Washington, DC – From the floor of the U.S. Senate Tuesday,
Senator Benjamin L. Cardin (D-MD)
called for greater transparency in the oil, gas and mineral industries in an effort to fight corruption and promote
stability in nations rich in such resources. Senator Cardin and
Senator
Dick Lugar (R-IN)
(D-RI), have introduced S. 1700, the
Energy
Security Through Transparency Act of 2009
, which would provide for public disclosure of payments to oil, gas and mineral extraction companies through mandatory filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. , along with co-sponsors
Charles E. Schumer (D-NY), Roger Wicker (R-MS), Russ Feingold (D-WI), and
Sheldon Whitehouse
Following are excerpts of Senator Cardin’ remarks. The full text is available at
http://cardin.senate.gov/news/testimonyrecord.cfm?id=318464
.
Energy Security Through Transparency Act of 2009. It would move the United States in the direction of becoming an implementing country of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI). We can lead by example by showing the U.S. understands that there should be transparency in all the contracts we enter into for extraction of mineral wealth from America. As the bill provides, we should require the proper disclosure of payment from companies that use public lands on mineral extractions. EITI is about transparency so that companies and governments can be held accountable.
“We can have an open policy here in America to deal with our energy. It's important for our economy and it's important for our national security to get this done.”
The Energy
Security
Through
Transparency
Act of 2009
- Requires companies listed on U.S. stock exchanges to disclose in their regular SEC filings their extractive payments to foreign governments for oil, gas and mining;
- Expresses the Sense of Congress that the Administration should undertake to become an ‘implementing country’ of the Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (The U.S. currently is a ‘supporting’ country);
- Encourages the President to work with members of the G-8, G-20, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation to promote similar disclosure through their exchanges and jurisdictions;
- Commits the Department of Interior to disclosing extractive payments received for resources derived from federal lands.
