IV 
110TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. CON. RES. 401 
Expressing the support of Congress for enhancing energy independence 
through the usage of existing resources and technology. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JULY 31, 2008 
Mr. ADERHOLT (for himself, Mr. CANTOR, Mr. THORNBERRY, Mr. PENCE, 
and Mr. PITTS) submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was 
referred to the Committee on Natural Resources, and in addition to the 
Committee on Energy and Commerce, for a period to be subsequently de-
termined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions 
as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned 
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 
Expressing the support of Congress for enhancing energy 
independence through the usage of existing resources 
and technology. 
Whereas the price of oil has tripled in the past 6 years; 
Whereas the price of gasoline has almost tripled in the same 
time period; 
Whereas the United States currently imports over 60 percent 
of all crude oil consumed; 
Whereas the price of oil and gasoline today is determined by 
expectations of future market conditions; 
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•HCON 401 IH 
Whereas 90 percent of the world’s oil reserves are controlled 
by governments, not private companies; 
Whereas Congress has restricted access to key energy sup-
plies, including the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge 
(ANWR), the Offshore Continental Shelf (OCS), oil 
shale, heavy oil, and oil sands; 
Whereas ANWR is believed to contain 10,400,000,000 bar-
rels of oil, a figure which may be a very conservative esti-
mate; 
Whereas the daily oil production from ANWR could be great-
er than the amount of oil the United States imports from 
Saudi Arabia; 
Whereas exploration of ANWR could create 500,000 Amer-
ican jobs; 
Whereas the exploration would be conducted on only 2,000 
acres of the 19,600,000 acres that constitute the refuge; 
Whereas the United States currently allows drilling in 11 
other national wildlife refuges; 
Whereas environmentally-friendly techniques can be used to 
minimize environmental impact; 
Whereas the portion of ANWR proposed for exploration is a 
barren tundra, devoid of trees and frozen most of the 
year; 
Whereas 
exploration 
in 
ANWR 
could 
create 
$150,000,000,000 in Federal tax revenue; 
Whereas exploration in ANWR could lower gas prices from 
$0.75 to $1.60 per gallon; 
Whereas production of the oil in ANWR would add about 
$1,400,000,000,000 to our Nation’s wealth, assuming a 
price of oil of $140 per barrel; 
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•HCON 401 IH 
Whereas drilling is currently banned on 85 percent of the 
Offshore Continental Shelf (OCS); 
Whereas the United States is the only country in the world 
to restrict access to its OCS energy resources; 
Whereas Cuba is currently leasing land for oil exploration off 
the Florida coast; 
Whereas the parts of the OCS closed to exploration are esti-
mated to contain 16,600,000,000 barrels of oil and 
59,310,000,000,000 cubic feet of natural gas; 
Whereas historically, estimates of reserves have been under-
stated by about 50 percent; 
Whereas 63 percent of oil seepages in American waters are 
from natural causes, 32 percent are from cars and boats, 
only 4 percent are from oil tankers, and fewer than 1 
percent are from drilling; 
Whereas the OCS extends 200 miles from the coasts of the 
United States, and most energy proposals only propose 
exploration beyond 20 miles, the limit of what is visible 
with the human eye; 
Whereas modern offshore drilling rigs are so hurricane-resist-
ant that even Hurricane Katrina failed to cause any sig-
nificant spillage of oil from rigs in the Gulf of Mexico; 
Whereas exploration in the OCS could lower gas prices by 
$0.90 to $2.50 per gallon; 
Whereas production of the oil contained in the OCS would 
add about $2,300,000,000,000 to our Nation’s wealth, 
assuming a price of oil of $140 per barrel; 
Whereas 
the 
United 
States 
has 
an 
estimated 
2,000,000,000,000 barrels of oil in the form of shale oil, 
1,000,000,000,000 of which is recoverable; 
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•HCON 401 IH 
Whereas 
by 
comparison, 
Saudi 
Arabia 
only 
has 
250,000,000,000 barrels of crude oil reserves; 
Whereas our shale oil reserves make the United States the 
country with the world’s largest oil reserves; 
Whereas America’s recoverable shale oil reserves are equiva-
