Question
Energy > Renewable Energy > Oil
Eliminate oil companies' tax breaks and make sure they pay their fair share for drilling on public lands.
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192 votes for this question.
Background
[The House] passed legislation to rescind $14 billion in tax breaks and subsidies for oil drillers and reserve the money to develop alternative energy projects and conservation technologies. By a vote of 264 to 163 on Thursday, with many Republicans joining the Democrats, the House sent the bill to the Senate for its consideration. Passage came despite opposition from the oil industry and the Bush administration, which said the bill singled out the companies for higher taxes and could increase the country's dependence on foreign oil.
The bill would rescind $7.6 billion in tax breaks for oil drillers that the Congress passed in 2004 and 2005 and will raise another $6.3 billion in royalties from companies that pump oil and gas in publicly owned waters of the Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska. One provision is intended to correct errors in drilling leases signed by the Interior Department in the late 1990s that allowed oil companies to escape billions of dollars in royalties over the next decade. The provision, opposed by the White House and the industry, would require companies that refuse to change their leases to pay a ""conservation fee"" on each barrel they produce. Otherwise, under the bill, the companies would be barred from additional leases.
[International Herald Tribune - http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/19/business/oil.php]
So far the bill has not found any sponsor in the U.S. Senate.
The bill would rescind $7.6 billion in tax breaks for oil drillers that the Congress passed in 2004 and 2005 and will raise another $6.3 billion in royalties from companies that pump oil and gas in publicly owned waters of the Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska. One provision is intended to correct errors in drilling leases signed by the Interior Department in the late 1990s that allowed oil companies to escape billions of dollars in royalties over the next decade. The provision, opposed by the White House and the industry, would require companies that refuse to change their leases to pay a ""conservation fee"" on each barrel they produce. Otherwise, under the bill, the companies would be barred from additional leases.
[International Herald Tribune - http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/19/business/oil.php]
So far the bill has not found any sponsor in the U.S. Senate.
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