Senate Energy And Natural Resources Committee News

Hydrogen as fuel was in the spotlight during the last two weeks. The Senate's Energy and Natural Resources Committee held a hearing on February 10 looking at H challenges in the transportation, utility, industrial, commercial, and residential sectors.A week later, the US House Committee on Science, Space, & Technology held a hearing titled "H2Success: Research and Development to Advance a Clean Hydrogen Future."Also, of note, the US Department of Energy published two hydrogen RFIs - "requests for information." One on "Clean Hydrogen Manufacturing…

A group of 37 U.S.-based scientists whose research focuses on Arctic wildlife asked two U.S. senators in a letter on Thursday not to open the National Arctic Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas exploration, according to a copy seen by Reuters. The scientists, including several retired former officials from the Alaska Department of Fish & Game, the U.S. Geological Survey and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, said in a letter to Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Senator Maria Cantwell…

NOIA President Randall Luthi issued the following statement on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s passage of the OPENS Act, which will open new areas of the OCS to energy exploration and development, extend revenue sharing to participating coastal states, and lift the outdated ban on U.S. “The National Ocean Industries Association applauds the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee for passing the OPENS Act, which will strengthen America’s energy and national security, improve our national economy, and benefit consumers across the country. Over 85 percent of our federal offshore acreage is off limits to oil and natural gas development.

U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski said on Thursday she will unveil a bill next week to reverse the U.S. oil export ban in an effort to build support for killing the 1970s-era restriction that drillers say threatens to choke the domestic energy boom. Murkowski, the Republican chairwoman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said she will unveil the bill on Tuesday, although it was uncertain when the measure would get a vote in her committee. "I am going to be looking for every opportunity we might have to advance it," Murkowski said in a press conference.

The Obama administration on Friday finalized its recommendation to expand protected areas of Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, calling on Congress to block about 12 million acres (5 million hectares) from oil and gas drilling. U.S. President Barack Obama, in a letter to House Speaker John Boehner released by the White House, stood by his administration's earlier recommendation to preserve a wide swath of the state's Arctic refuge, setting up a likely battle with the Republican-led Congress over the oil-rich area. "This area is one of the most beautiful, undisturbed places in the world. It is a national treasure and should be permanently protected through legislation for future generations," Obama said in the letter.

On Oct. 20, 1973, King Faisal of Saudi Arabia imposed a total embargo on oil shipments to the United States among other countries in response to their support for Israel during the Arab-Israeli war. Faisal's decision led directly to the introduction of a ban on U.S. crude exports, which remains in force in a slightly modified form and is now the focus of an intense struggle for reform. Following the U.S. mid-term elections next month, Congress will take up the issue again, a debate that would benefit from an understanding of the history behind the ban. On Oct.

A senior U.S. Congressman from Texas has come out in full support of the United States lifting the 40-year old ban on crude oil exports, putting him at odds with fellow House Republicans wary of weighing in on the controversial issue. Rep. Joe Barton, who until now has maintained a relatively neutral public stance on a topic that has divided Republican members of the House energy and commerce committee, told Reuters in a statement that the time was right for the United States to overhaul its long-standing restrictions on exporting crude oil. "The shale revolution has changed the energy landscape in our country. It is time to change our laws to match this new reality…

Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Director Neil Kornze today testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on a bill that would increase the efficiency of oil and gas permitting on public lands and coordination among agencies by continuing the BLM’s Oil and Gas Pilot Office program. During his testimony on S. 2440, the BLM Permit Processing Improvement Act of 2014, Kornze described the key role pilot offices play in supporting the Administration’s All-of-the-Above energy strategy to create jobs and reduce the nation’s dependence on foreign oil. “The Obama Administration has made it a priority to permit environmentally responsible oil and gas development on the nation’s public lands,” Kornze said.

