NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Kansas U.S. Senator Dr. Roger Marshall said the Biden Administration is not trying to keep the U.S. energy independent.
"When President Biden took office, he shut down the pipeline," Marshall said. "That created uncertainty and it decreased supply. But, he went way beyond that. He shut down any new drilling in federal lands and federal waters. The EPA is doing everything it can to make it impossible to get a new permit to be able to actually go ahead and drill."
The administration is cutting off the money supply that helps drillers start work.
"People that I have known that have been very successful drilling oil wells before I was born cannot get loans from banks to do more drilling," Marshall said. "Consequently, only a third of our rigs are actually functioning right now. Despite a $110 a barrel oil price, they're not out there. What is happening is the federal government through the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the feds are saying we're going to give an environmental score to your loan."
The Russia-Ukraine conflict and the administration's policy to cut off Russian oil does impact the price at the pump, but the uncertainty of what climate-related rules might be on oil and gas producers is chilling their willingness to take the financial risk to find additional resources.
"If we had different policy out of the White House, it would take us a year to catch back up," Marshall said. "We're probably producing about 2 million less barrels per day. America consumes about 20 million barrels per day, to put it in perspective. We've cut back production for a lot of reasons and haven't replaced it."
Marshall would much rather see domestic drilling encouraged, instead of the administration looking to Iran and Venezuela to meet U.S. energy needs.