ANWR, $100 rebate part of energy packages

On April 26, two days after Congress returned to work, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said that legislation to remedy high energy prices could come to the House floor as soon as the first week in May and that the package would likely include a bill to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas drilling.

In the Senate where a GOP energy package also includes opening ANWR, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, took to the U.S. Senate floor April 24 to speak out on high energy prices and urge Congress to take action to increase domestic supplies and ease demand.

“Over the break, many of us in the Senate heard an earful from constituents about the high cost of fuel,” Murkowski said. “With crude oil prices passing an all-time record of $75 a barrel last week, higher prices at the pumps are guaranteed and soon.”

As Petroleum News went to press Thursday April 27, a vote on the Senate energy package was possible by the end of the week. Sponsored by Republican Sens. Charles Grassley of Iowa, Ted Stevens of Alaska, Pete Domenici of New Mexico and Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the Senate energy package is being offered as an amendment to an emergency spending measure now before the Senate funding the Iraq war and hurricane relief. The amendment also calls for $100 rebate checks for taxpayers to cushion the impact of higher gasoline prices.

The Senate passed a $2.7 trillion budget resolution, 51-49, March 16 with ANWR drilling language included. It called for raising $3 billion in revenues from leasing tracts in the 1.5 million-acre 1002 Area of ANWR that Congress set aside for possible oil exploration 25 years ago.

—Kay Cashman & Rose Ragsdale