Bush held a press conference this morning on the South Lawn, most of which was dedicated to discussing the economy, gas prices, and the intersection of the two.
The president seemed anxious to demonstrate that he’s aware of the problems, and almost desperate to address them, but didn’t have much to offer in the way of solutions. Bush did, however, rely on an old standby.
“[Democrats in Congress have] repeatedly blocked environmentally safe exploration in ANWR. The Department of Energy estimates that ANWR could allow America to produce about a million additional barrels of oil every day, which translates to about 27 millions of gallons of gasoline and diesel every day. That would be about a 20-percent increase of oil — crude oil production over U.S. levels, and it would likely mean lower gas prices. And yet such efforts to explore in ANWR have been consistently blocked.”
Asked about a possible summer moratorium on the federal gas tax, Bush said, “I will tell you this, that if Congress is truly interested in solving the problem, they can send the right signal by saying we’re going to explore for oil and gas in the U.S. territories, starting with ANWR.” (By the way, Alaska is a state, not a territory.)
Asked about peak oil and renewable energy research, Bush said, “[Y]ou say that people think we can’t — there’s not any more reserves to be found. Well, there are reserves to be found in ANWR; that’s a given. I just told you that there’s about 27 million gallons of diesel and gasoline that could be — from domestically produced crude oil that’s not being utilized. And not only that, we can explore in environmentally friendly ways.”
Asked about possible steps the administration can take “in the short term,” Bush said, “[O]pening up ANWR is not long term, it’s intermediate term. But it sends a clear signal, is what it does.”
In all, in a 50-minute press conference, Bush touted drilling the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge six times, including a few times in response to unrelated questions.
I know we’ve been down this road before, but since it’s been a while, and in light of Bush’s emphasis on ANWR this morning, it’s probably worth keeping a few details in mind that the president neglected to mention.
Drilling in ANWR would likely produce only 3.2 billion barrels of oil, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, not even enough to satisfy six months’ demand; oil would not begin to reach the market for another 10 years; and it would take 50 years to extract the full amount. For this pittance, the House leadership and the administration are willing to disturb hundreds of acres of pristine wildlife habitat.
I’d just add that the NYT reported a while back that oil companies are now “largely uninterested in drilling” in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, because “any oil from the refuge would meet only a tiny fraction of America’s needs.”
My hunch is, the White House wanted to a) look like they were offering a proposal to address the gas-price problem; and b) try to pin high prices on congressional Democrats. I’d be surprised if anyone really fell for this nonsense, but given the president’s enthusiasm, it’s worth setting the record straight.