DORGAN CALLS FOR MORE AMERICAN ENERGY

Senator says North Dakota should lead the way to energy independence

Friday, August 21, 2009

CONTACT: Justin Kitsch
or  Brenden Timpe
PHONE: 202-224-2551

(WILLISTON, N.D.) --- In a speech here at a meeting of the Mon-Dak Alliance, U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) said the United States needs to move aggressively to produce more American energy and wean ourselves off of our dependence on foreign oil. Dorgan said North Dakota is positioned to play a leading role in that effort with its significant coal, oil, wind, biomass, and other energy resources.

“We have an almost unlimited capacity to create energy in North Dakota – from oil, coal, biofuels, wind and other sources,” Dorgan said. “I believe we need to take aggressive action to produce more American energy. That will help not just our economy in North Dakota, but also our nation because it will move us away from the dangerous dependence on oil from countries that don’t like us very much.”

Dorgan gave attendees at the meeting an update on energy legislation currently under debate in Congress, where he plays a key role in developing the nation’s energy policy as a senior member of the Senate Energy Committee and as Chairman of the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee.

Dorgan has used those positions to fight for North Dakota’s energy industry. For example, he has worked to increase funding for federal programs that produce new technology for oil and gas development. The Department of Energy’s oil and gas research program has contributed to major advances in drilling technologies, including direction drilling, a technique that has opened new opportunities for oil and gas development in North Dakota’s Bakken Shale formation.

Through his key energy positions, Dorgan also persuaded the U.S. Geological Survey to assess the amount of recoverable oil in the Bakken Formation. The result of the study – that the formation has up to 4.3 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil, the largest reserve the USGS has surveyed in the contiguous United States – has helped attract new investment and new jobs to western North Dakota.

“I believe we need to make use of all of our energy resources to make our country energy independent, and we need to take a ‘moon shot’ approach to do it,” Dorgan said. “When President Kennedy decided he wanted to send a man to the moon, he didn’t say, ‘We’re going to try to go to the moon.’ He said, ‘We are going to the moon by the end of the decade.’ That’s the attitude we need to take with respect to our energy policy.”

Dorgan has authored legislation that would help North Dakota lead the way to achieving that goal. Dorgan’s energy bill would help build new electrical transmission lines to help get North Dakota energy to market, boost the use of wind and other renewable energy, and invest in large-scale carbon capture and storage projects that will help find better ways to use our coal resources.

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