ATA Files Comments on Next 5-Year Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- The American Trucking Associations today requested that the Minerals Management Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior expand the area where companies can drill for oil and natural gas along the U.S. coastline as part of a long-term strategy to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil, increase national fuel supplies and curb skyrocketing fuel prices.

Currently, drilling is limited to the Central and Western Gulf of Mexico. ATA has requested that MMS expand drilling areas well beyond those regions, including acreage off the coast of Alaska.

"We need the ability to explore new, untapped areas for domestic energy supplies," said ATA President and CEO Bill Graves. "The U.S. has an opportunity to improve our energy situation and continue to support economic growth, while providing consumers and businesses with the essential energy they need."

The U.S. trucking industry depends upon sufficient and affordable diesel fuel supplies to haul 9.8 billion tons of freight every year. Given current fuel prices, the industry is on pace to spend an unprecedented $85 billion on fuel this year, $23 billion more than in 2004. Environmentally sound expansion of the OCS leasing program will help ensure that the U.S. trucking industry has enough diesel fuel at affordable prices so that it can continue to deliver the American economy.

The Central and Western Gulf of Mexico supply 30 percent of the oil produced in the United States and about 20 percent of the natural gas. Other resource rich areas, however, remain under moratoria, preventing exploration and production off most of the U.S. coastline. These restrictions deny American consumers access to vast domestic energy supplies. Expanding access to new areas would ensure adequate domestic energy supplies because areas currently restricted contain large, untapped resources of oil and natural gas, which are critical to sustaining U.S. economic growth.

For example, about 300 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and more than 50 billion barrels of oil on the OCS off the continental U.S. can be recovered using today's technology. This is enough oil to maintain current U.S. oil production for more than 80 years and current natural gas production for almost 70 years. The supply could produce gasoline for 116 million cars and heating oil for 47 million homes for 15 years.

ATA, the national trade association for the trucking industry, is a federation of affiliated state trucking associations, conferences and organizations that includes more than 37,000 motor carrier members representing every type and class of motor carrier in the country before Congress, the courts and regulatory agencies.