House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) announced last Thursday the creation of a task force that would recommend short-term solutions to head off a potential natural gas supply deficit later in the year.

As a one-time member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Hastert sees an “ominous sign on the wall that a natural gas crisis is looming,” said spokesman Pete Jeffries. The gas market has catapulted to the national stage in recent weeks, as the Bush administration and congressional lawmakers have turned their focus to price and supply issues.

The “Speaker’s Task force for Affordable Natural Gas” includes 18 members, mostly from the Energy and Commerce Committee and House Resources Committee. The chairmen of the two committees, Reps. W.J. “Billy” Tauzin (R-LA) and Richard Pombo (R-CA), have been named to lead the task force. The two lawmakers called for a special panel to be set up in a letter to Hastert in late June.

Task force members have been charged with identifying the causes of the current gas supply shortfall, the impact of the above-normal gas prices on the U.S. economy, and short- and long-term policies to encourage a stable gas supply to ease prices.

The panel will conduct a series of nationwide hearings and report back to Hastert by Sept. 30. Jeffries would not say if the group would write legislation.

As a result of current conditions in the gas market, “people are losing their jobs and factories are faced with closures,” said Tauzin. “Supplies are tight and natural gas prices have doubled since last year. Yet our country has not run out of natural gas…It [simply] remains padlocked and guarded by the government. The speaker has asked the members of the task force to work…to eliminate this crisis before it occurs. We intend to deliver.”

In addition to Tauzin and Pombo, other key members of the task force are Republican Conference Chairwoman Deborah Pryce (R-OH), Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX), and Energy and Mineral Resources Chairwoman Barbara Cubin (R-WY).

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