[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 64 (Wednesday, May 11, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2863-S2864]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 ENERGY

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, yesterday, I spent some time on the floor 
talking about the recoverable reserves in the United States of America. 
I was shocked so many Senators--first of all, I was shocked that many 
listened but more shocked they came up to me and said: We were not 
aware we have this opportunity.
  I have, from the Congressional Research Service, a breakdown of where 
all of it is. I wish to share that breakdown and get it into the 
Record. I applaud Senator Murkowski and others for trying to open and 
fully develop the resources in the Gulf of Mexico. That is very 
significant. I applaud their effort, and I join them in their effort.
  We need to go further than that because in the Gulf of Mexico are--
these are figures of the Congressional Research Service--undiscovered, 
technically recoverable resources. Our resources, according to CRS, are 
greater than any other country in the world in oil, gas, and coal. I am 
going to talk just about gas right now because one of the big issues, 
of course, not just with my wife but with others, is the price of gas 
at the pumps.
  If we look at the undiscovered, technically recoverable resources 
just onshore, in the United States--some actually would be on public 
lands--it is 37.8 billion barrels of oil. Throw in Alaska and that 
would be 26.6 billion barrels; the Atlantic, 3.8 billion barrels; the 
Pacific, 10.5 billion barrels; the Gulf of Mexico, as I already said, 
44.9 billion barrels. The total U.S. endowment--our endowment--of 
technically recoverable oil is 162.9 billion barrels.
  We have talked about this before and talked about the fact that we 
have all these resources, but our problem is a political problem 
because the politicians will not let us reach these reserves. We are 
talking about the fact that they are hardly able to reach them in the 
Atlantic and the Pacific, and we know what has happened on the North 
Slope, ANWR. We have talked about that for a long time.
  People do not realize public lands--90 percent--are off-limits, off-
limits politically.
  I have to correct some of the statements some people have made that 
conveniently misrepresented what our

[[Page S2864]]

