http://www.heritage.org/Research/regulation/BlogEntry.cfm#6979

A new chart of the month at www.regwatch.org displays the top rule producing agencies of 2006.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/regulation/regwatch.cfm

Imagine laboring on a project for a considerable part of the year. The work accomplished shows promise, benefits consumers, and generates substantial revenue for the company. Despite all of the project’s benefits clearly outweighing the costs, your boss puts the kibosh on it.

In reality, the commercial production of Shell’s Mahogany Oil Shale Research Project, a study over 25 years old, could very well be headed down the same path with its ultimate boss being the federal government.

An estimated 1.2 to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil is available in the Green River Formation, an area which expands through most of Colorado and parts of Utah and Wyoming; the recoverable oil refined from oil shale would provide another resource for fuel production. In fact, an Environmental Impact Statement produced by the U.S. Department of Interior and Bureau of Land Management stated that:

A moderate estimate of 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil from oil shale in the Green River Formation is three times greater than the proven oil reserves of Saudi Arabia.

Any hopes of expediting the process to large scale commercial production appear grim at best. Despite Shell’s promising research and development of oil extraction technology, including a freeze wall the size of a football field to protect Colorado’s drinking water, the fact remains that federally owned land encompasses 70% of the oil shale accessibility.

If the latest energy bill moving through Congress indicates the path energy legislation will move in the future, Shell’s most hopeful target of ten years for mass commercial production appears to be unfortunately futile, as Shell projects a much longer time period if Congress fails to concede regions of the off-limit reserves.

In his op-ed Untapped oil supplies, Senior Fellow Ben Lieberman asserts that:

[C]ongressional efforts to reduce the restrictions on domestic energy productionhave fallen short in previous years. And now the new Congress isn't even trying. The Senate energy bill does nothing to lift existing restrictions, and the House version wants to add new limits.

While these restrictions apply to domestic crude oil production, one would expect comparable restrictions on oil shale in the U.S. to protect federal land and prohibit any contamination of the Colorado River basin. Restricting the domestic supply of oil and creating artificial markets for renewable fuels distorts the market, with the consumer bearing the additional costs.

Claiming the oil shale industry could compete at $25 a barrel, Shell made an effective sales pitch yesterday to Capitol Hill staffers, not to advocate subsidizing the production of oil shale, but to simply consider the economic benefits of reduced restriction and private investment. The risk involved is not whether oil shale will ever generate a profitable return; it’s whether or not Congress buys the pitch to lessen regulation for commercial production in a timely fashion.

Cross posted on www.regwatch.org (A Heritage Foundation Production)

The Competitive Enterprise Institute recently released its Ten Thousand Commandments 2007: An annual snapshot of the Federal Regulatory State. Environmental, health, safety, and communication regulations increase costs for the American consumer and prohibit optimal economic growth.

Highlights from the study include:

Agencies spent $41 billion to administer and police the regulatory state last year

In the past eleven years, regulatory agencies issued over 48,000 rules.

The Department of Treasury, Agriculture, Interior, and Commerce, along with the EPA, account for 44% of the rules moving through the agenda pipeline

787 of the 4,052 regulations in the pipeline affect small businesses.

In 2006, the Federal Register contained 74,937 pages, up 1.4% from 2005’s 73,870 pages.

Agencies issued 3,718 rules in 2006, down 6% from the 3,943 rules issued in 2005

The detailed report covers all the basics, provides all the statistics, and even offers solutions for regulatory reform. Once again, the underlying theme in CEI’s report is “No Regulation without Representation.”

While the study most likely will not result in protestors dumping anything into the Boston harbor, author Clyde Wayne Crews Jr. insists that Congress take responsibility for regulatory reform. Congressional accountability begets transparency and will hold the government responsible for the future direction of the regulatory state.

cross posted on www.regwatch.org

 If China’s top FDA regulator Zheng Xiaoyu was executed in a case that open and shut faster than Snoop Dogg on a drug charge, what would the top U.S. FDA officials get for killing thousands, if not millions through overregulation policies?  Lucky for them, they’d be saved by the 8^th amendment.

Xiaoyu is responsible for the unfortunate deaths of a number of infants, men and women not only in China but also in countries such as Panama that imported the contaminated medicine.  The losses caused by Xiaoyu’s corrupt politics are certainly tragic and unnecessary, but the number of deaths pale in comparison when you think of all deaths caused by drugs unavailable to those in need because American pharmaceutical companies were tied up in the regulatory process.  Contrary to popular belief, the FDA has become increasingly wary and time consuming in its approval procedure.

    Although legislative changes—such as the Prescription Drug User Fee Act
    of 1992 and the FDA Modernization Act of 1997—and various internal
    changes within the agency have been intended to modernize and 
    streamline the drug development process, the rate at which new drugs 
    appear in the marketplace has slowed considerably.

The skepticism of Chinese products might have others call for even stricter medicinal regulation and protectionist policies in the United States; however, the American system of drug testing from beginning to end has an average time of 12-15 years:

    By the time a drug company applies to the FDA for marketing approval
    of a new product, on average it has performed more than 70 clinical 
    studies on at least 4,000 patients.

If Zheng Xiaoyu would have been the top U.S. FDA official, he could have made these life-saving drugs available in a quarter of the time, for a small bribe of course.  And when I say small, I mean small.  Xiaoyu received only 6.5 million yuan ($850,000) for allowing medical companies to slip through the regulatory net.   Think of all the lives he would have saved if he let American pharmaceuticals slip through the cracks; he would have been a hero. Instead, his execution marks a clear political statement sent by the Chinese government after he slightly tarnished the infamous “Made in China” label.

cross posted on www.regwatch.org (A Heritage Foundation production)

Last week, in a significant victory for free speech, Congressman Mike Pence’s amendment to the Financial Services Appropriations bill passed 309-115, prohibiting any funds coming from the Federal Communications Commission to enforce the Fairness Doctrine on radio broadcasters. 

A day later, he introduced the Broadcaster Freedom Act with 111 co-sponsors to prevent any restoration of the Fairness Doctrine by the FCC. 

While Pence acknowledges the importance of passing the amendment to the appropriations bill, he continues to press for a long-term solution.

Although my amendment to the Financial Services Appropriations billpassed, prohibiting any funding to the FCC for the enforcement of the Fairness Doctrine should it be resurrected, we must keep in mindthat it is only a one-year moratorium on funding. While I am pleased that 309 Members of Congress supported this short-term fix, it is my hope that they will continue to stand for freedom of speech by joining me in a long-term solution to the problem by passing the Broadcaster Freedom Act. There is nothing fair about the Fairness Doctrine.

The overwhelming passage of Pence’s amendment gives hope for the passage of his Broadcaster Freedom Act. 

To re-emphasize James Gattuso’s point, Pence’s legislation redefines the question at hand.

Before: “Should regulation be imposed?”

Now: “Should regulation be allowed?”

Cross posted on RegWatch of The Heritage Foundation

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