Yet Another ANWR Drilling Push - But It's OK - It Will Fund ETHANOL!

[hatrack]

Could these people get any more stupid or predictable?

WASHINGTON -- Proponents of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge are seizing on the partial shutdown of oil giant BP's Alaska drilling operations to renew their push in Congress to expand petroleum exploration and production. Domestic drilling will be on the agenda when Congress returns in September. Negotiators in the House and Senate will begin trying to narrow their differences on two bills that call for expanded drilling on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf.

Neither of these bills has provisions for drilling in the wildlife refuge, but Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Tracy, chairman of the House Resources Committee, is expected to hold hearings on the American-Made Energy Freedom Act. The bipartisan House bill proposes to open 1.5 million coastal acres of the 19 million-acre refuge to limited drilling

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Environmentalists argue that BP's problems should encourage a search for alternative sources of energy rather than more oil. "We think the latest problem … should spur members of Congress to talk about how we can get away from fossil fuels," said Athan Manuel, the director of lands programs for the Sierra Club in Washington. Pombo's bill, co-authored by Rep. Dennis Cardoza, D-Atwater, seeks to win over reluctant Democrats by creating a special Energy Investment Fund. Royalties, lease payments and corporate taxes collected from opening the Alaska wildlife refuge could be used to pay for the development of alternative fuels such as ethanol.

According to projections from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, opening 1.5 million acres of the refuge could bring the federal treasury -- or a trust fund, should one be established -- as much as $112 billion in royalties, lease payments and corporate taxes. Environmentalists find it perverse to propose oil drilling in Alaska as a way to raise money for alternative fuels.

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http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/energy/story/14296576p-15149784c.html