[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 36 (Thursday, March 10, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1524-S1525]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            GASOLINE PRICES

  Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I wish to talk about gasoline prices and 
energy. Just a few years ago, this Nation was in the middle of an 
energy crisis not unlike the one we are in today. Back then Nevadans 
were confronted with record prices at the gas pump, and this body did 
nothing to relieve their burden.
  When I joined my colleagues to demand that we explore our own 
domestic energy possibilities, the call fell on deaf ears. In May of 
2007, I said that ``moving America toward energy independence needs to 
be more than a bumper sticker and a campaign slogan.'' Unfortunately, 
it remained just that.
  Campaign promises to protect our Nation's security interests remain 
on the campaign trail, and cheers at political rallies to increase 
America's energy independence are left behind with deflated balloons 
and forgotten confetti. Well, here we are. My colleagues on this side 
warned against what an unstable Middle East could mean for our gasoline 
needs. Yet, today, what are we witnessing? Turmoil in that region and 
escalating gasoline prices at home once again.
  Unfortunately, this time around, our economy is also in trouble. My 
State of Nevada has continued to suffer the most during this recession, 
and economists are not predicting a quick turnaround anytime soon.
  The problem with this new energy crisis is that a record number of 
people in Nevada and around the country are now without jobs and 
without homes. So how are they supposed to afford $4-a-gallon gasoline 
or maybe even $5-a-gallon gasoline at the pump? I will tell you simply, 
they cannot afford this.

  Recent unrest in Egypt, Libya, and other countries has forced gas 
prices to rise nearly 40 cents a gallon in the recent weeks. For those 
struggling in my State, that is verging on unfavorable. For those who 
are worse off, it already is. The price of gas is at a 2-year high. The 
average price of a gallon of gasoline in America is now $3.52. When 
President Obama first took office, the average price for a gallon of 
gasoline was $1.84. That is a 91-percent increase. What are we doing? 
Nothing. In Nevada, gas prices are rising and are now above $3.60 a 
gallon. The biggest concern with the rising cost of gasoline is that it 
translates into higher prices at the grocery store, utility bills, and 
virtually everything we do.
  I have spoken at length over the past few years about people in my 
State who are being forced to decide between paying the rent or putting 
food on the table to feed their families. But what are they going to do 
if they can afford to do either? This is a sad thought for me but a 
reality for many others.
  Throughout this economic downturn, Members from both sides of the 
aisle have come to the floor to talk about people in their home States 
who are suffering. Philosophical differences aside, both parties have 
put forth legislation that they believe will help the economic plight 
of many Americans. What have we done about energy prices that threaten 
to derail recovering families? Nothing.
  Rising gas prices affect nearly every sector of our economy. 
Everywhere we look in America today, our economy continues to be 
directly affected by the skyrocketing price of fuel. At a time when 
unemployment is over 14 percent in my home State and Americans are 
already struggling financially, we can no longer allow this problem to 
be ignored or to be set aside. We need real solutions that develop our 
domestic energy and oil production, and we need those solutions to 
decrease our dependence on dangerous foreign oil.
  We send over $500 billion a year out of this country to buy foreign 
oil. A lot of that money ends up financing the very people who would do 
us harm. What America needs is everything but foreign oil from 
dangerous countries. That needs to be our energy policy so that we can 
ensure that the price of gas does not further cripple our crumbling 
economy.
  In 2008, I spoke on the Senate floor and said these following words:

       The American people are looking to us for solutions. We 
     have a responsibility to make decisions here in order to 
     provide them much needed relief at home. For many months, 
     Republicans have been working to provide that relief. We have 
     been focused on a three-pronged approach: boosting renewable 
     energy and alternative energy, encouraging energy efficiency, 
     and growing our American energy supply. This line of attack 
     balances the need for us to be responsible stewards of our 
     environment with the need for reliable, affordable energy to 
     fuel our lives and our economy.

