Speed Up Oil Exploration Permits
The only thing better than twenty-twenty eyesight is hindsight. Hindsight is the ability to see history's mistakes and understand why. As gas prices continue to rise, our past inaction is partly to blame.
In 2001, I voted for a bill to expand the exploration of American sources of energy. The critics complained that it would do nothing to help gas prices for 10 years. Now ten years later, we have the same problem of supply not keeping pace with increases in demand.
However, instead of learning from our past mistakes, this administration seems to be doubling down. This week, the Environmental Protection Agency cancelled a permit that would have allowed oil exploration to begin off the coast of Alaska. It has now taken over five years for an air permit to be granted there. The same permit takes just several months in the Gulf of Mexico.
While the United States is tied up in its own bureaucratic regulations, other nations continue to develop their own energy resources. Brazil imported 77 percent of its oil in 1980. Today, it has a surplus. We need to tap our own American sources of energy, so that we are not dependent on foreign sources of energy.
This week, the House will vote on legislation that would set firm timelines to consider permits to drill offshore and sell additional leases in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Virginia. Hopefully, hindsight will show this to be the moment when America started down the path of energy independence.
Sincerely,