lent to the sum of the rest of the world’s crude oil re-
serves; 
Whereas most of the recoverable shale oil in the United 
States is located on Federal lands in Colorado and Utah; 
Whereas the land containing the most shale oil deposits in 
Colorado was specifically set aside for shale oil produc-
tion by executive orders between 1912 and 1927; 
Whereas environmentally sustainable production methods 
that extract the oil without digging up the shale are in 
development; 
Whereas such environmentally-friendly production methods 
will preserve the ground water by freezing a wall of water 
around the drill site; 
Whereas commercial-level production will likely be possible by 
2015; 
Whereas oil prices will probably fall before 2015 in anticipa-
tion of the increased production; 
Whereas production of the oil contained in America’s recover-
able 
shale 
oil 
deposits 
would 
add 
about 
$140,000,000,000,000 to our Nation’s wealth, assuming 
a price of oil of $140 per barrel; 
Whereas the Bureau of Land Management was blocked by 
Congress in 2007 from issuing shale oil production regu-
lations; 
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•HCON 401 IH 
Whereas the United States has the world’s largest reserves 
of coal, estimated at 275,000,000,000 recoverable tons 
and nearly 4,000,000,000,000 identified tons; 
Whereas America’s recoverable coal reserves could last an es-
timated 250 years; 
Whereas the process of converting coal to oil was invented by 
Germany during World War II and is currently profitably 
used by South Africa for a large percentage of its fuel 
needs; 
Whereas Americans are ready to begin building coal-to-liquid 
plants in the United States, but are held back by regu-
latory uncertainty and concern about global warming leg-
islation; 
Whereas the fuel produced from coal burns much cleaner 
than fuel produced from oil; 
Whereas much of the carbon dioxide produced by coal-to-liq-
uid plants could be stored underground and used to in-
crease recovery from oil wells; 
Whereas the United States has not built a new oil refinery 
in over 30 years; 
Whereas America currently relies on imports for over 12 per-
cent of our gasoline supply; 
Whereas our dependence on imported gasoline has been in-
creasing each of the past 10 years; 
Whereas building more refineries could lower gas prices by 
$0.15 to $0.45 per gallon; 
Whereas more refineries have not been built in part due to 
the extreme difficulty in obtaining government permits; 
Whereas imported oil, gas, and other petroleum products are 
currently the largest part of the United States trade def-
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•HCON 401 IH 
icit, accounting for $317,000,000,000 out of a total def-
icit of $815,000,000,000 in 2007; 
Whereas imported oil and gas are consuming an ever-increas-
ing share of our trade deficit; 
Whereas the massive transfer of wealth from the United 
States to the Middle East for oil imports is harmful to 
our Nation’s security; 
Whereas our military uses 132,000,000 barrels of oil per year 
and supports the development of American sources of 
fuel; 
Whereas a provision was added at the last minute before pas-
sage of H.R. 6, the ironically-titled Energy Independence 
and Security Act of 2007, that would prohibit Federal 
agencies from purchasing fuel from American sources like 
shale oil and coal-to-liquid plants, and require more Mid-
dle Eastern oil to be purchased; 
Whereas America has the capability to become much more 
energy independent, using today’s technology without a 
huge taxpayer expenditure by simply using the resources 
available; and 
Whereas the provisions in this resolution could add over 
$143,000,000,000,000 to our Nation’s wealth over time 
and lower gas prices by $2.00 per gallon, not counting 
the impact of coal-to-liquid: Now, therefore, be it 
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate 
concurring), That it is the sense of Congress that a set 
of laws should be enacted that— 
(1) make more American energy available for 
exploration and production, including in the Arctic 
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•HCON 401 IH 
National Wildlife Refuge, the Offshore Continental 
Shelf, and Federal lands onshore, including for shale 
oil and coal-to-liquid production; and 
(2) streamline the permitting process for build-
ing American refineries and allow the construction 
of refineries on Federal lands. 
Æ 
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