Congressman Doyle Votes Against Anti-Consumer Energy Bill

Washington, D.C. - U.S. Representative Mike Doyle (PA-14) voted against a bill today that would do little to lower gasoline prices – but would eviscerate important existing environmental protection laws. The bill passed on a controversial party-line vote in which House Republican leaders kept a 5-minute vote open for nearly an hour until they could secure a majority of “aye” votes.

“This bill will do nothing to lower the price of gasoline over the next 5 years,” Congressman Doyle said today. “It does, however, gut some of our nation’s hard-won environmental laws. The idea that eliminating environmental standards and removing local judicial control will solve this problem is absolutely wrong.”

“What’s worse,” Doyle added, “if a refinery is sited in your community and you fight that permit and lose, you get stuck with all the legal costs incurred by the oil company. This is a shameless pay-off for a politically connected industry that’s already raking in record profits.”

H.R. 3893, so-called “Gasoline for America’s Security Act,” would provide new fast-track authority for permitting refineries that removes court decisions from state or local district courts and, instead, assigns exclusive jurisdiction to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. . Furthermore, if the local communities lose their challenge in that court, they would have to pay all of the industry’s legal bills. In addition, the bill would create a new open-ended taxpayer subsidy – covering all the costs that an oil company incurs due to delays in the initial operation of a new or upgraded oil refinery.

This bill is unlikely to increase refining capacity. Oil refineries are not being built today because the industry has decided not to build them. There is a powerful economic incentive, in fact, for them to reduce that capacity. The oil industry has closed 177 refineries in the last three decades – while from 1975 through 2000, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency received only one permit request for a new refinery – and, as a matter of fact, that application was approved.

Of more immediate concern to consumers, this bill would do nothing to reduce gas prices. The bill’s so-called price-gouging provision gives the FTC authority to go after price gouging by sellers of gasoline or diesel fuel only in those areas where the natural disaster has occurred. It would do nothing, for example, about price gouging in Pennsylvania after Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana, Alabama, and
Mississippi. Oddly still, these provisions are directed more towards small gas station owners rather
than oil refiners – at a time when recent analyses indicate that retailers' margin at the pump have increased only 5 percent and refineries' prices have increased 255 percent. Moreover, the bill wouldn’t allow State Attorneys General to enforce the Federal law, nor would it make market manipulation a cause of action. Finally, the bill wouldn’t cover natural gas, home heating oil, and propane – even though those prices are forecast to increase nearly 75 percent this winter.

“The Republican House leadership named this turkey of a bill the “Gasoline for America’s Security Act,” Doyle observed. “I think a better title would be the ‘Don’t Hold Your Breath Act’. It would do nothing to control skyrocketing gas prices and home heating costs – and nothing to promote energy independence. It would simply reward the oil industry with tens of millions of dollars in new subsidies.”

“That’s why I voted against it and supported an alternative that would have given the Federal Trade Commission real authority to enforce price gouging nationwide – and allowed state attorneys general to enforce federal law,” Congressman Doyle said. “This alternative would have helped American consumers by halting price gouging, ensuring that our country has adequate emergency refining capacity, increasing investments in alternative energy to keep gas and home heating prices low, and making America energy independent by 2015.”

The Stupak-Boucher Substitute that Congressman Doyle supported would have provided consumers relief through effective anti-price-gouging measures both for gasoline and home heating costs. It would have given explicit authority to the Federal Trade Commission to stop price gouging, not just for gasoline and diesel, but for natural gas, home heating oil, and propane as well. The substitute would have provided enhanced civil penalties equal to three times the amount of unjust profits gained or up to $3 million per day, explicitly outlawed market manipulation, and empowered State Attorneys General to enforce the Federal law on top of their state laws. This substitute would also have provided relief to consumers facing skyrocketing home heating cost by expanding the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) through fines paid by price-gouging companies

The Stupak-Boucher Substitute would also have strengthened our nation's refining supply. The substitute would have established a Strategic Refinery Reserve (SRR) patterned after the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), to ensure new refining capacity that would operate at all times and could be increased during supply disruptions. This SRR could ramp up to full production when needed to provide additional supply during national energy shortages, decreasing price pressures at the pump – and would ensure that Federal fleet and military needs would be met at all times.

“The Members who voted against the substitute and for the Republican bill have a lot to answer for to their constituents,” Congressman Doyle said after the vote.