Washington, DC – Offshore energy exploration and production in the United States is safe and environmentally sound. Over the past 50 years, the U.S. oil and gas industry has developed innovative, 21^st century technologies and exploration techniques that are efficient, pose little threat to the environment, and ensure worker safety.

According to the National Academies of Science, less than 1 percent of the oil found in the North American marine environment comes from oil and gas development. Nearly 60 percent, however, is the result of natural seeps.

Thomas J. Pyle, president of the market-oriented Institute for Energy Research (IER), issued this statement in response to today’s Senate Energy Committee hearing on environmental stewardship and offshore energy production:

“Technology and innovation remains key to delivering more homegrown, job-creating American energy, both onshore and off. The facts and history demonstrate that offshore energy production, with today’s 21^st century technologies, poses little to no threat to our marine environment. In fact, marine life actually flourishes in waters shared with energy infrastructure.

“Unfortunately, a de-facto ban on safe, responsible offshore domestic energy development remains in place today, despite the fact that a clear majority of American people want access to the energy that is rightfully theirs. Advanced technologies currently deployed throughout the western Gulf of Mexico – which help deliver huge amounts of energy to keep our economy fueled and moving each day – are testament to the strides made to ensure environmental safety.

“Last summer the American people spoke, and Congress responded when it retired the nearly 30-year ban. It’s time for this administration to unchain the federal government’s stranglehold on so much of our nation’s job-creating energy resources offshore. Slow-walking this commonsense action could make the next energy crisis pale in comparison to the pain of $4 gasoline working families and small businesses felt during the summer of 2008.”

NOTE: Here is brief overview of some of the advanced, 21^st century offshore energy exploration technologies:

Advanced 3-D seismic and 4-D time imaging technologies: enable offshore operators to locate oil and gas resources far more accurately to necessitate less drilling and allow greater resource recovery.

Storm chokes: placed on all offshore wells to detect damage to surface valves and shut down production during an emergency.

Blowout preventers: continuously monitor the subsurface and subsea-bed conditions to prepare for unexpected changes in well pressure.

Waste product reuse technology: transforms drill cuttings, a waste product of rock pieces and drilling fluids produced when drilling a well, into raw material for bricks, roads, and even rebuilding Louisiana’s wetlands.

For additional information, please contact Patrick Creighton, 202-621-2947, or Laura Henderson, 202-621-2951.

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Not true, as you can see here.

This week Senator John Kerry, the lead author of the legislation, told the Senate Finance Committee that “the reason” we need to pass his cap-and-trade energy tax is that “over the last eight years, emissions in the United States of America in greenhouse gases went up four times faster than in the 1990s.”  Also not true.  In fact, he’s off by a factor of 32.

As the video shows, greenhouse gas emissions increased far slower in the 2000s than the 1990s. According to data from the Energy Information Administration,[1] U.S. carbon dioxide emissions increased by 15.14% between 1990 and 1999, but from 2001 to 2008 carbon dioxide emissions only increased by 1.88%. If Senator Kerry were correct, U.S. carbon dioxide emissions would have increased by 60.5% over the last 8 years, but they only increased by 1.88%.  Senator Kerry overestimated U.S. emissions by a factor of 32.

These are the authors of the Kerry-Boxer cap-and-trade energy tax legislation.  If our leaders can’t stick to the basic facts to support their argument for a national energy tax, and the lead author of the bill is this far off the mark on “the reason” Congress needs to pass it, Americans might reasonably question the validity of their estimates on how much the bill will cost them and our nation’s already-struggling economy.

Even more troubling, Senator Lindsey Graham is now working with Senator Kerry on a “compromise” in which Senators’ would accept the cap-and-trade plan in exchange for “opening new areas for offshore drilling.”  This would have been a bad compromise last year, but given the fact that the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) is now open—and has been since Congress allowed its ban on offshore drilling to expire on October 1, 2008—it appears to be an even worse compromise this year.

