API: Efforts to restrict energy exports misguided

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Jan 10, 2013, 02:32 ET

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- API President and CEO Jack Gerard called new coalition efforts to restrict exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) misguided and warned that restricting trade would have negative impacts on the U.S. economy and American families.

"Short-sighted efforts by a few industrial users to restrict exports in an apparent attempt to control prices would deprive American families of the wider benefits of lower costs and increased job creation," said Gerard. "America's newfound abundance of natural gas resources is a boon to all domestic manufacturing through lower energy costs, lower costs on raw materials and reduced heating bills. Restricting exports of energy as a 'strategic resource' makes no more sense than unnecessarily restricting the export of chemicals, agriculture products or cars, and such a backward move could violate international trade rules."

LNG exports would be a net benefit under every cost scenario analyzed, according to a recent NERA Economic Consulting study for the Department of Energy. The research found that gross domestic product (GDP) could increase anywhere between $5 billion to $47 billion as a result of LNG exports, with every scenario showing improvement in GDP over scenarios where no exports were allowed.

"Our vast resources have allowed us to become the world's biggest producer of natural gas," said Gerard. "Misguided economic theories and ill-considered policies could have disastrous consequences, disrupting the benefits to the wider economy, the trend of bringing manufacturers back home, and imperiling the billions of revenue energy investments bring to our government."

API is a national trade association that represents all segments of America's technology-driven oil and natural gas industry. Its more than 500 members – including large integrated companies, exploration and production, refining, marketing, pipeline, and marine businesses, and service and supply firms – provide most of the nation's energy. The industry also supports 9.2 million U.S. jobs and 7.7 percent of the U.S. economy, delivers $86 million a day in revenue to our government, and, since 2000, has invested over $2 trillion in U.S. capital projects to advance all forms of energy, including alternatives.

SOURCE American Petroleum Institute