"Gas prices are steadily rising. Folks are putting more and more of their hard-earned paycheck into their gas tank. Yet, wealthy energy giants are clamoring for more taxpayer money to pad their record-breaking, billion-dollar bottom lines. Shamefully, the Republican-controlled Congress wants to play crudeopoly with these interests instead of protecting American taxpayers," said Rahall.

     Rahall is the Ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Resources which has jurisdiction over resources extraction on public lands.

     The Committee print of this year’s attempt to pass comprehensive energy legislation includes royalty breaks for production of natural gas, oil, and geothermal energy on Federal lands. Among them are royalty holidays for deepwater wells and shallow water/deep wells in the Gulf of Mexico, onshore marginal wells as well as taxpayer financed kick-backs to industry to pay their costs of environmental compliance.

     Since January 2001, the price of a barrel of oil has more than doubled, from $25 to $58 last week. Today, a barrel costs $54. Meanwhile, varied media outlets have reported record-breaking fourth-quarter profits of the top oil and gas companies, resulting in a 30% increase in profits for 2004 for the top ten companies ("Big Oil’s Burden of Too Much Cash", New York Times, February 12, 2005).

     "It is outrageous that the Congress would hand over taxpayers’ money to these loot-laden international conglomerates, while the people are rewarded with skyrocketing energy bills. Worse still, these wealthy companies, which are paying only a pittance to drill on public lands, are angling for more access to treasured acres and the Congress is poised to grant it, no questions asked," declared Rahall.

     According to the Bureau of Land Management, 88% of the technically recoverable natural gas resources underlying Federal lands in Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, Utah and Wyoming are currently available for leasing and development. And according to the Minerals Management Service, natural gas production on Federal lands has nearly doubled since 1992, leaping 42% between 2003 and 2004. And 85% of the technically recoverable oil resources in the same region are also available for extraction.

     "In reality, our public lands are largely available to oil and gas production, but those resources are not infinite. If we are to mend our ways to reduce our reliance on foreign oil and gas, the Nation needs to reevaluate our use, not our access. And opening up that last sliver of protected lands seems to me to be an extremist solution that only diverts our attention from the real problem," said Rahall.

He continued, "I have long worked for a comprehensive national energy policy, but one that continues to spoon feed our appetite for oil at any expense is not in the best interest of America. The people are paying more than enough for their energy needs without Congress padding the profits through the federal treasury."