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The US Congress approved punishing new sanctions targeting Iran’s energy and shipbuilding sectors, a day after President Barack Obama unveiled measures to cripple Tehran’s nuclear drive.

The House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly 421-6 for the measure, which Foreign Affairs Committee chair Ileana Ros-Lehtinen described as the toughest sanctions yet imposed on the Islamic republic over its refusal to rein in its nuclear program.

The new rules — which target any person or company which works with Iran’s petroleum or natural gas sector, provides insurance to the National Iranian Oil Company, engages with uranium mining with Iran, or sells oil tankers to the country — passed the Senate by a unanimous consent vote.

“This bipartisan, bicameral agreement seeks to tighten the chokehold on the regime beyond anything that has been done before,” Ros-Lehtinen told the House.

She said the sanctions effectively put Iran’s energy sector “off limits, and it blacklists any related unauthorized dealings,” ultimately “depriving Iran of hard currency and funds needed to sustain its nuclear program.”

The legislation, which goes to Obama for his signature, is a reconciliation of a bill passed by the House in December and one passed by the Senate in May. Lawmakers wanted to move on the bill before going into their August recess.

It beefs up sanctions passed by Congress last year which imposed penalties on foreign financial institutions that do business with the Central Bank of Iran or other Iranian finance firms, essentially barring Iran’s business partners from the lucrative US market.

The House’s number two Democrat, Steny Hoyer, said the bill would deny Iran 80 percent of its hard-currency earnings.

“As long as Iran continues to pursue nuclear weapons, call for the destruction of Israel, and provide arms to terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, it will face the consequences in the form of sanctions, isolation and the continuing reality of the option of military action,” he said.

White House policy is “prevention, not containment,” and Obama “is keeping all options on the table,” Hoyer said.

The debate about sanctions comes amid deliberation over a possible first strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities by Israel. Iran has insisted its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

Last weekend Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed his doubts about the effectiveness of sanctions on Iran, saying that “all the sanctions and diplomacy so far have not set back the Iranian program by one iota.”

Republican White House hopeful Mitt Romney entered the fray last weekend, when he met with Netanyahu in Israel and said a nuclear Iran was “unacceptable” and that he would back Israel’s right to defend itself.

In the wake of Netanyahu’s remarks, and amid stalled negotiations with Iran, Obama on Tuesday tightened sanctions, targeting Iran’s oil export sector and a pair of Chinese and Iraqi banks accused of doing business with the country.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington, applauded the bill, calling it “the strongest set of sanctions the United States has ever imposed on any country during peacetime.”

“The implementation of this bill would subject virtually all of Iran’s energy, financial, and transportation sectors to U.S. sanctions,” AIPAC said in a statement.

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Conservative thinkers are playing host to a liberal idea: the enactment of carbon taxes. The issue is making news right before the national elections in the fall, and it could gain increasing momentum.

The American Enterprise Institute, which just held a conference on the subject, is saying that the fundamentals underpinning carbon taxes deserve to get aired. Many liberals would agree. But most — if not nearly all of conservatives — would disagree that the idea has validity. Contrary to that thinking, however, carbon constraints is a policy that is making international headway, and one that over time will ingratiate itself into U.S. energy policies.

“We have to have a system where all forms of energy bear their full costs,” says George Shultz, former U.S. Secretary of State under President Reagan. “For some, their costs are the costs of producing the energy, but many other forms of energy produce side effects, like pollution, that are a cost of society.

“The producers don’t bear that cost, society does. There has to be a way to level the playing field and cause those forms of energy to bear their true costs. That means putting a price on carbon. We’ve studied a variety of ways to do that, and to me the most appealing way is a revenue-neutral carbon tax. That is, you distribute all the revenue from the carbon tax in some fashion back to taxpayers, so there is no fiscal drag on the economy,” Shultz concludes.

The GOP legend, who issued his remarks to Stanford University, goes on to say that British Columbia has such a carbon tax. In that case, the government there gradually increased the tax and then redistributed it to individuals, making it popular.  He adds that the Republicans have historically been known as the party that issued policies to protect the environment, noting that it was under President Nixon that the 1970 Clean Air Act passed.

