, for these to be commercially viable,
for them to be scalable, these technologies are easily 10 years away,
perhaps 15, and in some cases, 20.
Another part of the answer, Mr. Speaker, is diversification. China is
building two to three nuclear plants a year. In America, we haven't
built a new nuclear plant and we haven't had any new permits in 30
years, and yet we know nuclear power has zero emissions, no impact, no
carbon footprint whatsoever. We need diversification.
Another thing we need to do, Mr. Speaker, under the Republican plan
to bring down the price of fuel at the pump is reduce the number of
boutique fuels. There was a time in America's history where if you
drove from Spokane, Washington, to Kansas City, Kansas, to Dallas,
Texas, to Miami, Florida, there's only one gasoline you bought. Now it
may be as many as a dozen, which drives up the price and leads to spot
shortages.
Mr. Speaker, not only have we doubled, we are twice as dependent on
foreign sources of energy today as we were at the height of the Arab
oil embargo. Not only are we importing more oil, we are now having to
import refined gasoline. Why? Because we haven't built a refinery in a
generation because of this worshipping at the altar of radical
environmentalism.
And Mr. Speaker, sometimes I think my friends on the other side of
the aisle have forgotten that people are part of the environment, too,
and they're struggling. They're struggling to keep their job, pay their
rent, fill up their cars. We have to expand American refining capacity.
And then we have to produce the energy we have. Mr. Speaker, we are
blessed with great energy resources. We are the Saudi Arabia of coal.
That's why I and the gentleman from Texas have introduced this bill to
ensure that Federal agencies can contract to help to develop these
promising technologies in coal-to-liquid. It's already being done in
Britain, in Saudi Arabia. We can do it now if the Democrat majority
would get out of the way and let us produce.
And our oil resources, Mr. Speaker, the Outer Continental Shelf, our
deep sea resources, why is 85 percent of that outlawed? Why is it off
the board? Why can't we produce there?
There are decades and decades and decades of energy just sitting
there for the take, and again, the radical environmental left that
helps control our Democrat majority won't let it happen.
The arctic area of Alaska, half of our proven petroleum reserves sit
there in an area of America where almost no one lives.
Mr. Speaker, I get to represent a large portion of East Texas, and I
can tell you, somehow man, nature and pump jack can coexist. They can
coexist peacefully, and it can be done in Alaska as well.
So, Mr. Speaker, I would hope that something as challenging as the
high price of petroleum, that we could come together as Republicans and
Democrats and work for the betterment of all the people in America.
But Mr. Speaker, you cannot outlaw supply and demand. You cannot do
it. Demand has increased precipitously over the world, particularly in
areas like China and India, and we're sitting on these great supplies,
and we're the only Nation in the world that I'm aware of who sits on so
much energy and refuses to produce it.
And instead, what does our Democrat majority offer us? Beg OPEC, sue
OPEC, tax oil companies, castigate oil companies, impose a form of
price controls. That does nothing, nothing to help American families.
The Republican plan will, and with that, I would be happy to yield to
the gentleman from Texas.
Mr. CARTER. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I hope that
everybody is listening in detail to what my colleagues are talking
about here today.
You know, I spent a long time as a district judge and watching
lawsuits. It is very fascinating, this sue OPEC argument that's out
there, because as I understand it, the lawsuit would be you are not
producing enough, therefore, you're fixing the price and we're suing
you. And I would see a lawyer for the Saudi Arabians or whomever we had
sued, they would say, well, wait a minute, you're not producing,
therefore, you're influencing the price of oil; so I'm going to
counter-sue you under this lawsuit, and now, America, let's see who's
not producing the most.
I'm afraid we'd lose because we're not producing anything on the east
coast, anything on the west coast, anything in half of the Gulf of
Mexico and anything in a quarter of Alaska, where they can argue that
they're producing everything they can pump. It's just how fast they
turn up the pumps. So that lawsuit might turn its back on us right
there, and that concerns me. But that's all speculation.
It's not speculation that that family's not getting to go on a
vacation. You know, it's not speculation the people who worry about how
they're going to get their children to their schools and their after-
school activities come the start of school in the fall.
I talked to a lady two-and-a-half years ago when the Democrat
minority, when we were in the majority, were criticizing us for $2.40 a
gallon, $2.50 a gallon gasoline. They were criticizing us, and I went
and pumped gas in a gas station for about 3 hours and talked to the
people as I filled up their tank.
And the lady who told the most compelling story was the one who said,
I have to get my kids to their various recitals, practices, after-
school activities and make sure they get to school on time. They go to
three different schools. I'm a single mom, with three kids in three
different schools in three different parts of town. And I have to
choose between what we eat or if we eat and whether I get to drive the
car to get these kids.
That was at $2.50 a gallon of gas. We have now got $4.07 a gallon of
gas, and I can't help but think about that lady every day and wonder--
I'd like to actually hear from her--wonder how she's doing.
Also, the trucker that hauled a load from Houston to San Diego and
got paid $1,800, and his fuel costs were $1,700, how is that man going
to make a living?
This is about making a living, living the American dream, just being
good Americans, and we're being kept from that by the Democrats' energy
policy. It's time to wake up and produce American energy for America.
Mr. HENSARLING. I thank the gentleman, and for our final closing
comments, I yield to the other gentleman from Texas.
Mr. CONAWAY. I want to thank our two colleagues for being with us
tonight to talk about this.
What you're really talking about is an attack on the American
lifestyle. We have built a Nation predicated on cheap gasoline because
it has always had cheap gasoline, and we've built suburbs. We've
expanded into rural areas. We've built a lifestyle that demands low
gasoline prices.
And what we are telling Americans is that this Democratic-led
Congress wants high gasoline prices and wants to attack the American
lifestyle.
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