While Democrats continue to offer very little in the way of solutions to our energy concerns, unless you count RAISING the price of oil (such as removing subsidies for energy companies, increasing the gas tax, etc.), some responsible legislators, including Virginia’s own State Sen. Frank Wagner and U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor, are actually trying to move the debate in a direction that helps America preserve its energy security.
Today, while President Bush was calling on Congress to lift the ban on off-shore drilling, Sen. Wagner was also calling on Gov. Kaine to use his “considerable influence in national Democratic politics” to do the same with his Democratic colleagues.
For next week’s special session, Wagner will introduce a bill which will establish the Offshore Energy Revenue Fund. Should the bill pass and the moratorium on offshore drilling be lifted, revenues from taxes collected from offshore drilling will be distributed to the following state budget items:
- 40% to the Transportation Trust Fund
- 40% for Chesapeake Bay cleanup efforts
- 10% to the Renewable Electricity Production Grant Fund
- 10% to the Virginia Costal Energy Research Consortium.
“Literally millions upon millions of dollars may be lying out of eyesight off our Virginia shores,” said Wagner. “Tapping these potential natural resources could improve our lot in three ways: Virginia motorists would be eventually pay less at the pump, vital government programs would be better financed, and our economy would receive a boost from the business activity generated by the exploration and drilling.”
Cantor also joined with Wagner, the President, and Sen. John McCain at urging congressional Democrats to get off their hands and lift the moratorium on drilling in the outer continental shelf.
This proposal does a number of things, but most importantly, if it were signed into law, it would signal to the world that we are serious about producing American energy. With that, upward pressure on prices in the spot markets and at the pump would likely diminish. In Virginia, deep water energy exploration would mean approximately $250 million/year for 40 years.
Bush, McCain, Cantor and Wagner all advocated drilling be done responsibly and with great concern to protecting the environment; but all also acknowledged that we can no longer wait and be held hostage by a Cartel.
I caught up with Sen. Wagner as he traveled home from Richmond:
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Update: Rep. Randy Forbes just got into the act too with HR6260, the “New Manhattan Project”. According to Forbes’ release, the bill calls for the United States to achieve 50% energy independence in ten years and 100% energy independence in 20 years and will award competitive prizes to the first individual or group who can reach any of seven established energy goals.
“The challenges we face in energy as a nation are far greater than one simple solution can fix. We need a bold initiative that challenges the United States to get to the core of our energy problems,” said Forbes. “I’ve introduced the New Manhattan Project for Energy Independence to bring together a new generation of scientists and researchers to overcome a unified national challenge just as we did with the original Manhattan Project in World War II. Like the first Manhattan Project, which was launched to ensure the security of our nation, today our national security depends on our ability to produce reliable sources of energy to fuel our economy and our vital defense efforts. We succeeded then by hard work and dedication to a unified mission, and I believe we can do it again to achieve 100% energy independence.”
To achieve these goals, the New Manhattan Project will bring together the scientists and researchers in the U.S. in a competitive format to reach one of seven energy goals. The project will award significant prizes to the first group, school, team, or company that reaches each goal as determined by a New Manhattan Project commission of scientists. Cash prizes to be awarded to the first person or entity to achieve each of the following goals:
- Double CAFE standards to 70 MPG while keeping vehicles affordable
- Cut home and business energy usage in half
- Make solar power work at the same cost as coal
- Make the production of biofuels cost-competitive with gasoline
- Safely and cheaply store carbon emissions from coal-powered plants
- Safely store or neutralize nuclear waste
- Produce usable electricity from a nuclear fusion reaction
In addition, the bill sets aside funding for grants to individual researchers, groups, educational institutions or businesses to help share the cost of work toward achieving the goals.
“These goals are not easy. The processes to reach them are not simple. But if we reach even one of these goals, we will move significantly closer to achieving energy independence in the U.S.,” said Forbes. “I believe in the greatness of the American people, and I believe that coming together with a unified goal to succeed in this national challenge will lead to scientific breakthroughs that will reverse our dependency on foreign oil. While others in Congress are just talking about this issue, the New Manhattan Project takes substantial steps at solving the issue. I encourage the current Majority leadership to move quickly on this legislation to bring it to the House floor for consideration.”
The New Manhattan Project for Energy Independence has been referred to the Committee on Science and Technology and is awaiting action.
Additionally, Jim Bacon has posted some thoughts on this subject.
Conservative to the core; liberal with his opinion! J.R. has been involved in politics for over a decade and has worked on several campaigns in Hampton Roads. He has served on the Executive Committee of the Republican Party of Chesapeake and the Central Committee of the Republican Party of Virginia. He is also the director of “Blogs United” in Virginia. 
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Jim,
Unfortunately the New Manhattan Project is entirely too logical and common sense driven for it to ever be enacted into law.
You’re asking the energy industry to retool itself and give up their energy monopoly. As some of the major contributors to Washington politicians (both Dem and Rep) they’ll never let it pass.
Until gas at the pumps hits well over $5 to $7 a gallon the majority of voting Americans won’t force Washington to implement this type of program.
And the oil industry will never allow gas to reach a level that America can’t afford. You watch, as soon as the public starts demanding action from DC, the gas prices will drop to about $3 a gallon for at least 6 to 12 months and then start creeping up again.
Just like a “good” heroin dealer, the oil industry will continue supply America their fix without actually giving us the “hot load” that could kill us.
Although, I do have concerns that they’ve become so greedy that they just might not care if we overdose, because India and China offer a whole new market for their product.
