Senators Choose to Revisit Controversial Arctic Refuge Drilling, Continues to Ignore Calls for Real Energy Solutions

Today, Senator Gregg (R-NH) offered a Budget Resolution in the Senate Budget Committee today that includes a single reconciliation instruction to just one committee: Senate Energy. This stand alone instruction directs them to meet their revenue target of $3 billion to the Federal Treasury by opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to leasing and development.

Below is the statement of Carl Pope, Sierra Club Executive Director:

"The tactic of an ‘Arctic-only’ budget reconciliation finally pulls back the curtains and reveals the true political agenda hidden in the Budget Resolution: isolating the Arctic drilling provision in an attempt to twist the rules and avoid meaningful debate on an extremely controversial issue. By offering Arctic Refuge drilling revenues as a stand-alone part of the budget, Senator Stevens (R-AK) and his allies have abandoned any pretense of actually working to balance the budget, and have instead turned it into a blatant shopping spree for the oil industry. The only purpose of this Budget Resolution is to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. They are obsessed with drilling in the Arctic Refuge and refuse to take ‘no’ for an answer...
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Drilling in the arctic is totally unacceptable. We do not need oil to sustain our economy. We have the power, money, and the technology to stop this unnecessary oil dependancy!! Instead of paying midwestern farmers subsidies to not grow crops, pay them to grow corn for E85, ethanol used as fuel. Put more money into vegetable oil recycling which can be used for biodesiel. Budget reseacrh dollars for hydrogen power whose only waste product is water! Take all the manuer from dairy and cattle farms and put it into incinerators to create natural methane gas, good for heating homes and cooking food. We CAN do these things. AND WE MUST ENCOURAGE OUR CONGRESSMEN TO OD THE SAME. TAKE ACTION. Check out the Sierra Club website, where you can register and send a letter. If you don't want to do that, send a letter personally to your representative, or call them. IT IS THEIR JOB TO LISTEN TO US. THIS IS HOW DEMOCRACY WORKS...