Date: 2014-06-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

I thank the ranking member for yielding to me. I have to admit that the Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act is a bipartisan problem we have in this Chamber. I rise as a cosponsor in support of H.R. 6. H.R. 6 represents a bipartisan effort to legislate. I want to thank my colleague from Colorado. Congressman GARDNER. for working with me. I wasnt an original cosponsor. but through our committee process we have worked it out. We achieved bipartisan support in the committee because we were working together. I think that is what the American people want Congress to do. It is important to recognize that there are more than 30 export permits to export LNG. These permits represent more than 35 billion cubic feet a day in LNG exports. Currently. the Department of Energy has conditionally approved six of them. but only one project has received final approval through DOE and through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. DOE has an important role in export to make sure that we dont increase our natural gas prices to where they are not affordable to our country. We are in an energy renaissance because of the success of natural gas. fracking. and directional drilling in our country. and we are producing more natural gas than we can use. whether it be for electricity production or for our chemical industry. I represent a huge chemical complex in East Harris County. There is literally a renaissance in the expansion of those chemical industries. It is increasing jobs and our exports because a lot of those chemicals we are producing from our U.S. natural gas will be exported. So someone else will pay for those jobs in our district in East Harris County. The Department of Energy has a role in this. The problem we have is that the Department of Energy has taken so long to approve these permits. The DOE really just needs to look if it is in our national interest. They include all these things under it. And that is correct. Let me give you an example. In Texas and North Dakota. we are flaring natural gas right now because we dont have customers in our country and we dont have a way to export it. It is bad for the environment. It is bad for the people who own those royalties because they are not getting paid for them. And it is just terrible to see something we can sell to someone else not be utilized. So that is why I support this bill. We wanted to find that sweet spot. so to speak. on where we can export what we are not using. Those of you who are familiar with Texas. we hold in reverence our Blue Bell Ice Cream. If you are there. in their commercials they will say: We eat all we can and sell the rest. That is what I want to do with natural gas. I want to use all we can. but I want to sell all the rest we cant use so it will help our balance of trade. help some of our allies who need it. but also keep our workers working in both the oil patch and the gas patch. My colleague states that one more approval would make us the largest LNG exporter in the world. But not all of these projects will be constructed. Only one has been approved all the way. Of the more than 30 applications. no more than a handful of these projects will be constructed and ultimately export LNG. Further. it is important that we clarify the LNG permitting processing before we discuss H.R. 6. There are two completely separate processes. First. a project must submit an application to export. If the project will send LNG to a country with which the U.S. has a free trade agreement. the application is automatically approved. In fact. the Port of Brownsville got their application approved in 30 days. If the project sends LNG to a country without a free trade agreementnonFTAthe DOE must issue a permit based on the public interest. For a project to actually export LNG in either case. the applicant must receive a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission permit. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission reviews the environmental impacts of the actual LNG facility. The FERC process takes 12 to 18 months and costs approximately $100 million. The issue H.R. 6 seeks to deal with is the nonFTA permits through the Department of Energy. The Department of Energy currently has 25 permits awaiting decision. The Department of Energy held most of these permits for more than 3 years. Even the DOE recognizes this is a huge problem and proposed changing the approval process. While I support the DOE changes. unfortunately. they fail to provide any certainty. H.R. 6 would place a timeline for the DOE to issue a decision. Again. remember. the DOE is going to have 12 to 18 months to know that permit because it is going through the Federal regulatory process already. We need to make sure that the environmental review process is protectedand that is what FERC doesbut we also need to make sure that the DOE makes those decisions timely so they can get those permits issued. I ask my colleagues to support H.R. 6 and provide certainty to the market.