WASHINGTON — A new study identifies the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument as one of six monuments likely rich in energy resources the government won't allow to be tapped.
The U.S. Geological Survey's study released Friday by the House Resources Committee looked at the 22 national monuments created or expanded by former President Bill Clinton and found several may have abundant oil, gas, coal or geothermal resources.
Committee Chairman Jim Hansen, R-Utah, said the federal government should rethink bans on mineral development in national monuments amid a worsening energy crunch. Environmental groups, however, have said plenty of resources are available elsewhere in less scenic and pristine areas.
Other new or expanded monuments with "moderate to high" volumes of oil and gas are the California Coastal and the Carrizo Plain monuments in California, Canyons of the Ancients monument in Colorado, Hanford Reach in Washington and Upper Missouri River Breaks in Montana.
Meanwhile, Hansen said, results estimate that Grand Staircase-Escalante "has one of the world's richest reserves of clean-burning coal and coal bed gas." Clinton created that monument to block a coal mine that he said environmentalists worried would degrade the area.
In addition, Hansen said, several new or expanded monuments — including Idaho's Craters of the Moon — show signs of geothermal energy. Hansen said it is "a clean and abundant resource that should play a larger role in meeting our future energy needs."
Hansen said he found it ironic that two monuments supposedly rich in oil and gas are in California, which is facing rolling electrical blackouts and other energy shortages.
"Californians are enduring disruptive shortages and price spikes while large reserves of both oil and natural gas sit in the heart of their state," he said.
"A foolish Clinton administration locked up these lands under protest from Republican and Democratic members of Congress. Now California begs power from surrounding states with no solution in sight," he said.
"We won't let that happen to the rest of the country. We have the domestic resources to cool and light our homes for centuries to come and the technology to reach those resources in an environmentally sound way that protects our clean air and clean water," Hansen said.
Hansen has asked House members whose districts include national monuments created or expanded by Clinton to talk with local leaders about how they may want boundaries or operating rules changes and invited them to submit bills to make those changes.
The first such bill was approved this week by a Resources subcommittee. It would convert much of the expanded Craters of the Moon monument into a preserve and would again allow hunting there that was banned by the recent expansion of the monument.
Hansen also announced this past week that he will push legislation to limit the size of monuments that presidents may create.
It would limit them to 50,000 acres. In comparison, Grand Staircase-Escalante contains 1.7 million acres. Hansen also wants to require a president to consult closely with state leaders for 60 days before declaring a monument.
Clinton had vowed to veto such bills, but Hansen hopes President Bush will be more receptive.
Bush has said he would favor mineral exploration in some national monuments in their less-scenic areas. Environmental groups insisted that could threaten sensitive lands unnecessarily.
For example, Wilderness Society President William H. Meadows said after Bush's statement, "Drilling on these lands would do virtually nothing to solve our energy problems. The fact is that millions of acres of the public lands with oil potential are already available to industry."
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