By Jessica Goad, Manager of Research and Outreach, Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Today, the House Subcommittee on Energy and Minerals will debate a proposal to jump start oil shale production, which could be one of the dirtiest forms of energy in existence if it were to become viable. Subcommittee Chairman Doug Lamborn’s (R-CO) bill would codify midnight regulations on oil shale that the Bush administration passed just as it was leaving office in early 2009.

You’re not alone if you haven’t heard of oil shale, which should not be confused with the viable energy producer “shale oil.” In order to develop the oil shale, a type of rock, power plants must be built to heat the rock up to nearly 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit and produce crude oil that still needs to be refined. This takes a large amount of energy and money, as well as 3-5 barrels of water per barrel of oil produced, a dangerous issue in the parched West.

Politicians and oil companies have extolled the virtue of this “new” form of energy since the early 1900s, yet not a single barrel of oil from oil shale has been commercially sold. That does not stop today’s politicians and oil CEOs from using the same language as their decades old predecessors. In a field hearing this summer, the Checks and Balances Project developed a bingo card with old-timey oil shale phrases — all of which but one were used. You can follow along today to see if the same arguments are used yet again (click on the card for a larger version).

Oil companies and proponents of oil shale claim it can “solve our energy crisis,” and Lamborn recently claimed that it is “one of America’s greatest natural resources.” Yet, despite decades of experimentation and hundreds of millions of dollars in investment, oil shale has never been produced commercially in the United States. Even the director of the Center for Oil Shale Technology and Research admitted that:

All of the major companies are doing oil shale because they think it’s an interesting and high-potential area, but they’re not in a hurry to make it productive…

Oil companies already have research and development leases on public lands, but they now seeking even more public lands on which to experiment. Lamborn’s bill continues to reward dirty fossil fuel companies for chasing what some have called “the petroleum equivalent of fool’s gold.” Throughout his career, Lamborn has received $126,962 from the oil and gas industry.

On Wednesday, House Natural Resource Committee Republicans held their 20th oversight hearing on how to drill more. In addition to oil shale, todays legislative hearing will feature bills to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and to mandate offshore oil and gas lease sales.

By Tom Kenworthy, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress Action Fund

To the short list – death and taxes – of things that are certain, add a third: House Republicans whining a duet with the oil and gas industry about complying with the nation’s bedrock environmental laws.

The latest example came today during a hearing before a subcommittee of the House Natural Resources Committee to examine the arcane subject of allowing the energy industry to employ so-called “categorical exclusions” to dodge thorough environmental reviews of drilling projects on federal lands. Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO) pushed back on the oil and gas industry claims:

The BP oil spill disaster proved that allowing companies to take shortcuts is a bad idea. It’s unfortunate that some continue to attempt an end-run around the law and protections for Colorado’s water, air, and public lands. We need reasonable, common-sense solutions that allow for balanced energy development, and I commend Sec. Ken Salazar for his diligent work to ensure responsible energy policy in the West.

The authority for drilling projects to bypass environmental assessments and more rigorous environmental impact statements under the National Environmental Policy Act was pushed by the administration of George W. Bush and endorsed by Congress in the Energy Policy Act of 2005. As with most things involving energy development on public lands, Bush’s Interior Department proceeded to go hog wild.

A 2009 investigation of how the authority was (mis)used by the Government Accountability Office found widespread abuses and illegalities in the way the authority was applied. Interior’s Bureau of Land Management, which oversees mineral development on federal lands, gave the industry exclusions in 28 percent of drilling permit applications from fiscal 2006 to 2008, the GAO found. And it did so in ways that were frequently “out of compliance with both the law and BLM’s guidance,” the report said.

Following up on that damning report, the Obama administration’s Interior Secretary Ken Salazar put a halt to the reckless fast-tracking in 2010 by issuing new guidance to the BLM that limited the use of the broad exemptions. Last month, on procedural grounds, a federal judge in Wyoming ruled that Salazar’s guidelines were illegally implemented. At today’s hearing, BLM’s deputy director Mike Poole announced that the agency would conduct a new rulemaking to comply with the judge’s decision.

But for the “drill, baby, drill” crowd, that’s not good enough. They want the Bush-era party to resume.

The liberal use of categorical exclusions, said energy and mineral resources subcommittee chairman Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CO), “are an essential part of streamlining an overly burdensome and bureaucratic process.”

Somehow Lamborn and his allies never got around to mentioning that even with those burdens in place, onshore oil and gas drilling is near a 20-year high, total U.S. crude oil production is the highest it has been since 2003, and the industry is sitting on thousands of unused drilling permits and leases covering nearly 30 million acres that have yet to be developed.

One of the most popular myths of supporters of unregulated natural gas drilling is that fracking — the hydraulic fracturing process that has spurred the drilling boom — has never contaminated groundwater. Although such supporters as Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) and Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CO) have been confronted with case after case of natural gas sites contaminating water with spills, blowouts, and other accidents, they argue that the fracking process itself poses no danger. They have been bolstered in recent years by statements from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, including administrators Carol Browner and Lisa Jackson:

BROWNER: “There is no evidence that the hydraulic fracturing at issue has resulted in any contamination or endangerment of underground sources of drinking water.” [Letter, 5/5/95]

BINGAMAN: And although there have been over a million hydraulic fracturing jobs conducted in the last 5 years, there have been zero confirmed instances of hydraulic fracturing contaminating drinking water. [Congressional Record, 3/7/02]

EPA: “EPA also reviewed incidents of drinking water well contamination believed to be associated with hydraulic fracturing and found no confirmed cases that are linked to fracturing fluid injection into CBM wells or subsequent underground movement of fracturing fluids.” [EPA, 6/2004]

LAMBORN: “More than one million fracturing jobs have been completed in the U.S. since the technique was first developed, and there have been no demonstrated adverse impacts to drinking water wells from the fracking process or by the fluids used in the process.” [U.S. House, 6/4/09]

AMERICAN PETROLEUM INSTITUTE: “U.S. government studies have shown no evidence of drinking water contamination from hydraulic fracturing.” [Empire Energy Forum, 11/12/10]

INHOFE: [There's] never been one case — documented case — of groundwater contamination in the history of the thousands and thousands of hydraulic fracturing. [4/21/11]

JACKSON: “I’m not aware of any proven case where the fracking process itself has affected water although there are investigations ongoing.” [Senate testimony, 5/24/11

INHOFE: “Since the first use of hydraulic fracturing, producers have completed more than 1.5 million fracturing jobs without one confirmed case of groundwater contamination from these fracked formations.” [The Hill, 7/19/11]

In fact, a New York Times investigation reveals that in 1987, the EPA documented contamination of groundwater by the fracking process. In a report to Congress, the agency described how “fracturing fluid migrated into Mr. Parson’s water well” in West Virginia:

Although this represents just one documented case, that hardly means that fracking contamination is extremely rare. Researchers are “unable to investigate many suspected cases because their details were sealed from the public when energy companies settled lawsuits with landowners,” Times reporter Ian Urbina explains.