House Votes to Continue Offshore Drill Ban

General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner, left, shakes hands with Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., Thursday, May 18, 2006 on Capitol Hill in Washington. Executives from the big three automakers were in Washington to talk with Congressional leaders about energy and automotive industry issues. (AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke) (Lauren Victoria Burke - AP)

The overall bill was approved 293-128 and sent to the Senate.

"Drilling for natural gas means drilling for oil," argued Rep. Lois Capps, D-Calif., citing industry pronouncements that where there is gas, often oil is found and probably would be developed. "Drilling three miles off our coast will not lower gas prices today or anytime in the near future."

Peterson sought to ease the coastal-state lawmakers' concerns.

Lifting the moratorium wouldn't mean drilling right away, he said. The presidential moratorium would not be affected by the congressional action, he said. And President Bush has said he has no intention of tinkering with the moratorium, which also had been the policy of his two predecessors.

But Capps said if Congress lifts its ban, there would be growing pressure on the White House to do the same.

Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., was more blunt. "Our coasts are simply too valuable to risk this. I can't depend on the president. The president is an oil man."

Separately, by a 252-165 vote, the House, directed the Interior Department to renegotiate contracts on oil leases that allowed companies to avoid federal royalty payments even when oil prices soared. To get companies to renegotiate the contracts _ which date back to the 1990s but involve leases still producing _ it barred companies from receiving new leases unless they renegotiate the earlier ones.

In other action on the Interior bill, the House:

_ Approved a restriction on road-building in the Tongass National Forest in Alaska.

_ Barred the Interior Department from selling wild horses for slaughter as part of its wild horse and burro adoption program.

_ Told the Environmental Protection Agency not to implement a 2003 directive that environmentalists contend reduces wetlands protection.

Separately, an attempt to debate climate change _ and for the first time bring up for a vote the idea of mandatory caps on greenhouse gases _ was blocked. A "sense of Congress" resolution on the subject was ruled out of order.

The climate provision offered by Rep. Norman Dicks, D-Wash., would have put lawmakers on record as agreeing that human actions were contributing to global warming and that carbon emissions into the atmosphere should be limited.

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The bill is H.R. 5386

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