Mark Udall: “I agree with President Bush that an America now ``addicted to oil'' needs to reduce its dependency on petroleum and…”

“I agree with President Bush that an America now ``addicted to oil'' needs to reduce its dependency on petroleum and other fossil fuels. And as a chair of the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Caucus, I strongly support legislation aimed at achieving that goal, including greater investments in renewable energy sources (such as wind, sun, and biofuels) that also will boost our economy, create jobs, and revitalize rural communities. Still, some additional development of the oil and gas resources of the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) would be desirable to help meet our immediate needs, and I could support appropriate legislation to achieve that result. Unfortunately, I do not think this bill is appropriate, and I cannot support it as it stands. The bill's provisions dealing with the OCS are excessively complicated and costly, and the bill also includes a plethora of unrelated and unnecessary provisions, including changes in the rules for onshore leases and a section dealing with oil shale royalties that I think is particularly troublesome. In the Resources Committee, I offered an amendment that would have made this a much simpler bill. It would have deleted all the complicated provisions dealing with State legislation, different rules for different parts of the offshore lands, and the disposition of Federal revenues--not to mention the section about oil shale.…”