On the recordNovember 19, 2013
I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Chairman, just let me talk about what this bill is about. This bill is about attempting to open Federal lands to energy production. All the talk has been on oil and gas. That is very important. But this is also for renewable by doing what? By saying that in the process of using Federal lands for energy production, those lands that have the potential for the most production should be the first leased. What a remarkable idea: go where the potential energy is. And that is what this bill does. But let me respond to my good friend from New Jersey who talked about how much we are producing in this country and so forth. I would suggest that he left out a few important points. First of all, it takes some length of time in order to get an active lease into production, and the gentleman didn't talk about that. Why? Because it generally takes 4 to 6 years. And sometimes it is 8 to 10 years. But in the last administration--the Bush II administration--they were very active in letting leases. And as a result of that, at the time that this administration took over, there were a number of active leases that were ready to produce. That is why the production was high in the early part of this administration. And just put it this way: again, we are talking about Federal lands that are being leased for production. When the President took office, roughly 1.9 million acres were leased for energy production. That was in 2009.…