The White House likes to claim a share of the credit for the drilling revolution that has transformed North America's energy production and security. Except the revolution has largely taken place on private rather than public land, and energy producers feel frustrated about the numerous obstacles and long delays in obtaining permission to drill in areas directly controlled by the administration. "Crude oil production has grown each year President Barack Obama has been in office to its highest level in 17 years," the Council of Economic Advisors wrote back in the summer of 2013. "Government-funded research supplemented private industry's work to develop the technology that sparked the boom," the council explained ("Reducing America's dependence on foreign oil", Aug. 29, 2013).

Tomorrow, April 8, at 2:40 p.m. EDT, U.S. Senator Mary L. Landrieu, D-La., Chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, will host a press conference to announce a recent study that highlights the importance of the Jones Act to Louisiana’s economy. Sen. Landrieu has long been a strong supporter of the Jones Act. In 2011, she wrote a letter to the president criticizing the Administration’s use of foreign vessels to transport crude oil within the United States during the ongoing Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) drawdown.

During the testimony today at a Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing on offshore energy revenue sharing, National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) president Randall Luthi urged Congress to take the next step in enhancing America’s energy security, energy reliability and American jobs by increasing access to the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) for energy exploration and development. “Only by providing additional oil and natural gas lease sales in more of the OCS can this theoretical revenue sharing become reality. The two policies are inextricably linked – revenue sharing and access,” Luthi testified. The hearing focused specifically on the Fixing America’s Inequities with Revenues Act (FAIR Act).

The National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) joined with the American Petroleum Institute (API), the International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC), the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA), the American Exploration and Production Council (AXPC), and the U.S. With House passage last week of an alternative five year leasing plan for offshore access, and the last remaining days with Congress in session before the expiration of the 60 day congressional review period under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, we are encouraged by bipartisan support for legislation that would facilitate offshore access to new areas.

An attempt to open a new section of the Gulf of Mexico to drilling cleared a major hurdle in the Senate, the Jackson Clarion Ledger reported. The 72-23 vote to end debate on a bill that would allow the first new offshore drilling in years was hailed by the nation's oil and gas industry as well as manufacturers, farmers and other businesses who seek decreases in the price of energy, especially natural gas. Promoted by Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Pete Domenici, R-N.M., the offshore drilling bill would open about 8.3 million acres in the eastern Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas exploration. The area is expected to produce 1.2 billion barrels of oil and enough natural gas to heat and cool 6 million homes for 15 years.

Citing environmental concerns, Florida senators sought to scale back oil and gas drilling plans for a part of the Gulf of Mexico, hoping to push development farther from the state's coast, the Washington Post reported. But the Republican chairman and top Democrat on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee indicated they would press ahead with legislation that would open more of the area to gas development at least 50 miles closer to Florida. Proponents of the exploration say the area offers the best chance for significant new natural gas production in the next five years. The bill would require the Interior Department to begin selling leases for oil and gas development in the "181 area" of the central Gulf within a year.

The Department of the Interior proposed leasing drilling rights in waters south of the Florida Panhandle in the Gulf of Mexico in a new five-year drilling plan that also would open waters off Virginia. The plan will cover the years 2007 to 2012. If given final approval next spring after a public comment period, the plan would be more restrictive than some drilling advocates want but not restrictive enough for some Florida lawmakers. The proposal calls for leasing in a large part of a disputed tract known as Lease Sale Area 181. It follows new offshore boundaries between states that the department drew in January, which prompted distress among Florida lawmakers.

The White House is confident its plans to open an Alaskan wildlife refuge to oil and natural gas production will win approval in the Senate in September, an administration official said on Wednesday. The area in question, a remote area in northeast Alaska called the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), is ground zero for President George W. Bush's energy package to boost domestic production and wean Americans from some of their dependence on foreign oil imports. "This administration is confident that it can move this package in its entirety," Karen Knutson, deputy director of Vice President Dick Cheney's national energy policy taskforce, said at a panel hosted by a conservative think-tank.