Sunday, May 9, 2010

The Best Energy Bill Corporations Could Buy: Summary of Industry Giveaways in the 2005 Energy Bill

Hey Dick, If fracturing fluids are so safe, why did you need to get a "Safe Drinking Water Act", exemption for Haliburton and the 15, politically connected gas drillers...Oh and why is the "chemical cocktail" so secret that emergency first responders can't even know what's in it? Sounds sketchy to me Dick.

Public Citizen’s Analysis of the Domenici-Barton Energy Policy Act of 2005
OIL & GAS REGULATORY ROLLBACKS

Section 322
http://www.marcellus-shale.us/2005-Energy-Act.htm
"Exempts from the Safe Drinking Water Act a coalbed methane drilling technique called “hydraulic fracturing,” a potential polluter of underground drinking water. One of the largest companies employing this technique is Halliburton, for which Vice President Richard Cheney acted as chief executive officer in the 1990s. This exemption would kill lawsuits by Western ranchers who say that drilling for methane gas pollutes groundwater by injecting contaminated fluids underground. Only 16 companies stand to significantly benefit from this exemption from clean water laws: Anadarko, BP, Burlington Resources, ChevronTexaco, ConocoPhillips, Devon Energy, Dominion Resources, EOG Resources, Evergreen Resources, Halliburton, Marathon Oil, Oxbow (Gunnison Energy), Tom Brown, Western Gas Resources, Williams Cos and XTO. These companies gave nearly $15 million to federal candidates—with more than three-quarters of that total going to Republicans. Moreover, the 16 companies spent more than $70 million lobbying Congress.



The Best Energy Bill Corporations Could Buy: Summary of Industry Giveaways in the 2005 Energy Bill
On August 8, 2005, President Bush signed into the law the energy bill; on July 28,the U.S. House of Representatives voted 275 to 156 to approve the energy bill; and on July 29, the U.S. Senate voted 74 to 26 to approve the energy bill.

Since 2001, energy corporations have showered federal politicians with $115 million in campaign contributions—with three-quarters of that amount going to Republicans. This cash helped secure energy companies and their lobbyists exclusive, private access to lawmakers, starting with Vice-President Dick Cheney’s Energy Task Force, whose report provided the foundation of the energy bill passed by Congress and signed by President Bush on August 8.

This energy bill will do nothing to address America’s energy problems; rather, it will make matters worse. The United States is one of the largest producers of energy—for example, we are the third-largest producer of crude oil in the world—so our problem is not that we don’t produce enough energy, but that our rates of consumption are among the highest of all countries. Our economic competitors in Europe and Asia typically use half the energy per person than we do, which helps explain why the United States alone uses 25% of the world’s energy every day. Reflecting the fact that energy companies helped write the legislation, the energy bill lavishes these lucrative corporations with billions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies, while doing little to curb energy demand.

http://www.citizen.org/cmep/energy_enviro_nuclear/electricity/energybill/2005/articles.cfm?ID=13980