  Again, that is what I said in 2008 when Republicans wanted to address 
the need for American energy independence. But the Democratic majority 
had other priorities.
  We simply cannot continue to pass the buck on to another Congress and 
kick the can down the road. We need to take action, and we need to do 
it now.
  Like the spending cuts, everything needs to be on the table when 
discussing American energy independence. By working to eradicate our 
dangerous dependence on foreign oil from the Middle East and Venezuela, 
we can protect Americans from choosing between paying the rent, 
providing food for their families, or paying for gas to drive to work.
  What does an ``everything but dangerous foreign oil'' approach look 
like? It means 10 billion barrels of oil from ANWR in Alaska. It means 
28 billion barrels from deep-sea exploration; about 1.8 trillion 
barrels possibly from oil shale in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming; 
trillions of cubic feet in American natural gas. It also means a 230-
year supply of coal and great potential for nuclear energy. These are 
American sources of energy. If we combine those with conservation and 
aggressive investment in renewable and green energy--solar, wind, 
geothermal, hydropower, fuel cells, and electric vehicles--they are all 
key to our American energy independence.
  I recently visited a couple of different places in my home State of 
Nevada that are producing electric cars. Those are great, but you still 
have to produce the energy to produce the electricity to run those 
electric cars. That is why we need this ``all of the above'' approach 
for American energy independence.
  My home State of Nevada is actually a shining example of many 
innovations being made on these fronts. Nevada Solar One in Boulder 
City is one of the largest capacity solar powerplants built in the 
world and generates enough electricity to power at least 14,000 
households a year. Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas has the Nation's 
biggest photovoltaic solar power system, which supplies 30 percent of 
the energy used at the base. Henderson has Nevada's first solar 
community, where each home has a rooftop solar electric system. Late in 
2007, Ausra, Inc., selected Las Vegas as the site for the first U.S. 
manufacturing plant for solar thermal power systems. The world's third 
largest geothermal power producer is headquartered in Reno, NV. And 
Nevada is home to the only associate degree program in the Nation in 
energy efficiency. It is absurd to think that people in Nevada are 
going to be crippled by increasing prices at the gas pump at the same 
time that our State is leading the way in renewable energy innovation 
simply because Congress will not act to address this crisis.
  Throughout this last year, bills were passed filled with unintended 
consequences because every dip in the economy was deemed by some to be 
a crisis that required an immediate solution. Yet we knowingly continue 
to ignore the energy crisis that will continue to plague our country 
every time the Middle East cannot get along.
  According to the Department of Energy, oil is the source of more than 
40 percent of our total energy demands and more than 99 percent of the 
fuel we use in our cars and trucks.
  The Senator from Alaska, Ms. Murkowski, was just on the floor talking 
about how we all want to transition to a more green economy. But the 
fact is, that is going to be years and even decades away, so we have to 
have American sources of energy here now.
  The United States consumed about 19 billion barrels of petroleum 
products a day in 2009. We receive over half of this oil--51 percent--
from foreign sources, predominantly from the Middle East, Africa, and 
Central America. We cannot continue to ignore this issue. Inaction is 
no longer an option.

[[Page S1525]]

  The Obama administration's approach to developing domestic energy 
production has been to impose regulations, withdraw permits, and shut 
off access to lands that contain valuable oil and natural gas deposits. 
In addition, the EPA is currently regulating domestic energy resources 
for greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act. We can no longer 
afford organizations, such as the EPA, claiming authority to cut off 
our access to resources because of arbitrary rules based on unsound 
science. These backdoor climate regulations could increase the cost of 
gasoline and electricity by 50 percent. These policies work to promote 
our dependence on foreign oil, and they do nothing to reduce the cost 
for ordinary Americans.
  Ten billion barrels in ANWR in Alaska means that not drilling is not 
an option. ANWR is roughly the size of South Carolina, but drilling in 
ANWR will only be about the size of McCarran Airport in the city of Las 
Vegas. That is about 2,000 acres out of the size of South Carolina. If 
I had a map here, it literally would be a dot on a huge map. That is 
how tiny an area we have to disturb to get this 10 billion barrels of 
oil out of ANWR.
  We can even access ANWR during the winter months. We can drive out on 
ice roads that are 6 feet thick, and then in the spring, when 
everything starts to melt and the animals need to come out for their 
breeding in the springtime, we can cap the wells, take all of the 
equipment out, and let nature take its course in the summer months.
  Additionally, at least 40 billion barrels of recoverable oil in the 
National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska and the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas 
means that Alaska alone can replace crude imports from the Persian Gulf 
for nearly 65 years. Let me repeat that. New oil in Alaska can 
replace what we import from the Persian Gulf for the next 65 years. If 
that is not in the interest of America--our national security interests 
and our national economic interests--I don't know what is. I bet that 
is a statistic the Obama administration would rather keep hidden. As a 
matter of fact, they are keeping it hidden because the EPA is blocking 
the ability of Americans to go in and get those oil and natural gas 
reserves.

