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Energy Bill Goes To Senate
John Stith
Staff Writer
2005-04-22
 SecurityProNews RSS Feed
The U.S. House of Representatives approved President Bush's comprehensive energy policy bill. The bill addresses many issues with energy today but it's rampant with controversy as well.
The Senate will get the bill next and it remains to be seen whether or not the bill makes it through the chamber. This is the fifth time in the President's two terms the House has passed an energy bill.
The bill includes huge tax breaks totaling over $8 billion and billions more in subsidies. Also in the mix is the controversial gasoline additive MTBE. MTBE, which contaminates ground water, is causing billions in cleanup and litigation for various oil companies. The energy bill will give them $2 billion and protect them from the lawsuits being waged by water companies and municipalities all over the country.
The bill also calls for drilling at the Artic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). The heated aspect likely wouldn't make it past the Senate. The Department of the Interior says the United State could recover 10 billion barrels of oil from 2000 acres of the 19 million acre refuge. The Senate plans to attach the ANWR measure to budget, which couldn't be filibustered.
Related this is testing for natural gas and oil in the extremely deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico. This could disturb the sperm whale population, which dives deeply into these waters to look for food. The other factor could be hurricanes, which caused problems to some oilrigs last year during the catastrophic hurricane season last year.
Bush challenged Congress to hand him energy legislation amidst soaring gas prices, frenzied oil trading and rising inflation.
About the Author:
John is a staff writer for SecurityProNews covering cyber security.
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