Democrats in House Resources try to strip ANWR oil wealth from budget bill

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The House Energy and Natural Resources Committee, chaired by Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Arizona, has inserted a provision in a budget reconciliation bill that could take the 10-02 area of ANWR off the table for drilling.

In 2017, the U.S. House and Senate passed budget resolutions allowed drilling in the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge by making it part of paying for a $1.1 trillion budget for fiscal year 2018.

This new provision basically reverses that in budgetary terms.

The reconciliation bill is expected in the Senate this week, where it will be up to Sen. Lisa Murkowski to convince Sen. Joe Manchin, now the chair of the Senate Natural Resources Committee, to strip the provision. Murkowski has a good relationship with Manchin, who is a moderate Democrat.

Alaska’s congressional delegation has worked to open ANWR for decades, to be stopped by administrations that were both Democrat and Republican. That is, until President Donald Trump made the 10-02 area a priority for Alaska and signed the bill.

Leases for the area were auctioned in January, and the State of Alaska’s Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority now holds $12 million in winning bids, of the $14.4 million awarded.

18 COMMENTS

  1. Abraham Lincoln, ” America will destroy herself from the inside”……..so it looks like the democrats would rather buy foreign oil and put more Americans out of work. It seems to me they really are trying to provoke a literal political war with it’s own people. Question is, who and which politician is getting richer with this? Certainly not Americans.

    • Ben, it’s quite obvious that the Chinese are behind this. I’ve always said that if you can follow the money, then you’re going to find the culprit. The CCP want us to be completely divided so they can come in and takeover.

  2. I was curious as to why Arizona got involved with Alaska’s oil. Seems that Arizona may consider Alaska to be a direct competitor with their oil and gas.
    Alaska’s 8+% of national production may not seem like much, but with margins so tight, it really cuts into Arizona’s bottom line.
    So it seems that it’s not about saving the environment, but about cutting out Alaska as a competitor.
    Just google Arizona oil production.

  3. It took 20 years to get ANWR open.
    Democrats destroy that effort in a week. Along with thousands of Keystone jobs, girls sports, oil and gas leasing and our state economy. All the while screaming that anyone who disagrees with them is a racist or a bigot or something.
    Sickening.

  4. Republicans used the same process to get ANWR and a huge tax cut for the rich. What goes around comes around

  5. Our senator needs to have some legislation restricting or reversing something big in Arizona. We need to fight back all these other state reps that want to control Alaska’s course. I would be willing to use some PFD funds to file lawsuits and anything we can to stop all development in those states that or in our business. This is an Alaskan issue they don’t live here.

  6. We already knew the instant Biden became President that there would be no permits granted for drilling in the 1002 Area. What Congress cannot do is unmake the sale of the leases. Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of the US Constitution prohibits retroactive laws.

    It is a given that no drilling permits to drill in the 1002 Area will be granted by the federal government before 2025.

  7. You have way too much faith in Murkowski and Manchin, they will go through the motions for reelection purposes but we are going to get screwed. Mark my words!

  8. ANWR oil wealth, lol – they (Murkowski, Young, Sullivan, etc.) promised a billion $$ in state revenue from lease sales when they opened the refuge up. What they got was nothing – the state had to SPEND money, plus now it has to pay yearly rental fees. All for oil that won’t be developed anytime soon, if ever. This has been nothing but a vanity project for years. Murkowski, Dunleavy, Sullivan – they’ll have Alaska see the same fate as coal towns in the northeast. They’ll claim overregulation and a war on oil and stomp their feet and get re-elected, when for years they could have been prepping Alaskans for the inevitable. GM just announced plans to be all electric by 2035. Investors see the long-term risks in oil investments, especially risky Arctic plays. Alaska’s leaders, however, have zero vision, none.

    • Try building an all electric car without oil and coal. If you can demonstrate this you will be the world’s hero. The amount of new power generation needed to supply these new vehicles will more than offset any energy savings.

      • No one said oil and gas will go away completely, but you also didn’t provide any evidence to suggest the utility or likelihood of extreme oil plays like Arctic Refuge oil. Oil majors and investors want none of it, so Alaska is paying millions in leases and rent, for what? And when what they promised was billions in revenue?

        • The Deepwater Horizon disaster happened because safer places to drill were “protected”.
          Three and a half miles underwater vs. NPRA or ANWR? There’s still a few thousand more wells in the Gulf just as dangerous.

    • Hello Michael, say after reading your comment, I was wondering where the electric power is going to come from to re-charge all of those car batteries? I think it takes something like a 40 amp charger. That equates to running your Dryer and your hot water heater for what 6 hours?

      • Gee, Anthony, I don’t know, if only there were new, renewable energy sources that we could tap into, and the infrastructure builds and maintenance could bring new supply chains and jobs with them. If only oil and coal weren’t the only options available. If only battery storage technology could just iterate and constantly improve, much like today’s cell phones are more powerful than the super computers of 30-40 years ago. What a world that would be. It’s called technology and progress? But please, tell me more things you can compare to a charger.

      • Wind generators are built where the prevailing winds are. Migratory birds use these prevailing winds to reduce travel time.
        Wind generators suck energy from these winds. Enough of them could suck so much energy out of the winds as to change the prevailing patterns, affecting climate.
        Nothing in this universe is free. Everything exacts a price. There’s always a trade-off. The greenies conveniently leave this part out of their sales pitch.

  9. The government in Washington is going to do whatever it pleases for the simple fact that democracy and our Republic are dead.

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