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On the same day that the largest oil company in the United States reported record profits for 2022, Republicans used the first House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing of the new year to promote the further expansion of climate-wrecking fossil fuel production and attack efforts to build out renewable energy infrastructure.<\/p>\n
The energy panel is chaired by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.), the top recipient<\/a> of oil and gas PAC money in the last election cycle and a longtime advocate<\/a> of opening U.S. public lands and waters to fossil fuel drilling. <\/p>\n In keeping with her record, Rodgers kicked off Tuesday’s hearing by touting the House’s passage<\/a> of legislation that would require the federal government to lease a certain percentage of public lands and waters for fossil fuel extraction for every non-emergency drawdown of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve.<\/p>\n Rodgers touted last week’s vote as “bipartisan,” but just one House Democrat\u2014Rep. Jared Golden of Maine\u2014joined Republicans in passing the bill, which is unlikely to become law. Climate advocates have warned<\/a> that, if enacted, the measure “could lock in at least a century of oil drilling.”<\/p>\n “We need to be doing more to secure and unleash American energy,” Rodgers said Tuesday, attacking so-called “rush-to-green” policies and falsely blaming<\/a> Europe’s energy crisis on renewables.<\/p>\n Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.), chair of the panel’s subcommittee on energy, climate, and grid security, toed a similar line during his opening remarks at Tuesday’s hearing, decrying “the Democrats’ ‘rush-to-green policies'” and condemning science-backed<\/a> calls to phase out fossil fuels.<\/p>\n Duncan also praised surging oil exports, which experts say have driven up costs<\/a> for U.S. consumers while padding the profits of fossil fuel giants and contributing to the rise<\/a> of global carbon emissions.<\/p>\n \n