If the compromise is anything like the “Gang of 10” plan offered last year in the months before the Congressional ban on drilling in 85 percent of the OCS was set to expire, the only thing we’d be compromising is the progress we’ve already made. That’s because the Gang of 10 plan would have created a permanent ban on drilling in 78 percent of our offshore areas—areas that are now open.

But at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what the compromise may be.  The long-term costs cap-and-trade legislation would inflict on our economy and our way of life would be so devastating, that no compromise – offshore drilling or anything else – would justify its passage.

“It doesn’t take an advanced legal mind to interpret what Congress meant in the Deep Water Royalty Relief Act – it’s right there in black and white. Unfortunately, now that this case has officially come to a close, it will likely be used by those who oppose responsible energy development as a cudgel to beat Congress into passing bad legislation that would otherwise have no legitimate place in the energy debate.

“Make no mistake. Oil and gas revenues from federal lands and waters contributed more than $23 billion dollars to the Treasury in 2008 – making this the single largest revenue raiser after federal income tax receipts. And with scarcely three percent of the outer continental shelf currently leased for energy exploration, it’s fair to say we haven’t even scratched the surface of what could be a multi-trillion-dollar resource.

“Today’s court ruling represents a clear victory for the rule of law, and an unambiguous rebuke to those in the administration who believe they have the unilateral power to make law, instead of the faithful obligation to enforce it.”

Note: According to an economic analysis commissioned by the American Energy Alliance, robust offshore energy exploration and production would generate $8 trillion in additional economic output (GDP); $2.2 trillion in total tax receipts; 1.2 million new, well-paying jobs annually across the country; and $70 billion in additional wages each year.

For additional information, please contact Patrick Creighton, 202-621-2947, or Laura Henderson, 202-621-2951.

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But what’s most troubling about this misguided proposal – besides the fact that it will make American energy more expensive and less available at a time when Americans are demanding more, affordable energy – is  that it’s based on flawed intelligence.  The basis for the “use it or lose it” portion of the bill, for instance, is that energy companies have been “sitting on 68 million acres” (while paying millions of dollars in rent for those acres) in order to keep prices high.  And that 68 million acres, according to a widely cited report produced by Chairman Rahall’s staff last year in response to Americans’ calls to end the government’s self-imposed offshore energy embargo, “could produce an additional 4.8 million barrels of oil and 44.7 billion cubic feet of natural gas each day”. The Institute for Energy Research thoroughly debunked that manufactured canard, as did the Interior Department and the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, so this time it’s being sold under the guise of “efficiency” and “accountability”.

Specifically, Chairman Rahall’s bill would create a new, duplicative and unnecessary government leasing agency and add more red tape to already lengthy federal leasing process, while cutting in half the length of time a company has to wade through the process – and the protests and litigation anti-energy groups file each step of the way – to get to a point where they can “diligently develop” the lease.  The trouble here is two-fold.  For starters, the Chairman seems to be contradicting himself as he voted for legislation in 1992 that increased the lease period from 5 years to the current 10 years.  And it certainly hasn’t gotten any easier to develop energy on federal lands in a timely manner.  In fact, according to data from the Bureau of Land Managemen (BLM), protests filed by anti-energy groups at various stages of the leasing process have increased from an average of 167 per year from 1997-2000 to 1,180 per year from 2001-2007 – a 706% increase.  And in July 2008, when the BLM held a quarterly lease sale involving 78 parcels, 100% of the tracts that were bid on received protests.  Every one of them.  Unfortunately, the Chairman’s legislation does nothing to hold these groups “accountable” for their “efficiency” in delaying any progress toward the diligent development of federal leases.

But perhaps the most striking premise behind this legislation — and the multiple actions the Administration has already taken to restrict and reduce energy development on taxpayer-owned lands — is that the Bush Administration was too “cozy” with “big oil” and offered up an inordinate amount of federal lands for energy exploration. The rarely reported truth, however, is that the Bush administration offered far fewer acres for lease than did the Clinton Administration.  President Bush also made offshore energy development drastically more expensive and less likely by increasing the royalty rate on offshore energy leases by 50%, an increase Chairman Rahall’s legislation would apply to onshore oil and gas leases.  So if Chairman Rahall and Secretary Salazar truly want to correct President Bush’s energy failures, they ought to reconsider their efforts to double down on the actions he took to make domestic energy scarce and more expensive.

