US Senate panel fails to approve Republican-backed refinery bill

Washington (Platts)--26Oct2005

The US Senate Environment Committee failed to pass a Republican-backed
refinery and fuels bill Wednesday, making passage of legislation this session
to address soaring gasoline prices in the wake of recent Gulf hurricanes
exceedingly unlikely.

     Panel members voted 9 to 9, thereby rejecting the bill sponsored by
Committee Chairman James Inhofe (Republican-Oklahoma) that would have
streamlined refinery permitting processing by setting a deadline of 270 days
for the US Environmental Protection Agency to issue permits for new refineries
and 90 days for refinery expansions.

     The Inhofe bill also would have authorized the Economic Development
Administration to allot funds for building refineries at recently closed
military bases, and make refineries a priority within the EDA's Defense
Economic Adjustment program, which provides funds to communities with closed
bases to help diversify their economic base.

      The bill also sought to reduce the number of boutique fuels by
authorizing EPA to prevent other states from using a particular fuel blend if
one state stops using it.

     Prior to the vote, the panel rejected, by a vote of 10 to 8, a bid by
Democrats and the sole Independent on the committee to replace Inhofe's
refinery bill with a substitute that would have established a federally owned
refinery to be used in emergency situations.

      That substitute amendment, sponsored by Sen Jim Jeffords
(Independent-Vermont), would have set up an EPA-run strategic refinery that
would have operated like the government's Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

      The US House of Representatives earlier this month narrowly approved a
refinery bill that contained many of the same provisions as the Inhofe
measure. That bill was approved by two votes, 212-210, but only after the vote
deadline was extended an extra 40 minutes while Republican leaders twisted
arms to get fellow party members to support the legislation.

     Inhofe's bill, while not a companion piece of legislation to the House
refinery bill, was considered the vehicle Republicans would use to work out a
negotiated refinery bill between the two chambers in an effort to get a final
bill passed.

For more information, take a trial to Platts Global Alert at
http://globalalert.platts.com.

Please visit: www.platts.com

Their coverage of energy matters is extensive!!.