Date: 2006-05-18
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Chairman. I thank my colleague from Pennsylvania for his diligence in working on this issue. I understand tourism is Floridas biggest producer of revenue. and a lot of people go there. But if we dont pass an amendment that will help us get more natural gas. people at Disney World are going to have to be drinking their Cokes. or whatever they drink. out of something other than a plastic cup. - 0 2030 Our plastics industry in our country is made from natural gas. not only the feed stock. but the actual plastic. And so I dont know what we are going to do In our country if we continue to see high natural gas prices. We are already paying huge amounts to cool our homes in our part of the country. or heat our homes in the north. But we have a chemical industry that may not be popular if it is down the street. although it is in my neighborhood. But it produces jobs. highpaying jobs. and it produces this plastic that we drink from every day. And if we dont come up with some other way to lower the price of natural gas. we can just kiss this plastic goodbye. Eighty percent of our U.S. offshore waters are currently excluded from production: the eastern gulf. the Pacific. the -Atlantic coast and some coasts of Alaska. Only Texas. Louisiana. Mississippi. and Alabama have . coastal production. 100.000 jobs have been lost because of the high prices of natural gas. And these are highpaying manufacturing jobs that we desperately need to keep in our country. We have the highest natural gas prices in the industrialized world primarily because of our offshore moratorium. Even Northern Europe has cheaper gas. and I know we have had jobs move from my district to Northern Europe because the price of natural gas there is so much cheaper. And their environmental laws are so much stronger. Norway. Great Britain produce off their coast. Are we saying that they are not concerned about their beaches? It is ludicrous. We only have two options to prevent the loss of jobs. either import more LNG. liquefied natural gas. which we will bring in. or produce offshore. There is no alternatives. We have got to have it. Mr. Chairman. I urge Members to vote against the PutnamCapps amendment. Eighty percent of our U.S. offshore waters are currently excluded from productionthe eastern gulf. the Pacific. and the Atlantic coast. and some coastal areas off Alaska. Only the Texas. Louisiana. Mississippi. and Alabama coasts have production.. This contributes to high natural gas prices that have cost the U.S. nearly 100.000 jobs. primarily high paid manufacturing jobs. We have the highest natural gas prices in the industrialized world. primarily because of our offshore moratoria. Even Northern Europe has cheap. because they produce in the North Sea. Norway. Great Britain. who have drilled off their coasts with strong environmental laws. We only have two options to prevent the loss of further jobswe can build more LNG import plants and we can produce more gas offshore. There is no alternative to natural gas in many cases. Unfortunately. the opponents of both options are often the same pepplethey oppose LNG and they oppose drilling for gas. Maybe they think energy and plastics are made from thin air. Natural gas is the cleanest energy source we have besides solar or wind. and it is a critical fuel for industrial facilities and is a feedstock for the petrochemical industry that makes plastic. If we cannot produce natural gas here. we are going to have to import gas to heat our homes and import more plastic in bulk or in consumer products. That hurts our balance of trade. Canada has been producing gasonly wells in Lake Erie for decades. Any producer would rather have oil too at these prices. but if Congress says "gasonly" then it will be gasonly. and there will be no chance of oil spills. Mr. Chairman. I urge Members to support US. jobs. U.S. energy. and reducing the trade deficit by supporting U.S. natural gas. And oppose the PutnamCapps amendment.