  Also, in Louisiana, drilling for natural gas in the Haynesville Shale 
resulted in an estimated $5.7 billion in new household earnings for 
Louisiana residents in 2009, and it created over 50,000 jobs. I mention 
this because going after American energy produces American jobs. I 
think everybody in this Chamber agrees we need American jobs today.
  Now we are finding that there are more reserves located in central 
Louisiana and southern Mississippi, and they may contain 7 billion more 
barrels of natural gas. But we have also found many natural gas 
reserves in the rest of the country. Shale reserves in Pennsylvania, 
Ohio, New York, Oklahoma, and West Virginia could provide us with 
literally billions more barrels of natural gas.
  Yet, in the midst of this abundance, the administration has strapped 
down these reserves with regulations and too-long-to-comply-with 
permits. The solution to this situation is simple: We need to 
streamline the process to allow America to access its own resources 
without the hindrance of bureaucratic redtape. If we are allowed to 
fully tap into the potential of these reserves, we will be one step 
closer to developing affordable and environmentally safe compressed 
natural gas vehicles. This will not only curb our reliance on dangerous 
foreign oil but also create even more jobs and put us at the forefront 
of alternative-fuel technology. By using our own natural gas reserves, 
we can build more powerplants, improve our transportation needs through 
buses and trucks that run on natural gas, power our fleets, and improve 
our country's ability to manufacture steel, fabric, glass, and plastic 
that we need instead of outsourcing these jobs overseas, which is what 
has been happening.
  Madam President, 28 billion barrels of deep-sea oil means that the 
Obama administration cannot continue to hold these reserves hostage by 
banning deep-sea drilling. The Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic coast 
areas alone hold commercial oil reserves of 28 billion barrels of oil 
and up to 140 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. These are huge 
reserves.
  Despite the administration lifting its moratorium on permits late 
last year, only one deepwater well permit has been issued in the last 
11 months--only one. We can and we must do better than this.

  Yesterday, it was reported that the Obama administration will issue 
another handful of deepwater drilling permits in the near future. Of 
course, this comes at a time when the administration is appealing a 
ruling from a Federal court that has ordered the administration to act 
on the permits that have been pending and that have been virtually 
ignored.
  Secretary Salazar, in a Senate subcommittee hearing just yesterday, 
said oil production in the gulf will not drop significantly as a result 
of the administration's delay. He said we ``may see a blip.'' Well, 
this country cannot afford to see a downward blip. As a matter of fact, 
we need to see an upward tick. We need to see more production coming 
out of the Gulf of Mexico.
  Recently, Senator Vitter drafted his No Cost Stimulus Plan, as he 
calls it--or his 3 Ds. Those 3 Ds are domestic energy, domestic jobs, 
and reducing the deficit. This bill aims to increase our ability to 
access domestic energy sources to increase our energy independence. It 
would use these domestic energy sources to create thousands of real, 
private-sector, long-term jobs in areas such as my State, where we have 
the potential to lead the Nation in renewable energy.
  In 2009, the Obama administration canceled 77 oil and gas leases in 
Utah, and in 2010 it canceled another 61 oil and gas leases in Montana. 
This is astounding to me because now, instead of acting on American 
energy independence, we are trying to stifle the progress we are 
making. Senator Vitter's legislation would direct the Obama 
administration to reinstate oil and gas leases that were canceled and 
to open ANWR to oil production.
  Senator Vitter's legislation would also establish an ANWR alternative 
energy trust fund so we can pay for renewable energy development with 
our own money instead of borrowing money from China and Saudi Arabia 
and others to do it. The bill also restricts the EPA from imposing 
regulations that cut off our access to oil and gas resources instead of 
utilizing them.
  We have been talking about the debt on this floor and overspending. 
We need legislation to go after American energy. By the way, this 
legislation would not cost us any money. As a matter of fact, it brings 
in money to the U.S. Treasury because we get royalties off of American 
energy. That is the direction in which the Senate, the House, and the 
President needs to take our country--less dependence on foreign oil, 
more American security from an energy independence standpoint, more 
economic security, and more military security as well.
  Republicans have solutions and we are eager to start this debate, but 
we need the majority to bring these bills to the floor of the Senate. 
The issues are too critical for us to delay. We can't afford to let 
gasoline continue to go up and up and up, to $4, $5, who knows where it 
is going to stop.
  Unfortunately, President Clinton vetoed the bill that would have 
opened ANWR back in the mid-1990s. I think we were one vote short in 
passing the ability to open ANWR when President Bush was President. 
This body failed by one vote. That is unfortunate, because if we had 
opened ANWR, we wouldn't be in nearly as bad shape as we are in today. 
But it isn't just ANWR, it is many other places where we can have 
American energy and we need to act and we need to act now.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Dakota.

                          ____________________