Schultz’ comments are coming on the heels of the AEI confab. There, both Republicans and Democrats gathered to discuss the potential policy. According to news reports, representatives from Al Gore’s climate campaign and AEI’s own scholars represented the Republican view point, as did a former congressman from South Carolina who is starting the Energy and Enterprise Initiative. The progressive view is one led by U.S. Representatives Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Ed Markey, D-Mass., both of whom have chaired key energy committees.

Technologies Key

Among those scholars not present at the AEI meeting  was AEI’s Ken Green, who used to favor the carbon tax but now says the idea is “anti-competitive.” A carbon tax, he fears, would simply go into general revenues. He adds that unilateral action by developed countries would give unfair advantages to those developing countries that would have no such curtailment efforts.

“I naively thought that a revenue-neutral carbon tax might be possible, and if done right, might offer economic benefits that might mitigate its economic harms; if we replace taxes on productivity with taxes on consumption, we might get a net economy-wide benefit,” writes Green, in an EnergyBiz Insider column appearing a year ago.

Most of the earlier discussions centered on a carbon tax or cap-and-trade scheme, where carbon ceilings are set and utilities must meet them, or buy credits that allow them to exceed such limits. But those debates occurred after President Obama came to Washington and when his party controlled both legislative chambers. When the Republicans took over the U.S. House in 2010, those ideas died.

Under a carbon tax, government would tax utilities according to their carbon footprints that can be readily measured. NextEra Energy says that it is a fairer way to compute results and that it is easier to administer than a cap-and-trade system. The proceeds from the carbon fee would then be targeted directly to an account that would help fund the development of new technologies.

“Although both a tax on emissions and a cap-and-trade system use the power of markets to achieve their desired results, a tax is generally the more efficient approach,” adds Peter Orszag, former director of the Congressional Budget Office. “Studies typically find that over the next several decades, a well-designed tax would yield higher net benefits than a cap-and-trade approach.”

But if the president is re-elected, the notion of carbon constraints will get resurrected. And while such policies would still have an uphill climb over the next four years, that will slowly change as the technologies to enable the capture of carbon dioxide are developed and potentially commercialized.

EnergyBiz Insider is named a 2012 Finalist for Original Web Commentary presented by the American Society of Business Press Editors. The column is also the Winner of the 2011 Online Column category awarded by Media Industry News, MIN. Ken Silverstein has been named one of the Top Economics Journalists by Wall Street Economists.

Twitter: @Ken_Silverstein

energybizinsider@energycentral.com

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It’s tempting to focus mainly on the energy issues that have come up in the context of the presidential campaign, such as the Keystone XL pipeline, tax breaks for energy companies, and whether and how to regulate hydraulic fracturing, a.k.a “fracking”.  Yet whoever is inaugurated next January, and however he resolves these issues, he will also face a much wider array of energy concerns, including some that are outgrowths of current policies or have emerged after a long gestation.  Though not intended as an exhaustive list, here are a few such issues that merit close attention from the next president’s energy team.

They should begin by taking a fresh and objective look at the overall US energy posture and devising a clear and concise way to describe it to the public.  Big changes have taken place, with many of the issues that preoccupied us for the last decade or longer having become less relevant or out of date.  Topping that list is the sense of energy scarcity that has burdened us since the oil crises of the 1970s and early 1980s.  There’s a realistic possibility that the combination of “tight oil” and the gas liquids production from shale gas could push domestic US petroleum/liquids production back above its early ’70s peak of around 11 million barrels per day. At the same time, our net oil imports are declining, due in large part to the weak economy.  However, as the share of fuel efficient vehicles in our car fleet increases, it’s reasonable to think that we’ve already seen the peak of US demand for petroleum fuels, even after the economy returns to healthy growth.  The net result might fall short of energy independence, but it will put us in a much better position than our largest economic rivals in terms of real energy security.

