83R31689 JH-F

By: Keffer H.R. No. 2853

R E S O L U T I O N

WHEREAS, Texas has always maintained primary authority over and regulation of oil and natural gas production, including a completion technique known as hydraulic fracturing, and the other 49 states have maintained similar province over such production within their borders; and

WHEREAS, Hydraulic fracturing has been a common operation for decades, and it is used in exploration and production by the oil and gas industry in all the member states of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission without groundwater contamination; approximately 35,000 wells are hydraulically fractured annually in the United States and close to 1 million wells have been hydraulically fractured in the United States since the inception of the technique, with no known case of groundwater contamination; and

WHEREAS, The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has proposed a rule that would force an unnecessary, one-size-fits-all regulatory regime on top of carefully crafted, individualized programs designed by the states, but the bureau is unable to point to any incidents, examples, or data justifying the rule; such rulemaking in the absence of any incidents, examples, or data is in apparent violation of legal and procedural requirements designed to ensure that costs and other adverse effects are fully and carefully weighed against benefits; and

WHEREAS, The bureau's proposal is arbitrary and capricious in nature, as evidenced by the lack of justification and by erroneous cost estimates and clearly overstated and unfounded benefits; the states will suffer from this rule, both by increased costs to their citizens and by the loss of substantial royalty revenues from federal lands as exploration and production companies divert investment to state and private land in lieu of federal land; and

WHEREAS, In recognizing the importance of protecting our nation's underground water resources, the member states of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission have adopted comprehensive laws and regulations governing oil and gas exploration and production, and they employ highly trained personnel to effectively enforce them; disclosure tools, such as the website www.fracfocus.org, also play an important role in this effort; and

WHEREAS, Domestic production of oil and natural gas will ensure that the United States continues on the path to energy independence, and hydraulic fracturing plays a major role in the development of virtually all unconventional oil and gas resources and should not be limited in the absence of any evidence that hydraulic fracturing has resulted in groundwater contamination; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 83rd Texas Legislature hereby declare that the Texas Railroad Commission is the appropriate authority to regulate all oil and gas exploration and production activities in the State of Texas and that a federal one-size-fits-all regulatory approach ignores the local and regional differences among oil and natural gas operations that make state regulations more adaptive and effective; and, be it further

RESOLVED, That the Texas House of Representatives respectfully urge the United States Department of the Interior to withdraw the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's proposed rule to regulate hydraulic fracturing on federal and tribal lands, and to defer to the states on how best to address any health, environmental, or safety issues arising from hydraulic fracturing and related operations on these lands; and, be it further

RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward an official copy of this resolution to the president of the United States, to the president of the Senate and the speaker of the House of Representatives of the United States Congress, to the secretary of the interior, and to all the members of the Texas delegation to Congress with the request that this resolution be entered in the Congressional Record as a memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.