(On a personal note: I’m out of the sandbox next month and look forward to coming home to Norfolk. See ya soon. Phil)
Too bad Senator Wagner is so wedded to tollroads. He seems wedded to tollroads to meet our transporation funding needs.
Senator Wagner has got to go (unless he abandons tollroads and supports an increase in fuel taxes).
Too bad the Democrats did not even dare nominate anyone to run against him this past election cycle. His opponent would have had my vote. Of course he has from now until he next runs for re-election again to convince me I’m wrong about him.
Senator Wagner already serves on the Senate’s Transportation Committee, he can abandon his quest for making every Virginia highway a tollway, and spearhead an increase in the fuel tax as the most fair way to meet our needs.
Increasing supply through increased drilling helps on the supply side of fuel prices. Increasing fuel taxes (to provide needed revenue increases) counterbalances the need for decreased demand to provide lower prices. Increased fuel taxes punishes fuel guzzlers while motivating fuel conservation.
LittleDavid, as long as Sen. Wagner’s opponent’s share your zeal for higher taxes, he’ll be safe.
The Top Ten Reasons Why Offshore Exploration Is Wrong For Virginia
1. Seventy two percent (72%) of Virginia’s offshore drilling zone is within the U.S. Navy’s Virginia Capes Operating Area, the principal training area for air, surface and submarine units as well as a testing area for new vessels, aircraft and weapon systems. Vital to accomplishing their mission of national defense and used heavily for training Navy and Air Force combat units for the war in Iraq and the broader War on Terror, the Navy is strongly opposed to the restrictions and hazards presented by the presence of drilling rigs and related structures.
2. Virginia lacks drilling platforms, pipelines, terminals, storage facilities, and other energy infrastructure. Conversion to production of Virginia’s undiscovered, technically recoverable natural gas resources lying off Virginia’s coast would require an enormous amount of both time and money, and given the amount recoverable may not be economically attractive to develop.
3. Imagine the same dollars otherwise invested in drilling infrastructure spent instead on offshore wind. There are studies that indicate that a wind farm the size of Virginia Beach placed 12 miles off our coast, could produce as much as 20% of the entire Commonwealth’s energy demand. These are farms placed outside of the Navy’s critical Virginia Capes Operating Area.
4. The revenues ($200 million/yr.) that Sen. Wagner envisions from offshore drilling going to transportation funding, comes from both drilling for oil and gas and contradicts Virginia’s wishes for exploration of natural gas alone as expressed in its Energy Plan of 2007. Wagner’s plan also ignores the 72% of Virginia’s drill zone that the Navy opposes. Dr. James Koch of the Center for Regional Studies has estimated that under the revenue sharing scheme (for both oil and natural gas) contained in last year’s DOER Act, Virginia could gain $150 million in royalties each year. However, if opposition posed by the Navy was respected and drilling was not conducted within the critical Virginia Capes Operating Area, estimated royalties would drop to $42 million a year – a drop in the bucket considering our total demand.
5. There is no leasing scenario or regulatory framework that would allow development of natural gas and not simultaneously promote the development of offshore oil. “This puts the camel’s nose under the tent,” as my boss is quoted saying in The Hill.
6. Production in the Atlantic region started in 2011 (as proposed) would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices until 2030 – hardly a source for Virginia’s current transportation crisis. Then, starting in 2020, total natural gas production from the lower 48 OCS is projected to decline.
7. Shoreline processing equipment would clutter beaches and coastal zones with miles of pipelines and roads, and ports, helipads and dorms – hardly the attractive infrastructure greeting tourists to Virginia’s Eastern Shore, where they spent $890 million last year in Virginia Beach alone.
8. Four times more natural gas is available in areas already open to drilling than in waters protected by the moratorium, and the industry is using only a fraction (18%) of what it already has access to. We don’t need to open new areas for drilling.
9. The risk associated with offshore exploration/drilling would affect not just Virginia. Any environmental damage would spread far beyond Virginia’s coast. It would affect Maryland and North Carolina. You can’t just ethically do this on a one-state-only basis. Both Maryland and North Carolina remain adamantly opposed to offshore drilling. Senator Elizabeth Dole has continued to oppose lifting the moratorium.
10. Finally, there is an environmental cost (which translates to financial costs for clean-up/mitigation) to even just exploring for natural gas. Once exploratory drilling commences, the toxic drilling discharges and other routine drilling impacts are similar for either oil or gas exploration and eventual oil or gas development. Normal drilling operations generate an average of 180,000 gallons of waste muds containing toxic metals such as mercury and lead, per well, with most being dumped into surrounding waters. Each drilling platform also normally discharges hundreds of thousands of gallons of toxic “produced” water every day containing benzene, arsenic, lead and other pollutants.
Bottomline: Why explore for something that we don’t want to develop anyway. There’s too little for such a high cost and it hijacks our resources that could otherwise be spent developing cleaner energy like offshore wind and biodiesel (biodiesel from algae is being studied at nearby ODU) that spur a clean energy economy. The all important transitional energy source is meanwhile otherwise the huge number of fields already open to drilling.
Full disclosure: I work for the Sierra Club.
Brian,
But Senator Wagner really likes tolls. Unlike you, evidently, I see placing tolls on the roadways as being worse then tax increases.
If you have to pay $5.00 at the pump, why is that worse then paying $10.00 at the tollbooth?
I’m sticking with Eisenhower’s freeways.
David, I wish he had Eisenhower’s tax burden.
Eileen, offshore wind? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
That’s a good one! The left is providing enough onshore wind to power the hemisphere.
Your efforts to increase fuel costs are hurting the economy. I don’t see you turning in the keys to your automobile to practice what you preach.