Then there’s shale gas.  Not only has it reversed a worrisome decline in US natural gas production that prompted numerous projects to import liquefied natural gas (LNG), but it has upended our assumptions about future prices and emissions in the electric power sector, while completing the divorce of oil and electricity that began in the 1980s.  Now we’re talking seriously about exporting natural gas. When you combine all these changes with biofuels that are contributing roughly a million barrels per day to US supply (in volumetric, though not BTU-equivalent terms) the need to revisit some of our most basic assumptions about energy looks compelling.

Energy scarcity isn’t the only paradigm that needs to be rethought.  The current administration apparently took office with a view that was prevalent in the environmental community and among some in energy circles, that the solutions to climate change and energy security were effectively synonymous and synergistic.  That view predates the shale/tight oil revolution and was founded on the notion that renewable energy and efficiency were the only serious answers to both concerns.  That linkage was always oversimplified, because it ignored the trade-offs inherent in the shortcomings of every energy technology available.  And now, thanks to unexpected technological developments, we face an explicit choice between energy abundance based on hydrocarbons and a lower-emissions future based on renewables and electric vehicles that won’t reach the required scale for decades, despite promising early signs. The transition from the former to the latter appears long and largely unpredictable, nor will it be cheap.

The next administration also faces a set of practical issues, along with the big-picture reframing described above. Two of these issues involve urgent tasks.  The first is the growing need for a thorough evaluation of of the recent and current approach to incentivizing renewable energy technologies and projects.  Since early 2009 we’ve spent tens of billions of dollars on a constellation of federal grants, tax credits, and loan guarantees to stimulate the growth of a domestic renewable and advanced energy industry and the deployment of its products. There’s a lot of new hardware on the ground, but the sustainability of this industry looks uncertain. Although only a fraction of the companies that received federal support have failed, the tally has grown large enough–with the addition of Abound Solar last week–that it’s no longer acceptable merely to shrug off these losses as par for the course.  We need some hard-nosed, detail-oriented outsiders to conduct a comprehensive post-expenditure review and extract the major lessons learned.  That should be an absolute prerequisite before anyone contemplates renewing or expanding any of these programs, including the Pentagon’s $210 million “green fleet” program.

Another urgent clean-up task is the reform of the federal Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS).  This 2007 mandate was premised on the imminent arrival of cellulosic biofuel technologies that have turned out to be much harder than expected to transfer from demonstration to commercial scale.  That has resulted in drastic annual revisions to the cellulosic biofuel targets of the mandate, but even these lower targets have not been achieved.  Instead, the EPA imposes penalties on refiners and gasoline blenders for failing to blend non-existent volumes, with consumers ultimately absorbing the higher costs at the pump.  The attractive vision of abundant renewable fuels has thus turned into a bureaucratic game.  And while corn ethanol supplies 10% of gasoline and consumes nearly 40% of the US corn crop, it cannot more than double to meet the entire 36 billion gallon per year RFS target for 2022, nor should we wish it to.  Instead, the RFS must be updated to reflect reality, and the associated biofuel-credit trading system should be restructured to squeeze out the fraud that is infecting it, instead of leaving refiners and blenders–and again ultimately consumers–to pick up a tab estimated at $200 million.

These items don’t constitute an entire energy agenda by themselves, but together with a few higher-profile proposals from among those that both campaigns will announce and debate during the next four months, they could fill out a worthy first-hundred-days’ energy plan for 2013.

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The oil and gas industry is celebrating last week’s news that the Interior Department is suspending its proposing rules for hydraulic fracturing on public lands. The better way to view this is as the calm before next year’s federal regulatory surge.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar issued the new draft fracking rules in May, elbowing in on turf long occupied by the 50 states. The regulations, covering everything from disclosure of drilling chemicals to well integrity, are redundant. Drillers on federal lands are already subject to state regulations, and there have been no notable scandals or examples of botched oversight. The Environmental Protection Agency has tried to dig up pollution stories, only to have the evidence turn out to be phony or otherwise explainable.

The Western Energy Alliance industry lobby estimates that the Salazar rules will add at least $1.2 billion to the cost of new wells in 13 states. These costs will be borne primarily by small businesses and energy-producing Indian tribes, which are furious. In response, Mr. Salazar has agreed to extend the comment period on the rules for 60 days. The Obama Administration says the delay is proof of its reasonableness, a point it is trying to stress in this election season.

