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DOMESTIC NATURAL GAS PRODUCTION -- (Senate - April 22, 2004)

[Page: S4281] GPO's PDF
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Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I have up to 10 minutes, but I do not believe I will use that, if anybody is wondering.

I rise to speak about a disaster that has occurred within the last 24 hours in the country of North Korea . We now have on the wire service recognition of the fact that there was a train wreck in North Korea where two trains ran into each other. It appears that between 1,000 and 3,000 people were killed. One report says 1,000 and another report says 3,000. In the meantime, the North Koreans have cut off the telephone lines to the area and have closed the border, so considering the nature of the country, I do not know when we will find out how many.

The reason I rose to talk about it is because the substances that we have been told were in those trains do not come close to the explosive power of liquefied natural gas. They are some kind of a liquefied petroleum and another product like propane, and it must have been sufficient power for this to ignite and blow up.

Why would I bring this subject up on the Senate floor? Well, I say to my colleagues, the Nation we live in has been on such an absurd path with reference to diversifying our energy resources that we are currently thinking about using liquefied natural gas in large quantities to take the place of natural gas, which is getting higher and higher in demand and less and less in terms of supply. I believe we ought to get on with producing as much natural gas from our own sources as possible. I believe the natural gas from the State of Alaska ought to be brought on board and we ought to help pay for the pipeline which will be the largest and most expensive construction job in our history, but it will transport voluminous quantities of natural gas and it will be ours.

It will not be liquefied natural gas from Algeria, Tunisia, or wherever it comes from.

We are inviting the opposite. We are inviting States, principally in the eastern part of the United States--at least it is not the West or the South again. But I would like to make sure other parts of the country understand that if they have been holding out and not wanting us to get this energy bill passed because they think this is some easier way--like we can solve this with wind instead of natural gas--you know it just is not true. We cannot produce enough wind energy to take the place of the natural gas shortage we are going to have if we don't get on with producing it as fast as we can, in as large quantities as we can, and from safe sources, safe in terms of reliability and safe in terms of the environment.

We are going to hear more about this. I am sorry that I come to the Senate floor with such drastic statements about energy and the destruction of people and property because of this collision involving energy sources. But I can tell you, what the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources has been suggesting we do is so much less risky than this, this fuel that exploded, that I almost wonder what is it going to take to bring us to our senses.

There are Northern and Eastern States saying, once they hear about LNG, they don't want it either. But I can tell you, there is not going to be any gas for parts of our country and it is not going to be imported from the West to the East; it is going to be brought to where it is needed. We are going to see people who are now talking with permittees who want to build plants, refineries, bases where you can harbor and hold liquefied natural gas.

Unless one of those trains had LNG, and I don't think it did, we haven't seen anything yet. If you killed 1,000 and wounded 1,000 and blew up a town with two trains running into each other and one of them was not LNG, then whatever we know about will be less volatile than LNG. So we could be looking at a more disastrous situation.

I also suggest while we are talking about terrorism, just think of that. If we have to bring in shipload after shipload of natural gas, just think of what we are going to have to do to make sure it is not part of a terrorist plan to blow up part of our country.

I for one hope we don't have to bring very much in, but I am sure, with what has been going on--and I am sure the occupant of the chair shares my concern--we ought to be very careful. We ought to take on the issue of, can we get some nuclear powerplants built in a safer way than in the past? Can we produce some truly clean coal-burning plants? We can bring solar, wind, and geothermal on. We can give them subsidies, all that are in this bill which we will not bring up today.

I think for those who are looking at that terrible country, terrible in terms of the nature of the existence of the people in North Korea , we can do nothing but shake our heads in fear and trepidation. I just finished reading a book about North Korea . As a Senator from a free country, to just read what is going on in that country just scares me to death. How the people can be so ravaged, so disgraced as human beings by that regime, and then to have something like this happen to them makes me terribly unhappy to be part of leadership in this world, that we can still let that eyesore of terrible proportions exist. Here is another one--3,000 people. Just absolutely pathetic.

I yield the floor. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.