Orrin Hatch

Mr. HATCH

Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Oil Shale and Tar Sands Development Act of 2005. In doing so, I would like to thank Senator Robert Bennett and Senator Wayne Allard for cosponsoring this legislation. It could not be any more apparent to Americans when we pay to fill up our cars that this country is in need of a strong, comprehensive energy strategy. Our citizens recognize that there is a shortage of petroleum, and that that shortage is driving up prices. American consumers have increased their demand for oil by 12 percent in the last decade, but oil production has grown by less than one half of one percent. Is it any wonder we rely on foreign countries for more than half our oil needs? We import 56 percent of our oil today, and it's projected to be 68 percent within 20 years. On a larger scale, global demand for oil is growing at an unprecedented pace--about two and half million barrels per day in 2004 alone. However, while global oil production is increasing, the discovery of new oil reserves is falling dramatically. Moreover, trends indicate that the global thirst for petroleum will continue to grow, especially in Asia. Last month, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan stated, ``Markets for oil and natural gas have been subject to a degree of strain over the past year not experienced for a generation. Increased demand and lagging additions to productive capacity have combined to absorb a significant amount of the slack in energy markets that was essential in containing energy prices between 1985 and 2000.'' We are quickly heading into a global energy crunch, and our lack of sufficient oil supply at home will give us little or no buffer against it. Increasing our domestic oil reserve is imperative both from an economic and a national security perspective. I am pleased to report to my colleagues today that a solution is available. It is a little known fact that the largest hydrocarbon resource in the world rests within the borders of Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming. I know it may be hard to believe, but energy experts agree that there is more recoverable oil in these three States than there is in all the Middle East. In fact, the U.S. Department of Energy estimates that recoverable oil shale in the western United States exceeds one trillion barrels and is the richest and most geographically concentrated oil shale and tar sands resource in the world. This gigantic resource of oil shale and tar sands is well known by geologists and energy experts, but it has not been counted among our Nation's oil reserve because it is not yet being developed commercially. Companies have been waiting for the Federal Government to recognize publicly the existence of this resource as a potential reserve and to allow industry access to it. This bill would give them that chance. Some might ask why we have not yet developed these resources if doing so could have such a profound economic potential? I understand why we have been so hesitant to develop this resource in the past. During the 1970s, we saw a very large and expensive effort begin in western Colorado to develop oil shale there. When the price of oil dropped dramatically, though, the market for oil shale went bust and the region suffered an economic disaster. We should never forget that experience. Much has changed since the 1970s, and it would be senseless to continue to ignore the huge potential of this resource. I think there has been a mind set within the government and the local communities resulting from the Colorado boom and bust experience that developing this resource would be risky. The fact is, developing this energy resource is no more risky than producing oil offshore or in the Arctic. It is certainly less risky than continuing to rely on oil from the Middle East or from other foreign competitors. We need to remember that our past failure in this area was not necessarily a failure of technology, but rather an inability to sustain this technology economically because of a very large slump in gas prices. Today's economics and advances in technology combine to provide the right scenario to begin the development of the world's largest untapped oil resource. Skeptics might ask how we know that the price of oil won't plummet, causing the problems of the 1970s all over again? The world is now reaching peak oil production of conventional oil. With the tremendous growth in India and Asia, and the accompanying need for oil, experts predict there will be little economic incentive for prices to drop. This is a new scenario for the world, and it forces us to shift our focus to unconventional resources. We have already seen this shift in focus by the government of Alberta, Canada. Alberta recognized the potential of its own tar sands deposits and set forth a policy to promote their development. As a result, Canada has increased its oil reserves by more than a factor of 10, going from a reserve of about 14 billion barrels to its current reserve of 176 billion barrels in only a few years. And just think we are sitting on one trillion barrels, more than five times what Canada has. I think it's outrageous that Utah imports about one-fourth of its oil from Canadian tar sands, even though we have a very large resource of those very same tar sands in our own State sitting undeveloped. The government of Alberta, which owns the resource, has moved forward in leaps and bounds, while the United States has yet to take even a baby step toward developing our untapped resource. Our proposed legislation looks to the Alberta model to help the United States move toward greater energy independence. The Oil Shale and Tar Sands Development Act represents a necessary shift by our government from an almost complete reliance on conventional sources of oil to our vast unconventional resources, such as tar sands and oil shale. In drafting this legislation, we have been mindful of the environment and of States' water rights. We live in a different world than when these resources were first developed. Unlike 30 years ago, we now have the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Mining Reclamation Act. Also, new technologies make the effort much cleaner and require less water than in the past. Industry understands that any water it needs will have to be acquired according to State law and according to existing water rights. Let me talk, for a moment, about the specific provisions in our bill. S. 1111 would establish an Office of Strategic Fuels tasked with, among other things, the development of a five-year plan to determine the safest and steadiest route to developing oil shale and tar sands. The bill would also establish a mineral leasing program in the Department of the Interior to provide access to this resource. Recognizing the tremendous national interest in this resource, our legislation provides a number of programs to encourage oil shale and tar sands development, including Federal royalty relief, Federal cost shares for demonstration projects, advanced procurement agreements by the military, and tax relief through the expensing of new equipment and technologies related to oil shale and tar sands development. The size of our nation's energy challenge is enormous, but in Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming we have an answer that more than meets the challenge. This bill moves us down that path. I urge my colleagues to join us in our effort to help the United States open the door new frontier for domestic energy.