Note well, however, that Mr. Salazar isn’t offering to kill the rules. Meanwhile, other federal agencies ranging from the EPA to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration are looking for ways to justify imposing their own rules on fracking in the name of water quality, worker safety and more.

As Mr. Salazar put it this week, state oversight “isn’t good enough for me.” If President Obama is re-elected, a sure bet is a tax increase. The second surest bet is that oil and natural gas fracking will face a deluge of new federal costs and bureaucratic orders.

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The U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration issued the following news release:

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) today released the complete version of Annual Energy Outlook 2012 (AEO2012) which, in addition to the Reference case projections, includes 29 alternative cases which show how different assumptions regarding market, policy, and technology drivers affect projections of energy production, consumption, technology, and market trends and the direction they may take in the future.

“Uncertainty is inherent in long-term projections,” said EIA Administrator Adam Sieminski. “By modeling scenarios using a range of assumptions about market, policy, and technology drivers, we gain a better understanding of the potential impacts in critical areas of uncertainty.”

Key results highlighted in AEO2012 include:

The rate of growth in energy use slows over the projection period, reflecting moderate population growth, an extended economic recovery, and increasing energy efficiency in end-use applications

Overall U.S. energy consumption grows at an average annual rate of 0.3 percent from 2010 through 2035 in the AEO2012 Reference case. The U.S. does not return to the levels of energy demand growth experienced in the 20 years prior to the 2008-2009 recession, because of more moderate projected economic growth and population growth, coupled with increasing levels of energy efficiency and rising energy prices.

Existing Federal and State energy requirements and incentives play a continuing role in requiring more efficient technologies. New Federal and State policies could lead to further reductions in energy consumption. The potential impact of technology change and the proposed vehicle fuel efficiency standards on energy consumption are examined in several cases in the AEO2012.

Domestic crude oil production increases

Domestic crude oil production has increased over the past few years, reversing a decline that began in 1986. U.S. crude oil production increased from 5.0 million barrels per day in 2008 to 5.5 million barrels per day in 2010. Over the next 10 years, continued development of tight oil, in combination with the ongoing development of offshore resources in the Gulf of Mexico, pushes domestic crude oil production higher.

Because the technology advances that have provided for recent increases in supply are still in the early stages of development, future U.S. crude oil production could vary significantly, depending on the outcomes of key uncertainties related to well placement and recovery rates. Those uncertainties are highlighted in several cases completed as part of AEO2012 and discussed in an article examining impacts of uncertainty about current estimates of the crude oil and natural gas resources.

With modest economic growth, increased efficiency, growing domestic production, and continued adoption of nonpetroleum liquids, net imports of petroleum and other liquids make up a smaller share of total U.S. energy consumption

U.S. dependence on imported petroleum and other liquids declines in the AEO2012 Reference case, primarily as a result of rising energy prices; growth in domestic crude oil production to more than 1 million barrels per day above 2010 levels in 2020; an increase of 1.2 million barrels per day crude oil equivalent from 2010 to 2035 in the use of biofuels, much of which is produced domestically; and slower growth of energy consumption in the transportation sector as a result of existing corporate average fuel economy standards.

Proposed light-duty vehicle fuel economy standards covering vehicle model years 2017 through 2025, which are not included in the Reference case, could further reduce demand for petroleum and other liquids and the need for imports, and increased supplies from U.S. tight oil deposits could also significantly decrease the need for imports as examined in several cases in AEO2012.

Natural gas production increases throughout the projection period, allowing the United States to transition from a net importer to a net exporter of natural gas

Much of the growth in natural gas production in the AEO2012 Reference case results from the application of recent technological advances and continued drilling in shale plays with high concentrations of natural gas liquids and crude oil, which have a higher value than dry natural gas. Shale gas production increases in the Reference case from 5.0 trillion cubic feet per year in 2010 (23 percent of total U.S. dry gas production) to 13.6 trillion cubic feet per year in 2035 (49 percent of total U.S. dry gas production).