reserves are. Instead of using ``recoverable reserves,'' they use 
``proven reserves.'' That is a technical term. In order to prove a 
reserve, you have to drill and analyze and core and see how much oil 
there is. Obviously, if we will not let anyone drill, they cannot prove 
it.
  When they say we only have 2 percent of the world's proven reserves, 
that is absurd because we have to drill to determine what that is. 
Other countries do not have that problem. We are the only country in 
the world that does not exploit our own resources.
  People are going to have to realize that if you want to do something, 
it is such a simple thing to do deal with. It is supply and demand. 
There is not a person here or a person listening today who has not gone 
through the elementary experience in school of learning supply and 
demand. We have the supply in America and we have the demand. The 
politicians will not let us exploit our own resources. That is the 
problem we have. You do not have to overly complicate this issue.
  It is interesting--and I hate to say it; I am not pointing fingers in 
a partisan way--when Democrats and the administration say: We are going 
to tax big oil, they say actually they are going to do away with some 
of the benefits big oil has. They are not benefits. These would be four 
huge tax increases the Democrats are doing on big oil. That is not big 
oil. That is oil, period. I will not go into the details of depletion 
allowances and percentages. It is not important.
  The point is, they have the same benefit every other manufacturer 
has, and to single them out and say: We are going to punish big oil, 
all that is going to do is make the price at the pumps skyrocket. It 
gets right back to supply and demand.
  By the way, those who are trying to use the argument that this 
somehow is going to produce revenue that is going to be used, I suggest 
even the White House's figures, the maximum revenue generated would be 
$4 billion. Keep in mind, they lose all the benefits, so that is not a 
net of $4 billion.
  Take the State of Texas, for example. They do not have an income tax. 
They have the oil tax that has run that State very well for a long 
period of time. Senator Menendez made a statement and said taxing the 
oil companies is not going to bring down the price of gas. They are not 
even claiming it will. I just think that when one sees such an obvious 
solution to the problem--just exploit our own resources--we are very 
foolish not to do that.
  We all talk about the solutions to the problem. We talk about the 
spending of this administration, more debt increases in just the first 
2 years of the Obama administration than the entire debt since George 
Washington, in the history of this country, the huge spending, the $5 
trillion in the President's three budgets of deficit--I remember coming 
down and complaining in 1995, at this very podium, when the Clinton 
administration came out with a budget for fiscal year 1996 and it was 
$1.5 trillion. I said: We cannot sustain that level. Now it is $1.5 
trillion in each of the three budgets, just the deficit. That is more 
than the entire United States of America back in 1996.
  I suggest that when people say there are only two solutions to this 
problem, either reduce spending, which would be my choice, or increase 
taxes, which I would not do, I say there is a third option. That option 
is to do something about the cost of regulation. Right now, if we just 
take what the EPA is doing in five--in fact, I will say three of the 
major overregulations we are going over right now--people in the Senate 
know we have defeated cap-and-trade legislatively by massive 
percentages five times since 2003. This administration says: If we 
cannot have cap and trade, we are going to do it, not legislatively, we 
will do it through the EPA. That is what is going on now with 
greenhouse gases.
  If you add up what the administration is doing in terms of the cost 
of greenhouse gas regulations, that is between $300 billion and $400 
billion; on ozone, if they choose--and they said they are going to 
choose--the 60-parts-per billion standard, that would be $676 billion; 
the boiler MACT would be something in excess of $1 billion. Throw in 
utility MACT and cement MACT, it comes to $1 trillion. This is what I 
am trying to get at. I used the figure that for every 1 percent 
increase in economic activity, it produces new revenue of $42 billion. 
That has changed. According to the Congressional Research Service--they 
are bipartisan, they are factual--for every 1 percent increase in GDP, 
it produces $50 billion additional revenues.
  If we just take these regulations and add them up, all the increase 
of costs to GDP of the three regulations I mentioned, that is $1 
trillion. If we take the fact it is $14 trillion GDP in a given year, 
this would be 7 percent of that $14 trillion. For each 1 percent, it 
would be $50 billion. We could generate new revenue of $350 billion 
just by taking this overregulation out of our society.
  One can argue: Inhofe, that is not true because these regulations 
have not passed yet. That is right, so it would probably right now be 
about half that. When the Obama administration came in and announced 
these regulations were coming, the manufacturers, the producers, those 
who are driving the economic ship were the ones who said that because 
of the uncertainty of these regulations, we are going to slow down what 
we are doing. If we were to lift all these regulations, I assure my 
colleagues we would be approaching, at least by 1 year, $350 billion. 
That is without a tax increase. That is without reducing spending.
  We need to look at this realistically because this is an opportunity 
we have. A lot of people remember back in the days of Ronald Reagan. I 
can say the same thing back in the days of President Kennedy. Of 
course, he was a Democrat. They felt overregulation and high taxation 
was an inhibiting factor to slow down revenue. Of course, in the case 
of Ronald Reagan, the total revenue coming from the marginal rates of 
1980 was $244 billion. In 1988, it was $466 billion. That was at a time 
when we had the largest reduction of taxes and regulations in this 
society. It is shown to be true over the years.
  My bottom line is this: People know about spending. People know about 
taxes. They do not know about regulations. The people who are affected 
directly--the manufacturers--understand it. The figures I am using are 
actual figures we have gotten with which no one argues. The fact that 
$50 billion of increased revenue comes from each 1 percent increase in 
GDP is a fact that is supported by the CRS.
  I offer that, along with our opportunity to become totally 
independent from the Middle East, with regard to our ability to run 
this machine called America.
  Before I yield the floor, I see the Senator from Alaska. I hope he 
was listening to what I was talking about because the opportunities in 
Alaska are tremendous--26.6 billion barrels of oil. I am sure he 
understands that. I wish to make sure everybody else does.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BEGICH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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