Remember President Obama’s State of the Union speech last month, the one where he said, “we have a supply of natural gas that can last America nearly 100 years, and my administration will take every possible action to safely develop this energy,”
Well, it took Obama nine days to do the opposite of what he promised. Today, the Interior Department announced proposed new rules that add a layer of bureaucratic regulation to companies using hydraulic fracturing to develop natural gas and oil.
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The proposed rules also remove millions of acres of public lands in Western states from energy exloration and production, thus preventing the nation from harvesting an estimated 1.5 trillion barrels of oil.
Institute for Energy Research (IER) offers a trenchant comment:
“The new rules appear to run counter to President Obama’s recent State of the Union address, in which he pledged to “take every possible action” to increase production on public lands. The damaging effects that these new rules will have on job creation and robust domestic energy development cannot be overstated.
“On the one hand, the administration wants to take credit for increased production on state and private lands and for offshore lease sales that were scheduled five years ago. On the other hand, the administration continues an ideologically-driven quest to stifle job creation in the energy sector and to raise the cost of energy through more regulation, more mandates, and more restrictions on affordable sources. At best, this administration is suffering from acute energy schizophrenia. At worst, the administration is using brute administrative force to hurt the oil and gas industries and reward its green energy cronies.
“It is hard to believe the administration’s rhetoric about greater energy independence when its every action continues to lead America further away from that goal. And with record job creation now happening in the traditional energy sector, this latest tranche of regulations demonstrates just how willing the President is to kill the goose that’s laying the golden egg.”
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