As a result of the projected growth in production, U.S. natural gas production exceeds consumption early in the next decade in the Reference case. The outlook reflects increased use of LNG in markets outside North America, strong growth in domestic natural gas production, reduced pipeline imports and increased pipeline exports, and relatively low natural gas prices in the United States.

When looking forward to 2035 there are unresolved uncertainties surrounding the technological advances that have made shale gas production a reality.

The potential impact of those uncertainties results in a range of outcomes for U.S. shale gas production from 9.7 to 20.5 trillion cubic feet per year when looking forward to 2035. Those uncertainties and their impact are examined in several cases that are summarized in an article in AEO2012.

Power generation from renewables and natural gas continues to increase

In the Reference case, the natural gas share of electric power generation increases from 24 percent in 2010 to 28 percent in 2035, while the renewables share grows from 10 percent to 15 percent. In contrast, the share of generation from coal-fired power plants declines. The historical reliance on coal-fired power plants in the U.S. electric power sector has begun to wane in recent years. Over the next 25 years, the share of electricity generation from coal falls to 38 percent, well below the 48-percent share seen as recently as 2008, due to slow growth in electricity demand, increased competition from natural gas and renewable generation, and the need to reduce emissions.

Although the current trend toward increased use of natural gas and renewables appears fairly robust, there is uncertainty about the factors influencing the fuel mix for electricity generation. AEO2012 includes several cases examining the impacts on coal-fired plant generation and retirements resulting from different paths for electricity demand growth, coal and natural gas prices, and compliance with environmental rules.

Total energy-related emissions of carbon dioxide in the United States remain below their 2005 level through 2035

Energy-related carbon dioxide (CO 2) emissions grow slowly in the AEO2012 Reference case, due to a combination of modest economic growth, growing use of renewable technologies and fuels, efficiency improvements, slow growth in electricity demand, and increased use of natural gas, which is less carbon-intensive than other fossil fuels.

Projections for CO 2 emissions are sensitive to economic and regulatory factors. These linkages result in a range of potential GHG emissions scenarios. In the AEO2012 Low and High Economic Growth cases, projections for total primary energy consumption in 2035 are, respectively, 100.0 quadrillion Btu (6.4 percent below the Reference case) and 114.4 quadrillion Btu (7.0 percent above the Reference case), and projections for energy-related CO 2 emissions in 2035 are 5,356 million metric tons (7.0 percent below the Reference case) and 6,117 million metric tons (6.2 percent above the Reference case).

The projections from the complete AEO2012, including the Reference case, all of the alternative cases, and supplemental tables showing the regional projections, can be found at: www.eia.gov/forecasts/aeo .

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The House voted 248-163 today for legislation that encourages more domestic oil and gas production by scaling back environmental regulations and opening up more federal land for drilling.

But the measure, like almost all the energy and regulatory bills adopted by the GOP House, is likely to die in the Senate. Just for good measure, the White House put out a statement saying President Barack Obama would veto the bill if it ever reaches his desk.

Among those making a case for the bill was Rep. Charles Boustany, R-Lafayette, who said that while the Obama administration lifted the post BP spill moratorium on deepwater drilling it continues to “slow-walk” permits. The Republican bill, he said, would allow a needed expansion of domestic oil and gas production.

“This bill would go forward and help us to streamline that process so we can get American energy production back up online in the Gulf of Mexico and to develop our energy security needs,” Boustany said. “We have the reserves. We have the opportunity.”

But the streamlining and forcing the Environmental Protection Agency to consider the costs of regulations, instead of primarily whether they’ll save lives by reducing toxic and dangerous emissions, sets a danger precedent, said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif.

“Rather than basing smog standards on what is healthy for our children to breathe, this bill would require standards to be based on what industry says it will cost to reduce pollution,” Waxman said. “This radical proposal will undermine decades of progress on cleaning up the air….The regulations blocked by this bill would create tens of thousands of jobs installing pollution controls and modernizing oil refineries.”

