GAS PRICES: Capito Again Supports Bill to Reduce America's Dependence on Foreign Energy

GAS PRICES: Capito Again Supports Bill to Reduce America's Dependence on Foreign Energy

Congresswoman Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) today gave strong support to legislation passed by the House of Representatives that will decrease our nation's dependence on foreign oil by increasing U.S. oil and natural gas production in the deep sea off of our nation's coastlines. The legislation, the Deep Ocean Energy Resources Act (H.R. 4761), cosponsored by Capito, marks the fourth time in the past two months that the House has acted on legislation outlined in Congresswoman Capito's five-point plan to lower gas prices.

"This bipartisan legislation takes a common sense approach in making use of our country's energy reserves in the deep waters off our coastlines," said Congresswoman Capito. "At a time when our country is more than 60 percent dependent on foreign sources of energy and Americans are paying near-record prices to fill their cars and heat their homes, it would be irresponsible to continue turning a blind eye to the incredible amount of untapped sources of energy here at home."

The legislation eliminates outdated federal regulations imposing a blanket prohibition on deep sea energy production. The bill gives decision-making power to the states, allowing them to choose whether or not to allow exploration off their coasts. Specifically, the bill gives states permanent authority to allow or prohibit energy production within 100 miles of their coastline, while allowing the United States to authorize energy exploration between 100 and 200 miles off states coastlines.

Capito went on to say that this legislation is important to helping West Virginia's economy, especially the chemical industry jobs in the Kanawha Valley.

"Increasing our domestic supply of oil and natural gas is good for our nation's economy, and it is good for West Virginia's economy," Capito said. "Chemical plants in the Kanawha Valley rely heavily on natural gas, so drastic price increases have hit them especially hard and led to job losses in this important employment sector."

According to the American Chemistry Council, the chemical industry has lost over 100,000 jobs across the country - about 10 percent of the total industry workforce.

In previous action on Capito's five-point plan to reduce gas prices, the House of Representatives on May 25 passed the American-Made Energy and Good Jobs Act, (H.R. 5429), which allows energy exploration in a small part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska. Prior to that, the House addressed another point of Capito's plan in passing anti-price gouging legislation, the Federal Energy Price Protection Act (H.R. 5253).

On May 1, Capito outlined a five-point plan that Congress should follow to help bring relief to West Virginians suffering from the high cost of gas. Along with exploring for oil in natural gas in the deep seas off our coasts, opening ANWR to energy exploration and banning price gouging, the plan also called for temporarily waiving boutique fuel regulations, temporarily waiving the tariff on imported ethanol and utilizing West Virginia coal by building a coal liquefaction facility.

http://capito.house.gov/press_office/detail-page.aspx?id=187&whichone=pr