Safer Oil and Natural Gas Drilling Technology Research and Development Act

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, oil and natural gas are a vital part of our economy and

will continue to be for the foreseeable future. In order to really ensure continued availability and access to this resource, we absolutely have to develop our domestic supply of oil and natural gas whether it is on land or offshore. Like any other complex endeavor, accidents are going to happen. The most we can do is try to prevent them from happening in the first place and then have the tools, technologies and resources to quickly contain, remove, and mitigate any oil spill. This was the motivation behind the passage of the research and development title of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, and it is our motivation again today.

H.R. 2693, as reported, is a good effort to address the many concerns that Science Committee members on both sides of the aisle had with the introduced version of the bill. It is also an attempt to deal with some of the shortcomings in the underlying statute. Although we all worked hard to find compromise on some of the language, a few concerns still remain.

I am pleased that the legislation maintains the Coast Guard as the chair of the Interagency Coordinating Committee. As the on-scene commander for oil discharges in water, Coast Guard leadership is very necessary to ensure a research and development program remains focused on relevant research. However, we have some reservations about streamlining the interagency committee by reducing the participants on the committee to Coast Guard, NOAA, EPA, and the Department of the Interior. While I understand the concerns that the size of the interagency committee was unwieldy, we heard testimony that the current structure did work. So I am left wondering if this is a case of a solution in search of a problem.

I am also a bit concerned that the direction of H.R. 2693 has shifted the focus of the underlying statute to concentrate much more on the environmental effects of the use of the cleanup technologies rather than the effectiveness of the technologies, themselves.

While researching and understanding the environmental effects of technology use is important and should definitely be a part of this program, it should not detract from the overreaching and overarching focus of research, technology, development, and demonstration. The Republicans tried to recover some of this equilibrium via an amendment accepted by the majority. However, the legislation still requires more balance.

During the markup, the committee adopted language greatly expanding the international coordination provisions of the statute. A lively discussion illustrated our concerns that such an expansive role could divert the interagency committee from its primary focus of research, technology, development, and demonstration.

I want to thank the majority for agreeing to temper the language to alleviate some of our concerns, and I am still hesitant that the vague provision could become a larger part of the program than was originally intended.

Coordination and collaboration with other nations and with foreign research entities can be a useful part of the program. For instance, we have seen that some of the assistance offered by other nations during the Deepwater Horizon incident was not accepted for various reasons, including that some technologies failed to be compatible with our own.

Researching the compatibility issues, advanced technology development and coordinated research for field testing of equipment are all activities that should be considered under this provision. I caution against a broader implementation of the language.

I have some reservations about a provision added during markup that would require any entity that receives Federal funding for research, upon request by the interagency committee, to turn over the results of that research to assist in the response effort. In times of emergency, it's vital that the response and decisionmaking authorities have access to the most recent and relevant information available, but the language included seemed broad and seemed unclear.

Research that could be helpful during a response to an oil spill may come from unconventional sources, such as information or technology developments created for a completely different purpose. The language suggests that the request for information would not be limited to those projects explicitly focused on oil spill research. Such a data call could yield a substantial amount of information, easily overwhelming the interagency committee, much like we saw when BP was taking suggestions on how to stop their leak.

We're pleased that the language has been modified to ensure better protection of this research; however, it's still ambiguous as to how the information request would be conducted.

When the country is in the midst of a crisis and Congress decides to act, it's possible for us to go too far to fix things, causing unintended consequences. Acting deliberately and in a focused manner will help the current situation and ultimately prevent the necessity of having to go back and fix things that resulted unexpectedly.

While H.R. 2693 progressed expeditiously through the committee process, my hope is that as we move through the legislative process, including a formal conference, some of our concerns and questions may be addressed. Preparedness is defined as activities and measures that exist before an emergency and are used to support and enhance the appropriate response. Research and development are key activities necessary for not only preparing for an event, but also trying to prevent its occurrence in the first place.

Finally, after changes made, I'm comfortable with the bill. And I thank you, Madam Speaker. I thank Chairman Gordon and Ms. Woolsey, who have been helpful and have written a bill certainly better than we think it was to begin with.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman yield?

I just want to congratulate you and Ms. Woolsey. This bill was improved very much by her knowledge and history of a bad occurrence that happened to her in her district that she is trying to spare the rest of our districts. I thank her for the good work on this.

