Bush Administration Proposes Oil Shale Rules. By Patty Henetz, Salt Lake Tribune, July 23, 2008. "The Bush administration on Tuesday released proposed rules administering commercial oil shale development on public lands in Utah, Colorado and Wyoming... The rules would govern lease management and royalty payments should extracting kerogen from rock for further refining into fuel ever prove economically feasible -- an open question given the likelihood of carbon taxes, lack of available Colorado River water and a host of environmental protection restrictions. The rules proposed by the Department of the Interior are part of an election-year push by Republicans to support development of oil shale, which a Rand Corp. study last year said could yield as much as 800 billion barrels of oil. 'As Americans pay more than $4 for a gallon of gasoline and watch energy prices continue to climb higher and higher, we need to be doing more to develop our own energy here at home, through resources such as oil shale,' said Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne... But even stalwart Republicans question the connection between pump prices and oil-shale development... [while] conservation organizations called the administration's move to develop rules a 'false hope.' 'Instead of gambling our resources on unproven fuel sources, such as oil shale, we should invest in proven options that will reduce prices such as higher fuel economy standards, energy efficiency and renewable generation technologies,' [said] Chase Huntley... [of] The Wilderness Society [on] Tuesday."
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