"To put it bluntly, if the taxpayer is feeling the pain of an energy crisis, it is coming from the derrick sticking out of his back pocket and this measure does nothing to ease it," said Rahall.

     Rahall is the Ranking Democrat on the House Resources Committee which has jurisdiction over energy development on federal lands and offshore resources.

     Today the Committee is voting on a version of the energy legislation that has stalled in the past two Congresses. Without even a hearing to establish a public record as to why the provisions in the committee print are necessary, the Committee will likely send the legislation to the full U.S. House of Representatives for a vote.

     Among the financial breaks granted to industry are royalty holidays for deepwater wells and shallow water/deep wells in the Gulf of Mexico, and onshore marginal wells in addition to taxpayer-financed kick-backs to help industry pay the costs of their own environmental compliance.

     "This package is empty of protections for some of America’s most fragile landscape. It lacks any and all budgetary sanity. It contains not even a hint of an interest in the health, safety, and well-being of the citizens of energy-producing communities," observed Rahall.

     The committee print also grants Federal agencies greater power to make decisions with less accountability to the public. It fundamentally rewrites the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to eliminate alternatives and to restrict the approval process for proposed energy projects to a simple yes or no of a developer’s plan.

     "Many alternative energy ideas are the wave of the future, but to diminish the role of the public in energy development decisions that will reside in their own backyards is an affront to our democratic process. These energy projects are not going to become less controversial if Congress shuts the process door on ordinary citizens, " said Rahall.

     In an effort to put forth a comprehensive and responsible national energy policy, Rahall will introduce language that rejects the Majority’s proposal and inserts a plan that allows energy development, empowerment, and endowment.

     The Democratic alternative is rooted in the belief that, if Congress puts American know-how to work to address our energy needs, it can find ways to provide energy while promoting quality of life for American families and preserving American treasures for future generations.

     While Americans consume 23 trillion cubic feet of natural gas a year, the construction of the Alaska Natural Gas Pipeline has been stalled since its Congressional authorization in 1976. The Democratic alternative would facilitate its construction to enhance the delivery of 35 trillion cubic feet of natural gas to the lower 48 States.

     The proposal rejects energy companies paying bargain basement prices to drill on the public’s land, but charging the public premium prices in return. It makes use of biomass, the leftovers from logging operations, to provide economic opportunities to rural communities. It empowers Indian tribes to play a greater role in our national energy mix. And it fully funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund to help State and local governments to mitigate the consequences of energy development.

     Finally, the proposal also reauthorizes the Federal program responsible with cleaning up abandoned mining sites that pose the greatest risk to health and human safety, while increasing the amount of interest accruing to the unspent balance in the fund that provide health care benefits to retired mine workers and their widows.

     "The Democratic alternative empowers communities to protect their resources and to provide a safe and healthy living environment for American families. It seeks to strike a balance that is out of whack in the Republicans’ proposal," concluded Rahall.