I thank the Republican whip for yielding.

Madam Speaker, on Monday, the House will meet at 12:30 p.m. for morning-hour debate and 2 p.m. for legislative business, with votes postponed until 6 p.m. On Tuesday, Madam Speaker, the House will meet at 10:30 a.m. for morning-hour debate and 12 p.m. for legislative business. On Wednesday and Thursday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for legislative business. On Friday, the House will meet at 9 a.m. for legislative business.

We will consider several bills under suspension of the rules. A complete list of all suspension bills will be announced by the close of business tomorrow. In addition, we will consider Mr. Taylor's bill, H.R. 1264, the Multiple Peril Insurance Act of 2009. We're also expecting to consider several items from the Senate, including Senate amendments to H.R. 4213, the Restoration of Emergency Unemployment Compensation Act; and Senate amendments to H.R. 4899, the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2010.

Lastly, Madam Speaker, we expect to consider several bills addressing the oil spill in the gulf, including H.R. 2693, the Oil Pollution Research and Development Program Reauthorization Act; and H.R. 5716, the Safer Oil and Natural Gas Drilling Technology Research and Development Act.

I say to the gentleman that will, again, depend on what our colleagues in the Senate send over to us and whether or not we can complete the business that we have before us that I've announced by Thursday. In the event that we don't have legislation coming back from the Senate that we needed to deal with on Friday, or our business that is scheduled does not take longer than Thursday, then it is possible that we would not be in session. But, again, I would caution Members that we have 2 weeks left to go and those days will be scheduled and will be utilized if needed.

In addition to the bills that we've already mentioned for next week, including the unemployment extension, the supplemental coming from the Senate, and the Science and Technology bills addressing the oil spill, we'll also likely consider a number of other bills addressing oil spill legislation. In addition, I expect we will consider several bills from the Appropriations Committee. I've talked to the chairman about which bills would be most likely for floor action before August, and he's looking at the Veterans and Military Construction and the Transportation-HUD bills.

As the gentleman I'm sure knows, they have marked up now seven, I believe is the accurate number of appropriations bills--excuse me. I think it's nine because they marked up two today, or are in the process of marking them up today, and I expect by the end of the day there will have been nine appropriation bills marked up. They will proceed. But I think those two bills are probably the first ones that will come forward.

Those bills, as you know, have not been reported out of committee yet and I've not discussed with the chairman his plans on how he would hope to bring those to the floor. I will be discussing it with him probably the latter part of next week, and perhaps we will have more information for you next week. Again, we expect the bills to come to the floor not next week, but the week after.

I thank the gentleman for his question and for his observation and for his assurances as well in terms of the number of votes we may have available for that alternative.

I say to the gentleman that it is my intention that certainly by the time we leave here that we will have made sure that the troops have the resources they need to prosecute the mission that we have given them as a Congress and the administration. There's no doubt that we will have 218-plus--a large plus, I think--of votes to accomplish that objective.

As the gentleman knows, however, we have passed a supplemental which does fund the troops. It wasn't the Senate supplemental. The House obviously has its own view on policy, and I'm sure the gentleman would want the House to prosecute its policies and redeem the majority of the House's view and try to reach agreement with the Senate.

The House acted on the supplemental before the break, including all of the President's request for troop funding, as the gentleman knows. It also included the administration's request for FEMA, Haiti, oil spill, and border security. In addition, as the gentleman knows, we added money to take care of almost 140,000 teachers and offset the additional money with spending cuts. So those were paid for. I'm hopeful that the Senate will not make significant changes to the bill that the House passed and will be able to pass that bill before the August work period begins. Again, however, I want to emphasize that I am fully committed and intend to ensure that the troops have the resources they need.

With respect to the gentleman's observation, he is absolutely correct. I was hopeful we would do it before Memorial Day, and then I was hopeful we would do it before the July 4th break. Interestingly enough, however, as we kept going along and I kept in contact with the chairman of the Defense Appropriations Committee, Mr. Dicks, as to when the funding was needed, the date kept moving. And the date that we now have, as the gentleman probably knows as well as I do, is August 7. But certainly I want to see us pass the funding for the troops and for the prosecution of the effort that the Congress has supported and the administration has set forth for our troops prior to that time.

I thank you for that effort. We will look forward to working with you to make sure that our troops are fully funded.