But if the goal is to ratchet down the amount of energy we produce here at home and further increase our dependence on imported energy, this big-government, no energy legislation will do wonders to further that agenda.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 6, 2009
Contact:
Patrick Creighton, 202.870.0850
Laura Henderson, 202.621.2951

China, Russia, Cuba, Brazil Advance Robust, Supply-Focused Energy Policy

In Washington, Senate panel looks for new ways to ration, constrict American energy

Washington, DC – As our chief global competitors continue to expand their access to job-creating, economy-strengthening energy resources, the U.S. Senate Environment Committee held another hearing today focused on subsidizing inefficient, intermittent, and expensive energy sources, while discouraging access to affordable and reliable ones.

Following the hearing, Thomas J. Pyle, president of the Institute for Energy Research, issued this statement:

“Another week, and another missed opportunity by Congress to address our nation’s growing energy crisis. Russia is brokering a deal with communist Cuba to drill just miles from the Florida Keys. The Chinese are voicing interest in partnering with Canada to expand energy production. And Brazil is moving at breakneck speed to develop their oil and gas reserves offshore. But in Washington, our leaders sit idly by, debating misguided policies that will increase the cost of energy, cripple our economy, and make us less competitive.

“Energy rationing and taxpayer-subsidized ‘green jobs’ has been experimented on the local, state, and national level. And universally, it has delivered higher energy costs, and less economic growth. Spain’s experience has led to an unemployment rate approaching 20 percent in its country. Denmark, often touted as the world leader in wind energy, gives away electricity at a loss. And in Lone Star state, Austin residents pay almost three times more for their ‘green’ energy.

“Our national energy strategy is upside down.  Instead of advancing meaningful, supply-oriented policies that keep energy affordable for all Americans – like the ones China, Russia and Cuba are advancing – our leaders are hard at work restricting access to our vast domestic supplies, taxing our affordable carbon based energy sources, and showering the “green” energy brokers on Wall Street with subsidies (tax dollars) and mandates.  Increased domestic energy production creates good-paying jobs here at home. Washington must focus on creating these good jobs, not exporting them offshore.”

More from IER on ‘Green’ Jobs and Abracadabra Energy Policy:

• Study:  Spain’s Green Jobs Experience.
• IER on Secretary Salazar and Solar: Interior Secretary Limits Domestic Energy Production, but Fast Tracks Solar Development.
• IER: Abracadabra Energy Policy: Are the Generating Alternatives to Coal-Fired Electricity Ready for Waxman-Markey Targets?
• IER Blog: Will “Green Energy” Trickle Down?

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 21, 2009
Contact:
Patrick Creighton, 202.870.0850
Laura Henderson, 202.621.2951

California Drilling: Progress or Economic Self Destruction?

Efforts to expand offshore production come with Sacramento’s heavy hand, and a wink and a nod from the enviros

Washington, DC – Thomas J. Pyle, President of the Institute for Energy Research (IER), issued the following statement today regarding California’s ongoing budget negotiations to meet the state’s 26 billion dollar financial shortfall, which includes responsible domestic energy development off Santa Barbara’s coast:

“It took more than 40 years, double digit state unemployment, the worst budget crisis in the state’s history, and a laundry list of concessions, handouts, and payoffs, but California is finally ending its irrational ban on responsible energy production off Santa Barbara’s coast.

“While some may consider this progress, the devil is always in the details. Under this so called ‘deal,’ negotiated by several out-of-the-mainstream organizations, Plains Exploration and Production (PXP) will be permitted to drill 17 wells from an existing platform in federal waters, tapping oil and gas reserves beneath an existing lease in state waters.