Mr. HATCH

Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Oil Shale and Tar Sands Development Act of 2005. In doing so, I would like to thank Senator Robert Bennett and Senator Wayne Allard for cosponsoring this legislation. It could not be any more apparent to Americans when we pay to fill up our cars that this country is in need of a strong, comprehensive energy strategy. Our citizens recognize that there is a shortage of petroleum, and that that shortage is driving up prices. American consumers have increased their demand for oil by 12 percent in the last decade, but oil production has grown by less than one half of one percent. Is it any wonder we rely on foreign countries for more than half our oil needs? We import 56 percent of our oil today, and it's projected to be 68 percent within 20 years. On a larger scale, global demand for oil is growing at an unprecedented pace--about two and half million barrels per day in 2004 alone. However, while global oil production is increasing, the discovery of new oil reserves is falling dramatically. Moreover, trends indicate that the global thirst for petroleum will continue to grow, especially in Asia. Last month, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan stated, ``Markets for oil and natural gas have been subject to a degree of strain over the past year not experienced for a generation. Increased demand and lagging additions to productive capacity have combined to absorb a significant amount of the slack in energy markets that was essential in containing energy prices between 1985 and 2000.'' We are quickly heading into a global energy crunch, and our lack of sufficient oil supply at home will give us little or no buffer against it. Increasing our domestic oil reserve is imperative both from an economic and a national security perspective. I am pleased to report to my colleagues today that a solution is available. It is a little known fact that the largest hydrocarbon resource in the world rests within the borders of Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming. I know it may be hard to believe, but energy experts agree that there is more recoverable oil in these three States than there is in all the Middle East. In fact, the U.S. Department of Energy estimates that recoverable oil shale in the western United States exceeds one trillion barrels and is the richest and most geographically concentrated oil shale and tar sands resource in the world. This gigantic resource of oil shale and tar sands is well known by geologists and energy experts, but it has not been counted among our Nation's oil reserve because it is not yet being developed commercially. Companies have been waiting for the Federal Government to recognize publicly the existence of this resource as a potential reserve and to allow industry access to it. This bill would give them that chance. Some might ask why we have not yet developed these resources if doing so could have such a profound economic potential? I understand why we have been so hesitant to develop this resource in the past. During the 1970s, we saw a very large and expensive effort begin in western Colorado to develop oil shale there. When the price of oil dropped dramatically, though, the market for oil shale went bust and the region suffered an economic disaster. We should never forget that experience. Much has changed since the 1970s, and it would be senseless to continue to ignore the huge potential of this resource. I think there has been a mind set within the government and the local communities resulting from the Colorado boom and bust experience that developing this resource would be risky. The fact is, developing this energy resource is no more risky than producing oil offshore or in the Arctic. It is certainly less risky than continuing to rely on oil from the Middle East or from other foreign competitors. We need to remember that our past failure in this area was not necessarily a failure of technology, but rather an inability to sustain this technology economically because of a very large slump in gas prices. Today's economics and advances in technology combine to provide the right scenario to begin the development of the world's largest untapped oil resource. Skeptics might ask how we know that the price of oil won't plummet, causing the problems of the 1970s all over again? The world is now reaching peak oil production of conventional oil. With the tremendous growth in India and Asia, and the accompanying need for oil, experts predict there will be little economic incentive for prices to drop. This is a new scenario for the world, and it forces us to shift our focus to unconventional resources. We have already seen this shift in focus by the government of Alberta, Canada. Alberta recognized the potential of its own tar sands deposits and set forth a policy to promote their development. As a result, Canada has increased its oil reserves by more than a factor of 10, going from a reserve of about 14 billion barrels to its current reserve of 176 billion barrels in only a few years. And just think we are sitting on one trillion barrels, more than five times what Canada has. I think it's outrageous that Utah imports about one-fourth of its oil from Canadian tar sands, even though we have a very large resource of those very same tar sands in our own State sitting undeveloped. The government of Alberta, which owns the resource, has moved forward in leaps and bounds, while the United States has yet to take even a baby step toward developing our untapped resource. Our proposed legislation looks to the Alberta model to help the United States move toward greater energy independence. The Oil Shale and Tar Sands Development Act represents a necessary shift by our government from an almost complete reliance on conventional sources of oil to our vast unconventional resources, such as tar sands and oil shale. In drafting this legislation, we have been mindful of the environment and of States' water rights. We live in a different world than when these resources were first developed. Unlike 30 years ago, we now have the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Mining Reclamation Act. Also, new technologies make the effort much cleaner and require less water than in the past. Industry understands that any water it needs will have to be acquired according to State law and according to existing water rights. Let me talk, for a moment, about the specific provisions in our bill. S. 1111 would establish an Office of Strategic Fuels tasked with, among other things, the development of a five-year plan to determine the safest and steadiest route to developing oil shale and tar sands. The bill would also establish a mineral leasing program in the Department of the Interior to provide access to this resource. Recognizing the tremendous national interest in this resource, our legislation provides a number of programs to encourage oil shale and tar sands development, including Federal royalty relief, Federal cost shares for demonstration projects, advanced procurement agreements by the military, and tax relief through the expensing of new equipment and technologies related to oil shale and tar sands development. The size of our nation's energy challenge is enormous, but in Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming we have an answer that more than meets the challenge. This bill moves us down that path. I urge my colleagues to join us in our effort to help the United States open the door new frontier for domestic energy.