Will the gentleman yield?

We have a very strict leave policy in my office, but we were convinced that getting off for his wedding was an appropriate use of that leave. Austin is a wonderful member of the staff. I am very pleased that you mentioned it. He has a wonderful new bride. His demeanor has changed markedly. He is much happier, and we're all happier to work with him. So Austin, congratulations to you.

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 2693) to amend title VII of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, and for other purposes, as amended.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on H.R. 2693, the bill now under consideration.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, as we all know, on April 20, 2010, an explosion occurred aboard the BP Deepwater Horizon drill rig that claimed the lives of 11 men and resulted in the largest environmental disaster in our Nation's history. While the flow of oil from the well might have stopped for now, as long as our economy is dependent on oil, we risk similar tragedies happening again and again.

We have a responsibility to ensure that the relevant Federal agencies are equipped with the technology and intellectual and financial resources needed to prevent future oil spills and to effectively respond when they occur. With that, I am pleased to bring before the House two bills that enhance U.S. preparedness for future oil spills and improve worker safety.

The first bill is H.R. 2693, the Oil Pollution Research and Development Program Reauthorization Act of 2010, introduced by my friend from California, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey. I congratulate her for her foresight in introducing this bill.

This bill was passed out of the Science and Technology Committee last week by a voice vote after considering 21 member amendments, and it incorporates a few additional changes, partly to address minority concerns raised in the committee markup.

H.R. 2693 amends the Oil Pollution Act of 1990. In response to the Exxon Valdez oil spill, OPA 90 was enacted to improve the Nation's ability to both prevent and mitigate oil spills. Unfortunately, little progress has been made since then, and today's responders are left with virtually the same set of tools they had in 1989.

Ms. Woolsey recognized this critical shortcoming in response to the COSCO Busan oil spill in her district in 2007, and she drafted this amendment to the OPA 90 to improve the interagency research program.

The BP Deepwater Horizon tragedy has made the intent of this bill all the more relevant today. H.R. 2693 enhances the research and development activities, sets up a more efficient Federal management structure, and provides for more robust oversight and accountability of the interagency R&D program established in OPA 90.

I would like to thank my ranking member from Texas (Mr. Hall) and other Republican colleagues for working with us to improve this bill.

Also, once again, I commend Ms. Woolsey for her foresight and for her commitment to enhancing the Nation's preparedness for oil spills through H.R. 2693.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey), the author of the bill.

Madam Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the chairman of the Energy and Environment Subcommittee, Dr. Baird.

I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

Madam Speaker, in conclusion, once again I want to thank the gentlelady from California (Ms. Woolsey) for bringing this bill before us, Dr. Baird for getting it through the subcommittee, the 26 Democrats and Republicans on the Science and Technology Committee that brought amendments to make a good bill better, and the majority and minority staffs for working together to bring this bill before us.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Madam Speaker, as we move forward today with floor consideration of H.R. 2693, the Oil Pollution Research and Development Program Reauthorization Act of 2010, I would like to recognize and thank Chairman Thompson of the Homeland Security Committee and Chairman Oberstar of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for their cooperation with respect to this piece of legislation. Both Chairman Thompson and Chairman Oberstar have been very supportive in getting this bill to the floor today, and at this time I would like to insert exchanges of letters between myself and each of the Chairmen into the Record.

House of Representatives, Committee on Transportation and

Infrastructure,

Washington, DC, July 20, 2010.

Hon. Bart Gordon,

Chairman, Committee on Science and Technology, House of

Representatives, Rayburn House Office Building,

Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Gordon: I write to you regarding H.R. 2693,

the ``Federal Oil Spill Research Program Act''.

H.R. 2693 contains provisions that fall within the

jurisdiction of the Committee on Transportation and

Infrastructure. I recognize and appreciate your desire to

bring this legislation before the House in an expeditious

manner and, accordingly, I will not seek a sequential

referral of the bill. However, I agree to waive consideration

of this bill with the mutual understanding that my decision

to forgo a sequential referral of the bill does not waive,

reduce, or otherwise affect the jurisdiction of the Committee

on Transportation and Infrastructure over H.R. 2693.

Further, the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure

reserves the right to seek the appointment of conferees

during any House-Senate conference convened on this

legislation on provisions of the bill that are within the

Committee's jurisdiction. I ask for your commitment to

support any request by the Committee on Transportation and

Infrastructure for the appointment of conferees on H.R. 2693

or similar legislation.