“In return, PXP must shut down the platform by 2022, dismantle three others, close two processing plants, donate 4,000 acres of land for a state park, and buy $1.5 million dollars worth of buses for Santa Barbara County. This, in my view, sounds more like a shakedown than progress. Either way, this ‘deal’ speaks directly to why California is facing a $26 billion dollar budget deficit.”

NOTE: Just last week, IER was joined by more than a dozen other consumer-focused and pro-energy groups in calling on the president to increase domestic energy exploration and production offshore. Click HERE to view this letter.

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a not-for-profit organization that conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. IER maintains that freely-functioning energy markets provide the most efficient and effective solutions to today’s global energy and environmental challenges and, as such, are critical to the well-being of individuals and society.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 10, 2009
Contact:
Laura Henderson, 202.621.2951
Patrick Creighton, 202.621.2947

One Year Later: As Anniversary of Lifting of Offshore Energy Ban Approaches, IER Asks: “Where’s the Energy?”

IER joins broad coalition of pro-energy, pro-consumer groups in asking White House, Congress to free American energy

WASHINGTON – As the July 14 anniversary of President Bush’s decision to lift his office’s unilateral ban on offshore energy development approaches, the American people are no closer to accessing those abundant reserves of homegrown energy than they were last July. Recognizing this fact, and seeking an explanation for it, the Institute for Energy Research (IER) today joined more than a dozen other pro-energy organizations in asking the president to move forward aggressively with expanded domestic offshore energy production.

Thomas J. Pyle, president of IER, issued the following statement:

“While the outdated presidential ban on clean, safe domestic offshore energy production may no longer be intact, more action is needed from Washington before the American people can access the energy offshore that’s rightfully theirs. The president has stated time and again that energy security is a chief concern of his administration. Well, this one-year anniversary of the lifting of the offshore ban should serve as a stark reminder to the American people, and to the president and Congress, that energy security will not – and cannot – be achieved without allowing America to produce its vast amounts of energy resources we have right here at home, especially along our outer continental shelf.”

NOTE: Click HERE to view this letter.

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a not-for-profit organization that conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. IER maintains that freely-functioning energy markets provide the most efficient and effective solutions to today’s global energy and environmental challenges and, as such, are critical to the well-being of individuals and society.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
April 21, 2009
CONTACT:
Laura Henderson 202.621.2951

Court Decision Tests Salazar’s Mettle on Offshore
Energy Production

Interior Secretary holds key to unlock drilling plan from legal morass, but cat holds his tongue

WASHINGTON – Institute for Energy Research (IER) president Thomas J. Pyle issued the following statement today in response to a recent court decision vacating the Department of the Interior’s existing five-year offshore energy plan, leaving the United States – absent intervention by the Interior secretary – without a legal means of developing its offshore energy resources even in areas currently approved for exploration:

“The existing 5-year plan encompasses areas with a mean resource potential of 10 billion barrels of oil and 44 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. At today’s prices, this represents a domestic investment of $669 billion dollars. That’s $669 billion dollars we can either spend here in America — putting Americans to work producing American energy — or spend abroad, increasing the wealth, employment and power of Nations that understand something our leaders appear to have forgotten: the strategic significance of seeking, securing, and producing the energy that makes economic growth possible.

“Now that this plan has been declared null and void as a matter of law, Secretary Salazar has a decision to make: He can order his department to immediately comply with the Court’s request for additional information and analysis – information that has never been required in the past, but has nevertheless already been collected – or he can use the same strategy for the current five-year plan that he has so ably employed for the new five-year plan: delay, obstruct, and distract.

“American jobs, to say nothing of nation’s energy future, quite literally hang in the balance. What’s it going to be, Mr. Secretary?”

NOTE: Last Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit upheld a claim filed by the nation’s leading anti-energy lawsuit groups supporting the assertion that the Interior Departments existing 2007-2012 offshore energy plan did not meet its criteria for prohibiting any additional production of American energy off our shores. The plan has been vacated, throwing into doubt whether any new exploration can commence without an active five-year plan in place. The decision also raises the possibility that the Interior Department will be forced to return more than $10 billion in up-front bonus bids. Operators have not yet announced whether they will seek further clarification from the Court, or future recompense from the Department.

