Alaska Wild Update #182 - May 5, 2002

QUOTES OF THE WEEK

"What the vote really boils down to is the power and influence of the environmental movement."
-Senator Frank Murkowski (R-AK)
"We have suffered a very severe defeat. We've never lost this before, and it's going to be hard to regroup."
-Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK)

HEADLINES

SENATE PASSES (finally) ENERGY BILL AFTER 5 WEEKS OF DEBATE
SENATE CONFEREES NAMED FOR ENERGY BILL
SECOND ALASKAN OIL REGULATOR QUITS JOB
TONGASS TIMBER SALE RULING ALLOWS LIMITED SALE TO GO FORWARD

SENATE PASSES ENERGY BILL

The US Senate voted 88-11 on Thursday, April 25, to pass the Senate energy bill. The bill now goes to a House / Senate conference to attempt to meet somewhere in the middle of all the differences between the two versions. The final Senate bill has many differences with the House energy bill that passed last year. Following is a brief synopsis of the analysis by US PIRG of some of the key differences between the House and Senate bills.

Besides the most obvious difference over drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the House bill has several other public lands issues that will have to be ironed out. For instance, the House bill gives the Secretary of the Interior the ability to re-visit decisions that protect public lands from oil and gas drilling as well as limiting the Forest Service’s ability to protect sensitive areas from oil drilling.

The House bill provides approximately $3.9 billion in tax incentives for oil and gas drilling and $14 billion in incentives for the oil industry as a whole; the Senate bill provides $4.6 billion. The House energy bill also contains numerous direct subsidies to the oil and gas industry. The House bill contains $3.3 billion in tax incentives for coal-burning power plants; the Senate bill contains $1.9 billion. Both bills also contain direct subsidies.

Both House and Senate bills also offer incentives for burning coal and also for developing “clean coal”. While the House version has no provisions for renewable energy, the Senate bill has a provision to require a small percentage of electricity to be produced from renewable sources – the first ever legislative requirement for a renewable energy portfolio.

The Senate bill also bans MTBE, the water polluting chemical that is added to gasoline as an oxygenate and puts in place a mandate for tripling the use of ethanol in gasoline. The House bill does not address MTBE. Finally, both bills have some incentives for renewable energy sources and efficiency, although some of the loopholes in these provisions could result in the provisions being more wasteful than efficient.

SENATE CONFEREES NAMED FOR ENERGY BILL

On Wednesday, May 1st, the Senate named the conferees who will be charged with negotiating with the House to work out the differences between the two chambers’ energy bills. While some of the conferees were obvious choices, like the Chair and Ranking Member of the Senate Energy committee (Senators Jeff Bingaman and Frank Murkowski) or the Senate Finance committee Chair and Ranking Member (Senators Max Baucus and Charles Grassley), two Democrats were chosen who are not on either committee. Senator Joe Lieberman (D-CT) is not a member of either committee, although he was one of the leaders of the successful effort to block a provision that allowed drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In addition to Lieberman, Senator Ernest Hollings (D-S.C.) sits on neither committee. Senator Hollings also voted against drilling in the Arctic Refuge. Finally, Senator John Kerry (D-MA), another of the leaders to prevent drilling in the Refuge, was also included on the conference committee even though Kerry is only eighth in seniority on the Finance committee. Both Kerry’s and Lieberman’s inclusion on the conference committee is a clear indication of the Senate leadership’s desire to keep drilling in the Refuge out of the final conference report.

The conferees were originally meant to be chosen based on overall seniority in the Senate, in accordance with an agreement approved Wednesday night. But that agreement deviates from what was originally agreed upon, which was to pick nine Democrats and seven Republicans, solely from the Energy and Finance committees. The new agreement called for eight Democrats, eight Republicans and one independent. Changing the agreement allowed Senate leadership to push Senator Daniel Akaka (D-HI), who supports drilling in the Arctic Refuge, out of conference, and to add Lieberman and Kerry.

According to the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the Democratic conferees include Chairman Jeff Bingaman (NM), Majority Whip Harry Reid (NV), and Senators Max Baucus (MT), John Rockefeller (WV), John Breaux (LA), Hollings and Kerry.

The Republican conferees include committee ranking member Frank Murkowski (AK) and Senators Pete Domenici (NM), Chuck Grassley (IA), Don Nickles (OK), Larry Craig (ID), Ben Nighthorse Campbell (CO), Craig Thomas (WY), and Minority Leader Trent Lott (MS). The final conferee is Jim Jeffords (I-VT).

