House again votes for drilling in Arctic refuge

Alaska senators make push
In the Senate, Alaska’s two Republican lawmakers said this week that they would continue to push to advance drilling there.

Sen. Ted Stevens, chairman of the Commerce Committee, said drilling could be included in a package of energy legislation that Republicans are drafting for possible consideration this summer.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, an Alaska Republican, said she has asked Democrats to support a plan to open the refuge that would also require an increase in corporate average fuel economy standards for auto makers, otherwise known as CAFE.

“I’ve been going to them,” Murkowski told reporters. “I’ve had no one slam the door in my face,” though there have been no solid commitments from Democrats.

Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, reiterated that refuge drilling was a “non-starter” no matter what. Even though he has pushed for CAFE standard increases, Durbin said, he would oppose combining fuel standard increases with refuge drilling.

“I don’t think that is an honest bargain,” he told reporters earlier this week.

Not tied to Gulf drilling
Some Republicans had hoped to attach refuge drilling to legislation that would open nearly 3 million acres of federal waters in the eastern Gulf of Mexico to energy exploration.

But a bill that would open the area off Florida to drilling has run aground in the Senate because of opposition from Florida lawmakers, said Sen. Pete Domenici, chairman of the Energy Committee and the bill’s sponsor.

The original proposal would have opened 2.9 million acres in the Outer Continental Shelf 100 miles off Florida to development, but Florida lawmakers have said they will oppose the bill unless it bans drilling less than 125 miles off the coast, Domenici said.

“You can’t put together a very viable package” under those limitations, Domenici said.

Sen. Bill Nelson, Florida Democrat, has threatened to filibuster the bill -- or talk it to death -- if it comes to a full Senate vote.

Republicans say U.S. consumers need the energy to head off a supply crunch, and that the area’s 7.2 trillion cubic feet of natural gas could heat nearly 6 million homes for 15 years.

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