WASHINGTON — President Bush on Monday lifted a presidential ban on offshore oil drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf that was implemented by his father, escalating a confrontation with Democrats in Congress over how to cope with soaring gas prices.
Lifting the presidential moratorium has no immediate effect on exploration because Congress has enacted its own prohibitions on offshore drilling every year since the 1980s, and congressional Democrats on Monday vowed to do so again.
But Bush’s move carries symbolic and political significance on an emotional issue in an election year. In a Rose Garden statement at the White House, Bush argued that allowing drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and off the Atlantic and Pacific coastlines would ease pressure on oil prices by increasing domestic production. Bush also urged Congress to approve drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, and he blamed Democratic opposition for the current run-up in gasoline prices.
“With this action, the executive branch’s restrictions on this exploration have been cleared away. This means that the only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources is action from the U.S. Congress.” Bush said.
Democrats and environmental groups such as the Sierra Club replied that expanding offshore oil production would take years and have no effect on oil prices for a decade or more. They urged oil companies to make greater use of federal lands and waters already open to exploration. And they pressed Bush to back other measures, such as releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, to lower the price of oil now.
Business groups widely hailed Bush for lifting the presidential ban and pointed to estimates by federal geologists that there may be as much as 17.8 billion barrels of oil in areas currently off limits.
But some oil companies have conceded that limits on skilled manpower and drilling equipment would make it difficult to increase offshore drilling in the near future. Oil company executives have said they would most likely focus on the eastern Gulf of Mexico if the moratorium is lifted.
The presidential ban has been in effect since June 1990, when President George H.W. Bush issued a directive to the Interior Department limiting offshore drilling to areas off the coast of Texas, Louisiana, Alabama and limited parts of Alaska. In 1998, President Clinton extended the order through 2012.
Last month, the current president called on Congress to lift its drilling ban, saying he would rescind the executive ban at the same time. But President Bush and his aides said he changed course because Democrats had failed to schedule hearings or take the issue seriously.
Marine sanctuaries would remain off-limits under Bush’s new memo. Coastal Alaska is already open to exploration, and many longtime leases remain off California and elsewhere.
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