Plans afoot to drill Alaskan wildlife refuge

WASHINGTON - A long-cherished Republican goal to open an Alaskan wildlife refuge to oil drilling has advanced in a Senate committee, and Democrats are not sure they can muster enough votes to kill the plan in the full Senate next week.

Senate Budget Committee members voted 12-10 along party lines on Thursday to reject an attempt by Wisconsin Democrat Russell Feingold to strip a provision to open the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil exploration from the annual budget resolution for funding the federal government.

During the past four years, moderate Republicans and Democrats in the Senate, using filibusters, have repeatedly blocked ANWR legislation, citing concerns about the impact of drilling on wildlife such as caribou, polar bears and migratory birds.

Under Senate rules, non-budget items must have at least 60 votes to end a filibuster, or nonstop debate.

But the budget resolution can be passed in the Senate with only 51 votes, which is why the Republican leadership inserted an oil-drilling measure in a budget bill.

Democrats now must scramble for votes to beat back the measure when the full Senate debates the budget next week, California Democrat Barbara Boxer told reporters.

"We're a few votes short of what we need" to overturn the plan, Boxer said. "We're hanging by a thread here."

The Senate has 55 Republicans, 44 Democrats and one independent.

Giving oil companies access to ANWR's potential 10 billion to 16 billion barrels of crude is the cornerstone of the Bush administration's energy plan to reduce oil imports. Republicans in Congress have long sought to pry open the refuge.

Feingold criticized Republican leaders for including a controversial drilling issue in the annual budget resolution. The measure sets the general parameters for all federal government spending in fiscal 2006.

"This is a back-door manoeuvre by drilling proponents to avoid an open debate because they know that drilling in the refuge lacks the support to be approved on its merits," Feingold said.

Senate Energy Committee chairman Pete Domenici said a simple majority vote is appropriate for the ANWR provision because the United States needs the 1 million barrels of oil per day that could flow from the wildlife refuge once it was developed.

"It's been a tradition in America that if you have a majority, you win," Domenici said.

Domenici accused environmentalists of a double standard in trying to protect ANWR while ignoring the widespread drilling in Texas and in New Mexico, his home state.

"Fly over it and you'll see. There's a hole in the ground you can see from the air every quarter of a mile -- all over Texas, all over New Mexico," Domenici said.

The Senate Budget Committee's budget measure estimated $2.5 billion would be collected in fees from energy companies that would pay the government to lease ANWR tracts to hunt for oil.

The House Budget Committee's draft resolution for fiscal 2006 does not currently include ANWR drilling, but the language could be added through an amendment. The House has voted to approve drilling in ANWR several times in the past.

- REUTERS