Smith Helps Defeat ANWR Plan
WASHINGTON, April 18–Sen. Bob Smith (R-NH) joined with the Democratic Senate majority on Thursday to block an attempt to allow oil drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).
Drilling proponents, including Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH), needed 60 votes to break a Democratic filibuster and force the Senate to vote on an amendment to the pending energy bill to allow the drilling. They fell 14 votes short, 54-46. Seven other Republican senators, including Lincoln Chafee (R-RI), Susan Collins (R-ME) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME), voted against the drilling.
Smith, who votes with the Republican Party on more than 95 percent of issues, has made the fight against ANWR drilling a personal priority. A legislative aide said he changed his position on drilling in Alaska after receiving 7,000 letters from constituents opposed to drilling. Smith said he “took the time to study my position, and changed it to do what’s right.”
“The [Alaska] Coastal Plain represents one of our last complete and unspoiled Arctic ecosystems in the world,” Smith said in a statement after the vote. “While I have been a supporter of exploration for many areas in this country – in fact some areas that Arctic drilling proponents have opposed – I believe it is a different case to drill and develop in a designated wildlife refuge that was set aside by both Republicans and Democrats, conservative and liberal, specifically for its pristine wilderness qualities.”
Gregg, in a March interview, defended his support for drilling, saying it would “minimally impact” the coastal plain of Alaska. “The United States could replace imports of all Iraqi oil over the lifetime of the designated area of ANWR,” Gregg said.
The House approved drilling in ANWR last summer. Rep. Charles Bass (R-NH) voted against drilling. Rep. John Sununu (R-NH) voted for it. Sununu also successfully introduced two related amendments, one that would limit drilling to 2,000 acres and another that would distribute 50 percent of all royalties to environmental programs.
Opponents of drilling said oil from the reserve would do little to curb oil imports.
The United States now uses 19 million barrels of oil a day, more than half of which is imported. The Interior Department estimates that ANWR could supply, at most, 1.9 million barrels a day.
Environmentalists contend that opening the 1.5 million acres in the 40 year-old coastal plain refuge to drilling would harm wildlife.
The administration holds that drilling is crucial because Iraqi president Saddam Hussein has halted oil exports for 30 days.
After Thursday’s vote, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said, “The president will continue to fight for the tens of thousands of jobs that are created by opening ANWR, as well as – more importantly – for the need for America to be able to achieve more energy independence that would result from opening ANWR.”
Defending drilling in ANWR, Gregg cited the increase in the number of Central Arctic caribou in the nearby Prudhoe Bay region since oil was discovered there in 1969. He said that advanced technologies “drastically reduce the intrusion of necessary infrastructure on the environment when drilling.” He added that 75 percent of Alaskans support limited development of ANWR.
According to a national poll conducted for the Associated Press by ICR of Media, Pa., more than half of the public oppose drilling in ANWR and only slightly more than a third favor it.
Adam Kolton, the Arctic campaign director at the Washington-based Alaska Wilderness League, which opposes ANWR drilling, said, “No oil from Alaska is used in New Hampshire – not to heat peoples’ homes, not for cars, not for electricity.”
Published in The Union Leader, in Manchester, New Hampshire
