FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 10, 2015

Contact:
David Turnbull, david [at] priceofoil [dot] org

Oil Change International Response to House Subcommittee Vote on Crude Export Ban

In response to this morning’s House Energy and Commerce Energy and Power Subcommittee’s approval via party-line voice vote of H.R. 702, a bill that would lift existing crude oil export regulations, David Turnbull, Campaigns Director of Oil Change International, released the following statement:

“The only thing this vote proves is that Big Oil continues to maintain its deathlike grip on so many of our elected representatives in Washington DC. Eliminating the crude export ban would not only hurt the many communities facing dangerous oil extraction and transportation in their backyards, but also our climate, as the industry digs up unburnable oil at an even faster clip. The only beneficiaries of gutting this law are the Big Oil Executives seeking to pad their profits.”

Analysis based on Oil Change International’s Dirty Energy Money database shows that members of the Energy and Power Subcommittee voting in favor of eliminating the crude export ban today have received over $7.9 million in direct campaign contributions from the oil industry since 1999. On average, those lawmakers voting to gut the ban received over 4 times as much oil industry money than those voting to keep the regulation in place.

For more information on the crude export ban, and why eliminating it will impact the climate, see our recent analysis at: https://priceofoil.org/2015/07/21/lift-export-ban-cook-climate/

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