Legislative Activity
House Energy Committee to Consider LNG Export Legislation
On Tuesday, March 25, the House Energy and Committee will hold a hearing to review H.R.6, the “Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act.” H.R.6 was introduced by Rep. Cory Gardner (R-CO), and would force the Department of Energy to expeditiously approve pending applications to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) into countries that are members of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Specifically, the legislation would amend Section 3(c) of the Natural Gas Act which currently deems applications to export LNG into nations that are party to a free-trade-agreement with the U.S. as “consistent with the public interest,” and requires those applications to be “granted without modification or delay.” H.R. 6 would replace the phrase ‘‘a nation with which there is in effect a free trade agreement requiring national treatment for trade in natural gas’’ with the phrase ‘‘a World Trade Organization member nation.”
Senate Energy Committee to Hold a Hearing Regarding Natural Gas Exports
On Wednesday, March 25, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will hold a hearing titled, “Importing Energy, Exporting Jobs. Can it be Reversed?” The hearing will feature testimony from a diverse panel of witnesses that either favor policies that stimulate natural gas exports, including LNG, or have published literature or quantitative data that supports export proponents’ arguments.
Regulatory Activity
DOE Sells 5 Million Barrels of Oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve
On Wednesday, March 19, the Department of Energy announced that it sold 5 million barrels of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve to a number of energy companies, with the majority of the product sold to Phillips 66 and Royal Dutch Shell, which purchased 3.3 million barrels in total. Other oil companies that purchased oil during the sale include ExxonMobil Corp., Marathon Petroleum Corp., and Mercuria Energy Asset Management BV. Chevron Corp., Valero Energy Corp., and Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) made unsuccessful offers to the Department.
BOEM GENERATES $872 MILLION IN REVENUE FROM GULF LEASE SALES
On Wednesday, March 19, the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) announced that a lease sale for oil and gas tracts in the Gulf of Mexico garnered $872,143,771 in high bids for 329 tracts covering over 1.7 million acres of federal land. BOEM’s Director, Mr. Tommy P. Beaudreau, explained that the lease sale demonstrates the Administration’s commitment to an “all of the above” energy policy, and that the Gulf of Mexico will continue to play a key role in U.S. energy development in the future.