Mr. HATCH

Mr. HATCH. Will the assistant majority leader yield for a question?

Mr. HATCH. Just to make it clear, there are two calendars in the Senate. One is the legislative calendar and the other is the Executive Calendar; is that correct?

Mr. HATCH. The legislative calendar is the main calendar for the Senate, and it is solely the Senate's; is that correct?

Mr. HATCH. But the Executive Calendar involves nominations through the nomination power granted by the Constitution to the President of the United States, and the Senate has the power to advise and consent on that nomination power, is that right, to exercise that power?

Mr. HATCH. What we are talking about here is strictly the Executive Calendar, ending the inappropriate filibusters on the Executive Calendar and certainly not ending them on the legislative calendar?

Mr. HATCH. Well, our Democratic friends argue--just to change the subject a little bit here--they argue we have to institute the judicial filibuster to maintain the principle of checks and balances as provided in the Constitution. But unless my recollection of events is different, this contention does not fit with the historical record. Isn't it the case that the same party has often been in the White House and in the majority in the Senate, such as today, but in the past, while the same party has controlled the White House and been a majority in the Senate, neither party, Democrats or Republicans, over the years, has filibustered judicial nominations until this President's term?

Mr. HATCH. Right.

Mr. HATCH. You got that right.

Mr. HATCH. Not quite right because the filibuster rule did not come into effect until 1917.

Mr. HATCH. Well, Senators had the right to speak, and they could speak.

Mr. HATCH. So in a sense it was not even known as a filibuster at that time. Nevertheless, they had the right to speak. To follow up on what you just said, we heard repeatedly from liberal interest groups that we must maintain the filibuster to maintain ``checks and balances.'' My understanding of the Constitution's checks and balances is that they were designed to enable one branch of Government to restrain another branch of Government. Are there really any constitutional checks that empower a minority within one of those branches to prevent the other branch from functioning properly?

Mr. HATCH. One last point. The 13 illustrations that the Democrats on the other side have given that they have said are filibusters, if I recall it correctly, 12 of those 13 are now sitting on the Federal bench, as you have said; is that correct?

Mr. HATCH. In other words, they are sitting on benches today?

Mr. HATCH. So the cloture votes in those instances were floor management devices to get to a vote so we could vote those nominations to the bench?

Mr. HATCH. So they were hardly filibusters in that sense?

Mr. HATCH. And spend a lot of time on the Senate floor.

Mr. HATCH. Advocating the step that we should invoke cloture and give these people a vote up or down?

Mr. HATCH. One last thing. As to the 13, 12 of them are sitting on the bench. The 13th that they mentioned was the Fortas nomination. In that case, there was the question of whether there was or was not a filibuster. But let's give them the benefit of the doubt and say there was a filibuster, since there are those who do say there was, although the leader of the fight, Senator Griffin, at the time said they were not filibustering, that they wanted 2 more days of debate, and they were capable and they had the votes to win up or down--

Mr. HATCH. He did. But what happened was there was one cloture vote, and it was not invoked. But even if you consider it a filibuster, the fact is, it was not a leader-led filibuster. It was a nomination that was filibustered--if it was a filibuster--almost equally by Democrats and Republicans.

Mr. HATCH. That is right.

Mr. HATCH. The important thing here is it was a bipartisan filibuster against a nominee by both parties, and in these particular cases, these are leader-led partisan filibusters led by the other party.

Mr. HATCH. Will the Senator yield on that point?

Mr. HATCH. The fact is, there have always been holdovers at the end of every administration. There were 54 holdovers at the end of the Bush 1 administration, and he was only there 4 years. We didn't cry and moan and groan and threaten to blow up the Senate over that. We recognized it was part of the process. I have to say with regard to the holdovers that were there at the end of the Clinton administration, there were some which they could have gotten through, but there were like 18 that were withdrawn. Ten withdrew their names. Some were not put up again between the two administrations. There is no question that I tried to do the very best I could to give President Clinton every possible edge. But this has always been the case. It isn't just this time. It happened with Democrats in control of the Senate and Republicans in control of the White House. I think that point needs to be made. I have heard a lot of moaning and groaning. I know my colleagues know I did everything in my power to accommodate them and help them.