Senate Votes to Allow Arctic Drilling...

yahoo.com ^ | March 16, 2004 | JOSEF HEBERT

[crushelits]

WASHINGTON - Amid the backdrop of soaring oil and gasoline prices, a sharply divided Senate on Wednesday voted to open the ecologically rich Alaska wildlife refuge to oil drilling, delivering a major energy policy win for President Bush (news - web sites).
he Senate, by a 51-49 vote, rejected an attempt by Democrats and GOP moderates to remove a refuge drilling provision from next year's budget, preventing opponents from using a filibuster — a tactic that has blocked repeated past attempts to open the Alaska refuge to oil companies.

The action, assuming Congress agrees on a budget, clears the way for approving drilling in the refuge later this year, drilling supporters said.

The oil industry has sought for more than two decades to get access to what is believed to be billions of barrels of oil beneath the 1.5 million-acre coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in the northern eastern corner of Alaska.

Environmentalists have fought such development and argued that despite improve environmental controls a web of pipelines and drilling platforms would harm calving caribou, polar bears and millions of migratory birds that use the coastal plain.

Bush has called tapping the reserve's oil a critical part of the nation's energy security and a way to reduce America's reliance on imported oil, which account for more than half of the 20 million barrels of crude use daily. The Alaska refuge could supply as much as 1 million barrels day at peak production, drilling supporters said.

"We won't see this oil for 10 years. It will have minimal impact," argued Sen. Maria Cantwell (news, bio, voting record), D-Wash., a co-sponsor of the amendment that would have stripped the arctic refuge provision from the budget document. It is "foolish to say oil development and a wildlife refuge can coexist," she said.

Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites), D-Mass., argued that more oil would be saved if Congress enacted an energy policy focusing on conservation, more efficient cars and trucks and increased reliance on renewable fuels and expanded oil development in the deep-water Gulf where there are significant reserves.

"The fact is (drilling in ANWR) is going to be destructive," said Kerry.

But drilling proponents argued that modern drilling technology can safeguard the refuge and still tap the likely — though not yet certain — 10.4 billion barrels of crude in the refuge.

"Some people say we ought to conserve more. They say we ought to conserve instead of producing this oil," said Sen. Pete Domenici (news, bio, voting record), R-N.M., "But we need to do everything. We have to conserve and produce where we can."

The vote Wednesday contrasted with the last time the Senate took up the ANWR drilling issue two years ago. Then, an attempt to include it in the budget was defeated. But drilling supporters gained strength last November when Republicans picked up three additional seats, all senators who favored drilling in the refuge.

[KurtAZ]

well...that would be 1mil barrels a month for 10,400 months...so what...866 years?

[marblehead17]

I asked a lib once why he didn't peddle his butt the 20 mile round trip for work. Of course, I got no answer.

[finnman69]

This photo is from the NRDC website, no bias there!

Alaska's musk oxen, wiped out by hunters in the late nineteenth century, were later reintroduced in the northern part of the state. Today, they number a few hundred on the Arctic Refuge coastal plain. According to the Interior Department, though, habitat destruction from oil-related activity in the refuge would reduce their numbers by 25 percent to 50 percent.

http://www.nrdc.org/land/wilderness/arctic/1.html

[conserv13]

How much of a supply would 10.4 billion barrels equal?

It is not that much. I have heard 2.5%-5% of our total use. That is a lot, yes, but not enough to get ous off the Saudi's teat.

[uncbob]

AFIK, there are no bison in Alaska.

Well there was a herd of them near Delta Junction when I was up there ( Fort Greely)in 1970 for Artic Testing

[smoothsailing]

Yeah, not to mention Walter Cronkite.

[KurtAZ]

oh sorry...days...uhm...28 years at 1mil barrels a day.

[VRWCmember]

they look like water buffaloes

Everybody's got a water buffalo
Yours is fast but mine is slow
Oh everybody's got a water buffalo-oooooo

< /veggie tales silly songs with larry mode>

[Sonny M]

No, that is likely an accurate photo.

No, its not.

The area they want to drill in, is a frozen tundra, that pic is not a frozen tundra.

[odoso]

I guess I just need to remember the more things change, the more they stay the same. Thanks.

[Sax]

something about the diffusion of responsibility. He'll cry all day about it, but ask him to put his money where his mouth is?...that mouth will shut tighter than a duck's butt.

[epluribus_2]

you must have been referring to the eskimo insurgent controlled Anwar province in the volatile western quadrant of Al-Asqa.

[uncbob]

My thought too.... buffalo in ANWR? I thought there were only caribou.

See my above reply

[PittsburghAfterDark]

Thank God!

I don't know what else to say but thanks be to God. It's about time we start using our natural resources instead of relying on foreigners to support us.

[KurtAZ]

Took my buffalo to the store
got his head stuck in the door

STOP STOP STOP! EVERYONE DOES NOT HAVE A WATERBUFFALO! We'll get letters asking "why don't I have a waterbuffalo" and "Where's my waterbuffalo?"

[RightWhale]

Musk ox.

[finnman69]

http://www.anwr.org/archives/how_long_would_your_state_run_on_anwr_oil.php

How Long Would Your State Run on ANWR Oil?
Based on mean United States Geological Survey (USGS) estimates of oil potential in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) (10.4 billion barrels*) and petroleum consumption for each state using statistics provided by the Energy Information Agency (EIA), the U.S. Department of the Interior calculated the number of years that ANWR oil would power each state.

http://www.anwr.org/archives/ANWRHowLong.pdf

State Number of Years ANWR Oil Would Supply State

Alabama 103 Missouri 77
Alaska 203 Montana 342
Arizona 108 Nebraska 255
Arkansas 146 Nevada 226
California 16 New Hampshire 315
Colorado 120 New Jersey 46
Connecticut 132 New Mexico 222
Delaware 399 New York 34
District of Columbia 1,710 North Carolina 58
Florida 29 North Dakota 399
Georgia 54 Ohio 43
Hawaii 249 Oklahoma 97
Idaho 363 Oregon 155
Illinois 43 Pennsylvania 39
Indiana 68 Rhode Island 570
Iowa 132 South Carolina 120
Kansas 141 South Dakota 499
Kentucky 79 Tennessee 80
Louisiana 36 Texas 9
Maine 249 Utah 218
Maryland 100 Vermont 598
Massachusetts 75 Virginia 62
Michigan 52 Washington 68
Minnesota 84 West Virginia 266
Mississippi 116 Wisconsin 83
Wyoming 374

[Combat Override Button]

They taste very gamey...
Cows are better.

[Happy2BMe]

MAJOR SHIFT IN ENERGY POLICY (FOR THE BETTER) - ping.

(This will send chills down the camels back in Saudi - it may even keep us out of future "Oil-ForFood" comedy scandals at the United Nations - hello Kofi.)

==================================

WASHINGTON - Amid the backdrop of soaring oil and gasoline prices, a sharply divided Senate on Wednesday voted to open the ecologically rich Alaska wildlife refuge to oil drilling, delivering a major energy policy win for President Bush (news - web sites).