Articles

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (WA-04) today joined House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (CA-22) and other House Republicans in introducing the Domestic Energy and Jobs Act, a package of American energy production bills, including five from the Natural Resources Committee, that will create new American jobs by streamlining burdensome government red tape, modernizing energy production processes and planning for American’s energy future production.

“It’s a simple fact that American energy production creates American jobs and helps grow our economy. States like North Dakota have strongly benefited from booming new energy production on state and private lands while the Obama Administration has kept the vast majority of federal lands off limits to energy development and job creation. As gasoline prices continue to strain the pocketbooks of American families, we need more access to our American energy resources to insulate ourselves from the unstable foreign energy market,”said Chairman Hastings. “These bipartisan bills remove government barriers to American onshore in order to create jobs and make America more energy secure.”

The Domestic Energy and Jobs Act includes the following five bipartisan Natural Resources Committee bills:

• H.R. 2150, National Petroleum Reserve Alaska Access Act. This bill cuts through bureaucratic red tape to unlock the full potential of energy resources in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) by ensuring that oil and natural gas are developed and transported in a timely and efficient manner. (Hastings, WA-04)
• H.R. 2752, BLM Live Internet Auctions Act. This bill gives the Secretary of the Interior the authority to conduct Internet-based auctions for onshore leases to ensure the best return to the Federal taxpayer, reduce fraud, and secure the leasing process. (Johnson, OH-06)
• H.R. 4381, Planning for American Energy Act. This bill establishes common sense steps to create an all-of-the-above American energy plan for using federal lands to meet our Nation’s energy needs. (Tipton, CO-03)
• H.R. 4382, Providing Leasing Certainty for American Energy Act. This bill makes reforms to the leasing process for onshore oil and natural gas projects on federal land in order to eliminate unnecessary government delays and hurdles. (Coffman, CO-06)
• H.R. 4383, Streamlining Permitting of American Energy Act. This bill reforms the process for energy permitting, once a lease is in hand, to encourage the timely development of our federal onshore oil, natural gas, and renewable resources. (Lamborn, CO-05)