Please place a copy of this letter and your response

acknowledging the Committee on Transportation and

Infrastructure's jurisdictional interest in the Committee

Report on H.R. 2693 and in the Congressional Record during

consideration of the measure in the House.

I look forward to working with you as we prepare to pass

this important legislation.

Sincerely,

James L. Oberstar, M.C.,

Chairman.

Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the chairman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the bill before us now, H.R. 2693, the Oil Pollution Research and Development Program Reauthorization Act, and shortly we will be discussing H.R. 5716, the Safer Oil and Natural Gas Drilling Technology Research and Development Act.

I want to begin by complimenting our chair, Ms. Woolsey and Ranking Member Hall for two outstanding pieces of legislation that could not be more timely, and that are tremendously important given not only the events we are facing in the gulf today, but towards trying to prevent these kinds of incidents from occurring in the future.

I want to start by commending the many thousands, more than 33,000 people who are in the gulf today working on this cleanup effort. I had the privilege of traveling there recently, along with members of our Science Committee staff, and when I met with some of those folks I asked what can we do to help? And their answer was the first thing you can do is tell people that we are working tremendously hard, and we are making a real difference. We have people working in more than 100- degree weather, in a terribly difficult environment, and they are working 12- to 14- to 16-hour days, 7 days a week. And they often feel that all they get is criticism. They are making a real difference. It's a heroic effort, an unprecedented scale, and we should be proud of them.

In that visit I met people from virtually every major Federal agency, from NOAA, EPA, National Marine Fisheries Services, the Coast Guard, and countless others, many of whom, I am proud to say, are from my own great State of Washington. And they are very proud of the work they are doing. I want to begin by acknowledging that.

As we all know, OPA 90 came in response to the Exxon Valdez spill. And thanks to Ms. Woolsey's leadership, we had actually begun in our subcommittee to try to review how the research effort to prepare for and prevent these kinds of spills was going forward. Sadly, that proved to be very prescient, because the spill that evolved in the gulf is precisely the kind of event that we were trying to prepare for.

The average folks that I represent say to themselves, and they ask us, a few simple questions: What went wrong that allowed this to happen to begin with? What are we doing now to get it cleaned up? How do we prevent future spills from happening? And if there should be a future spill, what can we do to clean it up and to better understand and mitigate the environmental impacts? The legislation, both bills before us today, answer those questions.

They are designed to improve our ability to extract material in a safe manner. One of the critical measures we are doing is reprioritizing some of the funding so there will still be an emphasis on the extractive technologies, but with greater attention paid to the safety of those, both the safety of the crews working on the vessel, and to the protection of the environment from environmental impact.

At the same time, we are trying to do measures to prevent accidents from occurring in the future. That includes implementing best practices, reviewing the technologies, human factors dealing with the communication, and the training of the workforce. Some of the testimony we had suggested the workforce training has not kept up with technological developments, particularly in the specialized area of deepwater drilling. And this applies to the regulatory agencies, who it's essential that they have personnel on the scene who are experts in the precise technologies that they are overseeing during their regulatory visits.

We also spent a great deal of time looking at the environmental impacts of this. What is it we know about how the environment is being impacted and what is it we need to know? This legislation before us will direct the research agencies to improve our knowledge both of the research available on how to clean this up--we heard from Mr. Kevin Costner and others who have technologies designed to clean up the water--but also so we can understand what we need to know to conduct research prior to the event.

Additionally, I am proud to have authored an amendment, along with Paul Tonko, that would allow us to pre-stage both technologies for cleanup and research studies so that should there be an event, we can make use of that event to gather more knowledge on what we can do to reduce the oil in the water and to mitigate the environmental impacts.

The other thing people are asking about is what are we going to do to make sure we can clean this up better? And I will tell you that the areas we visited in the gulf, there are some areas that are doing remarkable work to prevent oil from coming onshore in pelican rookeries, to try to clean up the beaches when they have been contaminated. But one thing we know, this is going to be a long- standing impact. And we need to not only research what's happening today, we need to continue to research what's going on in the future. This will be a long-term research project. This legislation recognizes and supports that.

Finally, I should say that this is an international issue, and this legislation provides for measures to collaborate with international entities.

