Posted on 07/25/2006 9:16:30 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger stood with environmentalists Monday to decry what he described as congressional effort to open federal waters off the nation's shores to oil and gas drilling.
"We do not want to make any changes," he said during a telephone press conference organized by the Sierra Club and other environmental groups.
"For anyone to think that this would bring gas prices down is ... a big mistake. Because this is not the answer."
The House already haspassed a measure giving states the right — and a large slice of the resulting revenue — to open federal waters 100 miles from the coast to oil and gas drilling.
The Senate is poised to vote this week on a measure opening a large chunk of Florida's coast to such drilling. Environmentalists fear the bill could lead to a merger with the House version and ultimately result in drilling off other states' coasts.
But the bills' supporters say the governor and the environmental community are demagoguing the measure that protects California's coast while enriching its coffers.
Today two moratoriums prohibit offshore drilling in federal waters: A presidential decree that carries no force of law and can be rescinded at will, and a congressional rider to a spending bill that gets approved annually.
The latter barely survived an effort to strike it last month.
"There is unprecedented pressure on Congress to do away with those bans in their entirety," said Brian Kennedy, spokesman for the House Resources Committee, which is chaired by Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Tracy, and played a key role in crafting the House legislation.
"God forbid there's a major interruption (in supply)," Kennedy added. "Congress could be forced to act ... and the first likely action would be to do away with the ban."
If that happened, states would have "no say whatsoever" over their coastal waters beyond three miles, Kennedy said.
The House bill, if signed into law, would impose an automatic ban on oil and gas drilling from three miles off the coast to 50 miles. State legislatures must vote to ban drilling from 50 miles to 100 miles. Conversely, they can authorize drilling from three miles out.
The bill also would give states a far larger share in the royalties from such drilling. California, where only a few federal leases are active in waters off Santa Barbara and Long Beach, would see annualpayments jump from $6 million to $140 million, Kennedy said.
Meanwhile, holders of other inactive but controversial leases would be able to exchange them for leases elsewhere, and California's historic aversion to offshore drilling — stemming from a 1969 blowout that sullied miles of coastline along Santa Barbara — would likely ensure a de facto ban.
"California gets a better deal than any other coastal state," Kennedy said.
Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope and many senators see it differently. The bill, Pope said, lets individual states control federal waters while diverting revenue from the federal treasury.
"It's a divide and conquer strategy," Pope said. "It enables the oil industry to start picking off one state after another."
California Sens. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, both Democrats, have placed holds on the Senate legislation. And any effort to bring the House version to a vote in the Senate would likely spark a filibuster, according to Sierra Club's lobbyist.
So why worry?
"We prefer not to take any chances," Pope said.
Okay, I'v had enough - I have just solved the energy problem:
We should immediately institute a national energy allocation program:
Those states that produce energy get all they want;
Those states whose representatives vote for legislation to increase energy supplies are next in line;
Those states whose representatives oppose energy production get zero.
Allocations are adjusted every six months, based on voting records for the previous six months.
Democracy in action - it's a beautiful thing.
Well not drilling sure doesn't solve it.
Cuba is doing it in their waters. Since Cuba is only 90 miles away, the waters are split equally. This would not apply for California, we have control 200 miles out.
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