On May 21, 2008, the Senate Judiciary Committee spoke with top executives from the petroleum industry. Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) and his fellow Democrats tried to blame the American oil companies for the high price of gasoline. However, it was the senators who got a lesson in "oil" economics.
Attending the Senate Committee's meeting were chairmans, presidents and vice presidents of BP America, Inc., Shell Oil Company, Chevron Corporation, Conoco Philips Company; and Exxon Mobil Corporation. The meeting was a "blood-bath" for the senators. The oil executives had the facts to prove that the US Energy Policy of the last 30 years is the prime reason of the present oil crisis.
President John Hofmeister of Shell Oil Company testified as follows:
"According to the Department of the Interior, 62 percent of all on-shore federal lands are off limits to oil and gas developments, with restrictions applying to 92 percent of all federal lands. We have an outer continental shelf moratorium on the Atlantic Ocean, an outer continental shelf moratorium on the Pacific Ocean, an outer continental shelf moratorium on the eastern Gulf of Mexico, congressional bans on on-shore oil and gas activities in specific areas of the Rockies and Alaska, and even a congressional ban on doing an analysis of the resource potential for oil and gas in the Atlantic, Pacific and eastern Gulf of Mexico.
The Argonne National Laboratory did a report in 2004 that identified 40 specific federal policy areas that halt, limit, delay or restrict natural gas projects. I urge you to review it. It is a long list. If I may, I offer it today if you would like to include it in the record.
When many of these policies were implemented, oil was selling in the single digits, not the triple digits we see now. The cumulative effect of these policies has been to discourage U.S. investment and send U.S. companies outside the United States to produce new supplies.
As a result, U.S. production has declined so much that nearly 60 percent of daily consumption comes from foreign sources.
The problem of access can be solved in this country by the same government that has prohibited it. Congress could have chosen to lift some or all of the current restrictions on exportation and production of oil and gas. Congress could provide national policy to reverse the persistent decline of domestically secure natural resource development."
Near the end of the hearing, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) asked Mr. Hofmeister about the Democrats' (now serving in Congress) and their latest efforts to block energy independence:
HATCH: I want to get into that. In other words, we're talking about Utah, Colorado and Wyoming. It's fair to say that they're not considered part of America's $22 billion of proven reserves.
HOFMEISTER: Not at all.
HATCH: No, but experts agree that there's between 800 billion to almost 2 trillion barrels of oil that could be recoverable there, and that's good oil, isn't it?
HOFMEISTER: That's correct.
HATCH: It could be recovered at somewhere between $30 and $40 a barrel?
HOFMEISTER: I think those costs are probably a bit dated now, based upon what we've seen in the inflation...
HATCH: Well, somewhere in that area.
HOFMEISTER: I don't know what the exact cost would be, but, you know, if there is more supply, I think inflation in the oil industry would be cracked. And we are facing severe inflation because of the limited amount of supply against the demand.
HATCH: I guess what I'm saying, though, is that if we started to develop the oil shale in those three states we could do it within this framework of over $100 a barrel and make a profit.
HOFMEISTER: I believe we could.
HATCH: And we could help our country alleviate its oil pressures.
HOFMEISTER: Yes.
HATCH: But they're stopping us from doing that right here, as we sit here. We just had a hearing last week where Democrats had stopped the ability to do that, in at least Colorado.
HOFMEISTER:
Well, as I said in my opening statement, I think the public policy constraints on the supply side in this country are a disservice to the American consumer.
The committee's Democrats had NO REPLY.
For 30 years we have had an energy policy that resembles a "witches' brew" of kick-backs and pandering to the Looney Left. For 30 years good engineers and technicians have kept this Country fully supplied with the energy she required; but we are not "Supermen". (I use the "we", because I too am an electrical engineer.) The electrical power grid will be facing brown-outs and "rolling" black-outs if this summer is too hot. Gasoline prices are expected to reach $5.00 per gallon by August, 2008. And this is just the start.
For 30 years, the Democrats have acted without the sense that God gave a retarded dodo bird. And now the "chickens" are coming home to roost.
Contant your Congressional Representatives and Senators. Ask, no DEMAND that all federal lands, including ANWR, be opened to oil exploration and development. DEMAND that the outer continental shelf moratoriums be lifted. DEMAND that all nuclear power plant construction resistrictions and "red tape" be eliminated. DEMAND that all oil refinery construction resistrictions and "red tape" be eliminated.
Do it for our Children. And our Grand-Children. And our Great-Grand-Children.