Domenici and Bingaman are at center of oil debate

U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici is leading a Republican charge to try to increase domestic oil production and reduce gas prices, but his fellow senator from New Mexico, Democrat Jeff Bingaman, has other ideas about how to deal with rising gas prices.

Domenici, the ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, announced on Thursday that he was introducing legislation to dramatically increase domestic oil production with more offshore drilling and by opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling.

The proposal to drill in Alaska may be enough to kill this proposal in an election year and with a Senate and House controlled by Democrats. Domenici’s proposal isn’t a bipartisan effort: It’s cosponsored by 19 other Republican senators.

“For years now, I have been trying to develop more domestic production of oil and gas, and for years, with one exception in the Gulf of Mexico, I have been blocked for political reasons,” Domenici said in a news release. “Consumers are now paying the price for those years of obstruction. The American people are fed up and I think oil prices at $115 or more a barrel might prompt them to ask Congress to reconsider the prohibitions that keep us from producing our own energy resources.”

Domenici said his legislation would produce as much as 24 million barrels of additional oil and would “go a long way toward helping us break the cycle of dependence on foreign sources of oil.”

You can listen to remarks Domenici made about the bill at a Thursday news conference in Washington by clicking here. You can read the details of his proposal here.

Meanwhile, Bingaman, in a Thursday speech on the Senate floor, which you can watch by clicking here, made his own proposals: freezing the filling of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, taking action to bring the oil market under the control of U.S. laws and regulations, and making suggestions to Americans that include driving 5 miles per hour slower, which would increase fuel efficiency by 7.5 percent.

Bingaman, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, also said he has reservations about “other ideas” being pushed on Capitol Hill.

“It is an election year, and while there is always a tendency to take rhetorical stands in the run-up to an election, the American people understand that. That’s one reason why they don’t always hold Congress in the highest esteem. Proposals that are mostly feel-good propositions will not fool voters for long, if at all,” Bingaman said.

Specifically, Bingaman said he does not support the proposal by Sens. John McCain and Hillary Clinton to suspend the federal gas tax, saying it would increase deficit spending and the proposal to reinstate the tax in September would be difficult on motorists, which could lead to an extension of the suspension and further deficit spending. Domenici said he also does not support suspending the gas tax, according to the Albuquerque Journal.

In his speech, Bingaman also took aim at Domenici’s proposal, saying it would be 10 years before any oil would come from drilling in the Alaska refuge and it wouldn’t be enough to significantly reduce dependence on foreign oil. But he did call for drilling on “other areas of federal land,” saying that tens of millions of acres of federal land currently under lease by the oil industry aren’t producing.

New Mexico’s two U.S. senators are the leaders in shaping the nation’s energy policy. They’re both taking a prominent role in a national issue that’s on the minds of many Americans. Who knows whether Washington can accomplish anything with a Republican president and Democratic Congress in an election year, but look for many ideas to be tossed around and for Domenici and Bingaman to continue to be at the center of the debate.