Refinery Bill Will Help Bring Fuel to American Drivers WASHINGTON – U.S. Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, made the following statement today during House floor debate on the Refinery Permit Process Schedule Act: “Mr. Speaker, today’s bill is part of an overall set of actions by this body to deal with long-term energy security issues in our country. The message that we hear from home is, ‘America needs American energy.’ “One part of that need is for more domestic refining capacity. Witness after witness at a number of our hearings in the Energy and Commerce Committee have told us so. “Every emergency on energy has found us with less and less refining capacity to refine fuel, and now there is absolutely none to spare here in the United States. “Without more refinery capacity domestically, prices are squeezed ever upward. “We are relying more and more on imported refined products as well as imported crude oil. “Why isn’t there more domestic capacity? Why haven’t new refineries in this country been built in the last 30 years? One reason is surely regulatory uncertainty caused by bureaucratic delays in the current permitting process. H.R. 5254 addresses that problem head-on while preserving every single existing statute providing for environmental protection and opportunity for public participation. Every one. Let me read that again. H.R. 5254 addresses that problem head-on while preserving every single existing statute providing for environmental protection and opportunity for public participation. Every one. Not one of those statutes is repealed or modified. “What H.R. 5254 does do is set up a federal coordinator who convenes all officials – state, local and federal – responsible for the permits for a proposed refinery. Working as one team, the agencies will integrate their action schedules, and the process should move forward expeditiously. “What role would a state play in this process? The bill provides that the governor of the state where the refinery would be sited designates the state officials to participate in the scheduling coordination. “If the governor of a state decides not to send any state official, not to appoint any state officials, nothing in this act can compel the state officials to participate in the effort. The federal coordinator will simply have to take that lack of state participation into account in scheduling the remaining actions of federal permitting officials. But if there is no state participation in that state, the process will not go forward. “Unless a state official is designated by his governor or her governor, he cannot participate in the agreement. Unless the governor signs on, the state agencies cannot be subject to a court order to stay on schedule. “That’s how the governor of any state where a proposed refinery would be located reserves the option of participating, or not participating, in the process. I will encourage any conference committee on this bill to further clarify that the governor has the option in the beginning to opt into the process instead of at the middle of it or at the end of it to not participate. That’s something we reserve for conference with the Senate. “For federal energy officials, however, the process is not optional once the request is made for the federal coordinator to help. “Here, Mr. Speaker, I do acknowledge the work of the gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Boucher, and the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Dingell, on this issue. The gentleman from Virginia spoke on this issue when the bill was brought up under suspension last month. Following that debate, and with the cooperation of the House majority leadership, Mr. Dingell, Mr. Hall, Mr. Boucher, and I did try to get together to explore common ground on this and other refinery issues. We did not reach resolution in time to incorporate some of our negotiations in the new language in this bill but I still look forward as we go to conference with the Senate to continue that dialogue in this context and perhaps bring others into the dialogue as well. “Mr. Speaker, a separate provision in the bill before us today calls on the president to designate three or more closed military installations as potentially suitable for the construction of a refinery. Why is this provision in the bill? Because we know of communities with closed bases that are interested in siting a refinery. We also know that the president of the United States is interested in this provision – he has spoken to me about it personally. They feel that a designation by the president would boost their chances of getting the attention of potential commercial developers. “We also recognize that not every community with a closed base may want a refinery. Nothing in this bill increases the likelihood that a community that does not want a refinery on a closed base will get one. Why? There are at least two reasons: “The bill only encourages the local redevelopment authorities to ‘consider’ the feasibility and practicability of siting a refinery. There is no requirement that they accept it. Despite what you may hear in the debate, that decision is left up to the community. “The secretary of defense is required to give ‘substantial deference’ to the recommendation of the redevelopment authority to site or not site a refinery on a closed military base, explicitly preserving existing law. “Mr. Speaker, this debate is about our nation’s energy security. I want commend the leadership of this body for bringing the bill in a timely fashion to the floor and expediting the bill. “Mr. Speaker, there are those who believe we’ve already run out of resources and ideas. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself one additional minute. They say that we’re all together in this, and we’ll just have to learn how to make do with less. Today they urge us to do nothing. I don’t accept that. We have a refinery need in this country for 21 million barrels of oil per day. We have refinery capacity for approximately 17 million barrels a day. Subtract 17 from 21 and you get 4 million barrels. We can certainly find the political will to come together to make it possible to reform the permitting process so that it might be possible to add to some existing refineries. And yes, for heaven’s sake, maybe even build one or two new ones. That’s what this bill is all about. It’s already passed the House floor once under suspension of the rules but it didn’t get the two-thirds vote. I’m hopeful today we’ll get a majority vote and send this to the other body and work with them when they report a simliar bill. “With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.” ####