Some concern was raised over the inclusion of Senator John Breaux due to his having voted to allow drilling in the Arctic Refuge. Senator Kerry and Lieberman have again vowed to block any conference report that includes drilling in the Arctic Refuge, a fact well known to all the conferees. Senator Breaux was quoted on Thursday as saying “I will vote to get a conference agreement that can pass both the House and the Senate and be signed into law to increase energy production and efficiency for this country”. Since the Senate has made it unequivocally clear, that as a whole, it does not support drilling in the Refuge, Breaux’s comments reflect the political reality that drilling in the Refuge is a poison pill for any conference report, and would result in no bill at all.

The Senate over the past week has been actively working to incorporate into the Energy bill the 100+ amendments that have been approved. When that task is completed, the Senate will send their final version of the bill over to the House, possibly by the end of this week. At that time, the House leadership will announce their own conferees and may even pick a date for the first conference meeting. At this time, there is no real indication as to the timing of when the conference may take place, or for passage of a final bill.

SECOND ALASKAN OIL REGULATOR QUITS JOB

The Anchorage Daily News reported on April 20 that another oil regulator has resigned from the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, the state's environmental agency, "claiming politics in a state heavily dependent on crude has made him ineffective." Robert Watkins, a 12-year veteran of DEC, said he will leave the agency at the end of this month.

Watkins had been responsible for managing field inspectors and spill-response plans for the North Slope and Cook Inlet oil fields until last December. At that time, he and his then-supervisor, Susan Harvey, were reassigned following a contentious debate over how many winter days to allow oil drilling on the Slope. Harvey and Watkins disagreed with Phillips Alaska Inc. over when the company should finish drilling this year in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. The regulators were concerned with avoiding possible oil spills as the winter ice thaws. The Phillips permit was approved without taking into consideration the concerns of Harvey and Watkins. Harvey has since resigned for the same reasons cited by Watkins.

Watkins said the Phillips debate was one of many frustrating regulatory differences that have arisen in recent years as he and his co-workers have tried to improve oversight.

"We're here to serve the public. I'm not going to make up science to fit the political story somebody wants," said Watkins.

Earlier this month, another Alaska DEC employee was charged with insubordination after raising concerns about a proposed air permit for British oil company BP. Watkins is the third DEC employee to publicly complain that the agency panders to the oil industry, the state's biggest business and funder of nearly 80 percent of Alaska's general budget.

TONGASS TIMBER SALE RULING ALLOWS LIMITED SALE TO GO FORWARD
Excerpts from the Juneau Empire, by Joanna Markell

In a recent court ruling, a federal judge has written a federal injunction to allow some logging in the Tongass National Forest to proceed. U.S. District Judge James Singleton of Anchorage issued an order Friday that stops timber harvest in most Tongass wilderness, but allows work on some existing timber sales and the Swan Lake - Lake Tyee electric intertie near Ketchikan to go forward.

The injunction will remain in effect until 45 days after the U.S. Forest Service publishes a court-ordered study that considers parts of the Tongass for wilderness designation, according to the order. The agency has said the supplemental environmental impact statement should be finished later this year.

Previously, the Forest Service had been found in violation of the law for failing to consider some areas for wilderness designation in the 1997 Tongass Land Management plan. At the time, Singleton issued an injunction that halted logging on the Tongass. He lifted it two months later, pending a hearing on the issue. Friday's order allows timber harvest and road building in areas where a site-specific environmental impact statement was published before 1999. As a result, five timber sales in central and southern Southeast Alaska that were the focus of a three-day hearing in Juneau in February can proceed, said Forest Service spokesman Dennis Neill.

At the February hearing, conservation groups argued that an injunction would protect high-value wilderness from irreparable harm.

Tom Waldo, attorney for the environmental law firm Earthjustice, said the environmental groups in the case are pleased with Friday's order, although it didn't go as far as they had hoped.

"It's a victory for roadless areas of the Tongass in that it prevents any further logging or road building in areas approved in the last three years," he said. "It gives some breathing room ... so there's some possibility of protecting these areas in the wilderness review that's taking place right now."

Friday's order doesn't appear to stop the Forest Service from planning timber sales areas under review for wilderness designation, but would stop a decision in such cases, Waldo said.

The judge's order can be appealed, but conservation groups need more time to review it before deciding what to do next, Waldo said. Meanwhile, right-of-way clearing for the 57-mile Swan Lake-Lake Tyee electric intertie is scheduled to start this summer. The overland power line will connect Ketchikan with Petersburg and Wrangell.