For the second time in this session, Rep. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, persuaded his House colleagues to pass his amendment, increasing the maximum royalty payments due producing states from $500 million a year to $750 million a year, starting in 2023. That’s six years after Louisiana and other producing states are to begin taking in 37.5 percent of royalty payments under 2006 legislation, known as the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act.

Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., objected.

“I would say to the gentleman from Louisiana that his State already won the baby in the king cake when the GOMESA giveaway was enacted back in 2006, and you’re already entitled to $150 billion worth of revenue coming out of the Federal Government and heading your way,” Markey said. “And so I just think it’s time or your region to give a little back to the other 46 States in the Union that didn’t benefit from that 2006 giveaway to you.”

Landry, whose amendment was adopted 244-173, strongly defended it.

“The citizens of Louisiana have passed a constitutional amendment that dedicates all of the proceeds from offshore royalty to go to wetlands restoration, coastal restoration, and hurricane protection,” Landry said. “This is buying us an insurance policy that the other 46 States, who I know have been so generous to help us when hurricanes ravage our coast, this helps to protect us. And I know that the gentleman from Massachusetts would love to protect the environment in Louisiana.”

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., the chief sponsor of the GOMESA legislation, praised the House vote to raise the yearly cap from $500 million to $750 million.

“I commend Congressman Landry for passing this important amendment to advance the goal of bringing more offshore oil and gas revenues to coastal states–particularly Louisiana–that host energy production,” Landrieu said. “We need leaders who will work to lift the cap on oil and gas revenues for the benefit of our coastal communities.”

But Markey and other Democrats complained that Republicans refused to schedule votes on amendments designed to encourage alternative energy development, and defeated an amendment that would have denied new permits to oil companies that benefited from a mistaken provision in a 1990s drilling permit that spared them from paying most royalties. The amendment, Democrats said, would help to reduce the deficit and ensure that all oil companies  pay least modest royalty fees to develop oil and gas on federal property.

Republicans said that taxes or fees shouldn’t be increased on oil companies at a time American desperately needs industry jobs.

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After a drumbeat of complaints from energy companies that the Obama administration is blocking domestic oil and gas production, the Interior department released a report claiming that U.S. oil and gas producers are sitting on millions of acres of idle government land leases.

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar says that if producers were sincere about wanting to increase energy production, they would activate millions of acres of public land already leased to them. What should they be doing on that land? Drilling.

In a statement issued Tuesday, Salazar says the administration wants companies “to develop the tens of millions of acres they’ve already leased but have left sitting idle.”

A report released by the Department of the Interior claims that of 36 million government acres leased offshore for oil and gas production, 72 percent sit idle. Onshore, in the lower 48 states, says the report, more than half of federally leased acreage sits idle, “neither producing nor under active exploration or development by companies who hold those leases.”

The American Petroleum Institute calls the administration’s claim “absurd” and “willfully misleading.”

In a statement, API CEO Jack Gerard says that just because a lease doesn’t fit the government’s definition of active doesn’t mean it’s idle. Where a lease truly is idle, the reason often is that the producer must hold off drilling while they wait years to get the necessary government permissions.

Erik Milito, API director of upstream and industry operations, says there’s another reason some leases aren’t being used: There’s only a 30 to 40 percent success rate to finding oil. A producer has to narrow down its leases to find the few ones good enough for drilling.

The fallacy behind Salazar’s assertion–which Milito characterizes as being, ‘We don’t have to open up any more public land to you, because you’re not using the leases you’ve already got’–is the belief “that you just put a pipe in the ground, and you’re ready to go–that there’s always oil there.”

Kathleen Sgamma, vice president of government and public affairs for the Western Energy Alliance, whose members produce, she says, 27 percent of the natural gas and 14 percent of the oil in the U.S., cites a more basic reason a lease may be idle: Its oil and gas may be uneconomic to extract.

As energy prices fluctuate, and as technology improves, she says, idle leases are brought into production. The most dramatic and most recent example is the 200,000-square-mile Baaken oil field underlying North Dakota and Montana. As recently as five years ago, she says, many leases here sat idle. Then technology and economics made production possible, and production boomed.