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a not-for-profit organization that conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. IER maintains that freely-functioning energy markets provide the most efficient and effective solutions to today’s global energy and environmental challenges and, as such, are critical to the well-being of individuals and society.

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www.InstituteforEnergyResearch.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
APRIL 8, 2009
CONTACT:
LAURA HENDERSON
202.621.2951

Drumbeat Continues: Administration Enlists Another Soldier for its War on American Energy Production

Washington, D.C. – IER President Thomas J. Pyle issued the following statement in response to Secretary Salazar’s appointment of Ned Farquhar – former employee of the most aggressive of all the anti-energy lawsuit groups, the Natural Resources Defense Council – as the new Deputy Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management.

“Ned Farquhar’s professional history demonstrates that in the past, he has ascribed to a philosophy right in line with the Administration’s emerging agenda: To artificially increase the price of the energy we use to fuel our cars and heat our homes and force American companies to take their jobs, energy, and economic investment to other nations.  We at IER hope that as Farquhar moves to this position of tremendous responsibility over U.S. mineral resource development, his actions will be guided by facts, rather than rhetoric or ideology.

“It is discouraging that the Administration appears to be assembling a team that seeks to tax, regulate, and increase prices until our domestic energy industry ceases to exist.  Moreover, Farquhar’s appointment illustrates the Administration’s apparent willingness to place controversial outliers in positions that do not require congressional confirmation.”

NOTE: As deputy assistant, Mr. Farquhar will work with the Department to establish new land management policies and oversee energy and mineral resource development on all taxpayer-owned lands in the U.S.  His appointment does not require congressional confirmation.

More from IER:

• Press Release: If By “Open,” He Meant “Closed,” Salazar’s is the Most Open Process Ever
• Fact Sheet: Offshore Energy Exploration: Myths vs. Facts
• Press Release: Road to Serfdom: Bill Leads to Less Energy, Fewer Jobs, Worse Economy

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a not-for-profit organization that conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. IER maintains that freely-functioning energy markets provide the most efficient and effective solutions to today’s global energy and environmental challenges and, as such, are critical to the well-being of individuals and society.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
APRIL 7, 2009
CONTACT:
LAURA HENDERSON
202.621.2951

If by “Open,” He Meant “Closed,” Salazar’s OCS Public Review Process is the Most Open We’ve Ever Seen

WASHINGTON, D.C. – IER President Thomas J. Pyle today issued the following statement in response to growing concerns surrounding Secretary of Interior Salazar’s increasing efforts to close off public access to the creation of a five-year plan for energy production on the outer continental shelf (OCS).

“Secretary Salazar and his department may say they’re interested in an open comment period, but the real story appears to be a concerted attempt to make it harder than ever for the public to be heard. The Department of Interior has changed what was formerly a simple process for receiving public comments into a closed, lengthy, bureaucratic, process full of government red-tape and void of public opinion.

“Even though polling shows that the majority of the American people want to look for American energy in American waters, we still operate under a nearly three-decade self imposed embargo. Similarly, while Salazar continually states that the U.S. has only limited reserves, he fails to mention that his own department estimates that oil from the OCS could quadruple our reserves.

“Affordable, accessible American energy is far too important to be left to a politicized policy that doesn’t take Americans’ views into account. IER will continue to monitor and delve further into what looks like behind-the-scenes coordination among Administration leaders and political organizations.”

More from IER:

Press Release: Hundreds in NJ Turn Out in Support of Offshore Energy Development
Fact Sheet: Offshore Energy Exploration: Myths vs. Facts
Press Release: Salazar’s Fantasy Land on East Coast Windmills

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a not-for-profit organization that conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. IER maintains that freely-functioning energy markets provide the most efficient and effective solutions to today’s global energy and environmental challenges and, as such, are critical to the well-being of individuals and society.