Arctic Drilling Hinges On One Vote

Soaring energy prices and the precarious nature of Persian Gulf oil are boosting the chances Congress will approve oil drilling in an Alaska wildlife refuge.

A showdown is nearing in the Senate on whether to allow drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, one of the Bush administration's top domestic priorities, and both sides say the outcome could hinge on a single vote.

Senate Republicans said Tuesday they fully anticipate a provision on developing oil in the refuge, known as ANWR, to be included as part of a budget measure to be take up by the full Senate next week.

The latest tally shows 49 senators ready to vote for the pro-drilling provision when it gets to the Senate floor, one shy of the number needed to overcome strong Democratic opposition, according to GOP sources.

Pro-drilling forces in the Senate distributed a memo among many of the GOP offices on Tuesday that urged an all-out push to try to find one more senator that might be persuaded to shift allegiance and join the pro-drilling ranks.

"Dick Cheney has been working madly to secure the 50th (vote)," said the e-mail sent to GOP offices.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee is anticipating that the Senate Budget Committee will include a provision on ANWR when it finishes its budget resolution on Thursday, according to his spokesman, Bill Hoagland.

Development of the millions of barrels of oil believed to be under the coastal plain of the refuge in the far northeastern corner of Alaska has been at the heart of President Bush's energy agenda.

But many leading Democrats, including several who hope to challenge Mr. Bush in the 2002 election, are determined to protect the 100-mile-long sliver of tundra where ANWR's oil is located.

Such protection has been an obsession for environmentalists who insist that drilling will destroy its value as a sanctuary for polar bears, musk oxen, caribou and migratory birds.

Mr. Bush has argued the refuge's oil — anywhere from 5.6 billion to 16 billion barrels — should be tapped to reduce America's dependence on foreign crude, although the refuge oil won't be available for three to four years even if Congress gives the go-ahead.

With gasoline prices averaging $1.71 cents a gallon this week and topping $2 in many places, and people worried about oil supply problems if war erupts in Iraq, pro-drilling forces in the ANWR debate believe they have the public's attention as never before.

On Tuesday, Interior Secretary Gale Norton called a half dozen groups, including farming and union interests, to her office and urged them to go to Capitol Hill and "knock on doors and help sell the message" on Arctic drilling to any fence-sitting senators.

She also was laying out an argument in testimony before a House committee Wednesday on the need for ANWR's oil as a matter of national security, insisting it can be pumped "while protecting the environmental values we all hold dear."

Her testimony came as ministers of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries decided not to increase or remove production quotas, despite the looming war and increasing prices. The ministers argued that world politics — not supply-and-demand — was to blame for the price rise.

Last week, scientists from the National Research Council reported that existing oil exploration activities in Alaska were taking a toll on the ecosystem there. While oil companies had taken steps to mitigate their impact, the researchers found that whales were changing migration patterns and populations of scavenger animals had increased because human refuse provided a boosted food supply.

Those changes had their own consequences. Native tribes found it more difficult to hunt the whales, while the higher number of scavengers posed a threat to endangered species of birds.

However, the scientists took now position on the ANWR debate.

"Although any expansion of oil exploration and production will exacerbate some existing effects and generate new ones, the committee noted that it was beyond the scope of its study to say whether the benefits derived from oil and gas production justify the accompanying undesirable environmental consequences," read a statement announcing the report. "Society as a whole must debate and decide that issue."

The House approved a refuge drilling bill in the last Congress, but it was stymied in the Senate.

Drilling supporters say if the Senate acts this year, they are confident the GOP-controlled House will go along with the Senate measure.

Democrats, led by presidential aspirants Sens. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut and John Kerry of Massachusetts, vowed to filibuster any drilling proposal.

That would mean supporters would need 60 votes to get the measure passed — if it were in a normal bill.

But by including the ANWR provision as part of a budget resolution, drilling supporters protect it from filibuster.

Drilling opponents would have to get 51 votes to remove the ANWR provision from the budget bill. As of Tuesday, they have just that many votes, according to both GOP and Democratic sources.

Republicans are eying Democratic Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor, both of Arkansas, Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., and freshman Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., in hopes one might switch, sources in both parties say.

A spokeswoman for Coleman, who succeeded the late Paul Wellstone, a strong critic of drilling in the refuge, said she could not comment on Coleman's views on the refuge. Spokesmen for the other three could not be reached Tuesday evening, but none is believed to have shifted allegiance, according to a Democratic source.

Five Democrats — Sens. John Breaux and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Sens. Daniel Akaka and Daniel Inouye of Hawaii, and Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia — continue to be solid in the pro-drilling camp, as they were in the last Congress.

Republican Sens. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, Mike DeWine of Ohio, Peter Fitzgerald of Illinois and John McCain of Arizona wrote a letter to Frist strongly objecting to the ANWR issue being intertwined in the budget process. The six were among eight GOP senators who voted against drilling last year and have not changed their views.