The DOI report, she says, “Actually is useful, since it shows that we’re becoming more efficient at operating on public lands. To have 44 percent of public lands in production is very high, compared to the 30 percent it’s been historically. There will always be maybe 30 percent of leases that don’t pan out. But of the rest, we estimate half are somewhere in the [drilling] process. If government is truly serious about increasing production, they would remove some of the red tape.”

The Alliance says that when you add up the time required for prospecting, drilling, and waiting around for government approvals, 19 years can pass before a lessee actually sees oil. During part of that time, the government counts the lease inactive.

She says she knows the government can move energy projects ahead more aggressively when it wants to, because it has done exactly that with wind and solar projects. It’s only politics, she says, that accounts for the different treatment accorded oil and gas.

A spokesman for the Department of the Interior, asked to respond to the industry’s contention that DOI’s report is both misleading and absurd, says, “The report speaks for itself. The notion that we have somehow locked up federal lands clearly doesn’t square with the facts. Our goal is to continue expanding safe and responsible development, and we will continue to take steps to deliver on that priority.”

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The director of the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management said Wednesday that the Obama administration’s five-year plan for offshore drilling should be finished by the end of June and that it leans heavily on expanding oil production from the central Gulf of Mexico.

In speaking before the Republican-controlled House Natural Resources Committee, Tommy Beaudreau, who accepted the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management job in September, took criticism Wednesday from some Republicans for alleged drilling delay tactics and for not moving forward with oil-drilling proposals along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

On the other hand, some Democrats were critical Wednesday of President Barack Obama even considering and studying drilling off of the coasts of Virginia and other Atlantic coast states.

Beaudreau touted Obama’s “all-of-the-above energy strategy” that includes renewable energies, while arguing that the 2012-2017 plan focuses on known oil-rich sites.

He said the central Gulf is the No. 1 priority and the “crown jewel” of the nation’s outer-continental shelf with a projected 31 billion gallons of oil or more waiting to be collected.

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings, R-Wash., criticized the Obama administration for delays with the five-year plan and with accusations of closing access to much of the nation’s natural resources for energy production.

“Now more than ever, with gasoline prices still hovering near $4 a gallon and unemployment above 8 percent, the United States should be doing everything we can to ensure the timely and responsible production of our domestic energy resources,” Hastings said. “Unfortunately, the Obama administration is instead pursuing an agenda that keeps 85 percent of our offshore areas closed to new American energy production.”

Beaudreau responded that the administration has been selling new drilling leases in the Gulf and that another major lease sale is scheduled for June 20. He said the 2010 BP oil leak off of Louisiana’s coast was a “major development” that required the administration to step back and make some reassessments.

Since then, Beaudreau said, private industry has mostly responded well in its efforts to increase safety and improve its well-capping technologies.

Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., defended Beaudreau and Obama in arguing that the “nefarious” actions of BP required significant changes.

Markey chastised the Republican-led House for not taking up legislation to improve drilling regulations and increase the liability cap. He also noted that overall domestic oil production has increased under Obama.

But U.S. Rep. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, was among those who took aim at not authorizing drilling off the Atlantic coast.

“I believe we will find there’s great potential out there,” Landry said.

Beaudreau said the administration is moving forward with environmental impact studies and seismic surveys for Atlantic offshore drilling before deciding whether to move forward.

The latest seismic data is more than 25 years old, he said, noting that the new studies should be done by the end of the year.

“We’re moving forward,” he said, noting that they need to work out concerns from the Department of Defense about possibly upsetting national security and military operations in the Atlantic Ocean.

Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., D-N.J., said Atlantic drilling should not even be an option when the focus must switch from “dirty fuels” to renewable energies. He warned of another BP incident happening along the eastern seaboard.

But Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, criticized Obama for not opening up the Pacific coast for more drilling offshore of California as well.

“It’s OK to mess up Louisiana’s coast, but southern California, being Democratic, is much more delicate,” Gohmert complained.

As for drilling in Alaska, Beaudreau said applications from Shell to operate in the Alaskan Beaufort and Chukchi seas are still pending. The issue that must still be answered is how good Shell’s deployment of its well-capping system is, he said.

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