In conclusion again, I just want to acknowledge the leadership of Mr. Hall, the ranking member, who has been instrumental in prior work to make sure we had developed competitive technologies to gain access to these resources for the benefit of our country, but the foresight of Ms. Woolsey, and the outstanding leadership in bipartisan fashion of Chairman Gordon.

The Research and Science Committee has again led the way on an issue of major national importance. I am proud to have been a part of this, and urge passage of both bills today.

I would like to thank Chairman Gordon and Chairman Baird, the chairman of the Energy Subcommittee, and Ranking Member Hall for leadership and for cooperation and for making a base bill even better.

Madam Speaker, in 2007, the container ship Cosco Busan collided with the San Francisco Bay Bridge, spilling 58,000 gallons of oil into the San Francisco Bay and causing great harm, great harm to the surrounding environment, great harm to the economy of my district, and great harm to the surrounding Bay Area.

Although this spill was minor compared to the current gulf coast catastrophe, the impact to the Bay Area was widespread. Thousands of birds, including 50 different species, were killed, coastal fisheries were impacted, and marine mammals died. All told, more than 200 miles of coastline was polluted by the Cosco Busan oil spill, costing more than $70 million in environmental cleanup costs.

What occurred to me throughout the ordeal was the question and the confusion regarding who was in charge and what technologies were available to assess and clean up the mess. That's why I introduced H.R. 2693 last year, before the catastrophe of the Gulf of Mexico, to strengthen coordination of Federal research and development of science and technologies that will prevent, combat, and clean up spills. And that is why Chairman Baird held a hearing on the very issue.

Madam Speaker, if we learned anything from the Cosco Busan spill, it was that we need to strengthen coordination and leadership of oil spill response, research and development. And everything that we learned from the BP Gulf of Mexico disaster magnifies my concerns.

Madam Speaker, following the Exxon Valdez oil spill, Congress passed the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, which created an interagency coordinating committee to coordinate research and development of oil spill prevention and response among 14 Federal agencies. Not one, not two, not three, not four--14 Federal agencies. It was confusing during the Cosco Busan spill, but that was nothing compared to the confusion of the gulf disaster.

Chairman Gordon, I want to thank you. Chairman Baird, I want to thank you for helping to streamline the structure of the interagency coordinating committee in H.R. 2693. And Ranking Member Hall, I want to thank you for accepting the changes we've made and the improvements.

I also want to thank the members of the Science and Technology Committee and the staff who worked so hard to improve this legislation and ensure that it reflects recent developments in the gulf.

Madam Speaker, H.R. 2693 streamlines the interagency coordinating committee to include representatives from NOAA, the Coast Guard, EPA, and the Department of the Interior, while retaining the Coast Guard as the chair of the interagency committee. This ensures that the agencies with the most research expertise in oil spill prevention, detection, and recovery and mitigation are working together for common solutions in an effective and efficient way.

Additionally, the interagency committee is required to collaborate with the other Federal agencies listed in the Oil Pollution Act. And my bill now includes the National Science Foundation to this list.

My bill increases the authorized level of funding for Federal oil pollution research and development from $22 million to $48 million, all of which is drawn from the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. This level of funding hasn't been changed since 1990.

H.R. 2693 also authorizes $12 million in funding for a regional research program to provide peer-reviewed competitive grants to institutes of higher learning and research facilities to improve technologies used to prevent and respond to oil spills.

Following the Cosco Busan oil leak, we heard time and again from people responding to the bill that the technology they were using was inadequate, and was, in fact, almost the same technology used to respond to Exxon Valdez decades earlier.

During the Science Committee markup of H.R. 2693, as the chairman mentioned, nearly 20 bipartisan amendments were adopted that strengthened this bill. With estimates putting the total amount of oil spilled in the gulf at nearly 200 million barrels, it's essential that we have the best science and technology possible to deal with a disaster of this magnitude.

As long as we extract, use, or transport oil in the United States, there will be some risks of oil spills along our shores. It is obvious that oil spills negatively affect our coastlines, our marine ecosystems, and our fishing and tourism industries. Madam Speaker, we must do our best to protect the public and the environment from future oil spills.

This bill brings us closer to that goal through targeted and coordinated research, development, and demonstration that will help us better prevent, better combat, and better mitigate future oil spills, no matter the size.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this important legislation.