changes in the law because the Justice Department is so tough on them because if they get together even to play golf, the caddy might be listening. Do you have any notion how we could meet this antitrust problem?

Mr. SIMON. That is what we are going to have to be meeting with the Justice Department on, Mr. Chairman. You are 100 percent correct. We cannot call meetings down here and get this industry to sit in one room. We have to do it individually with their attorneys before they will respond to questions. They are extraordinarily sensitive and I guess for good reason, with the antitrust problems.

Chairman PROX MIRE. I would like to ask one other question I stated I was very interested in when we began. The energy resources owned by the Federal Government, what appears to be a great ignorance on our part as to what these resources are, what the reserves are, how much there is. From estimates I have seen, as much as 80 percent of the economically recoverable domestic energy reserves belong to the Federal Government in the form of oil and gas on the Outer Continental Shelf and coal and shale oil and other mineral rights on public domain lands, but it seems the Government is very poorly informed about the nature, extent and in some instances even the location of its own natural resources and ill equipped to learn where they are, where its energy resources are and how much are in its possession. Will you tell us whether you agree with the statement that the greater part of future oil and gas and coal, shale oil and other energy production will come from the public domain? Do you have any figures or estimates how much will come from the public domain?

Mr. SIMON. You are completely accurate in saying we do not have the accurate information. Remember, a lot of that is done on estimates and it is estimated that the Outer Continental Shelf, for instance, holds potentially 40 to 45 percent of our proven reserves and that is Federal lands. I have already stated that there are estimates that in the oil shale area, 2,800 billion equivalent barrels of oil, 85 percent of which is owned by the Federal Government. So we have a significant portion of this petroleum and nonpetroleum related future energy resources. And we are going to compile all this data as to

Chairman PROXMIRE. You agree the present situation is not acceptable, that we must do far better in getting the information we do not now have.

Mr. SIMON. Yes, sir.

Chairman PROXMIRE. Why should not the Government have the capability of conducting its own seismic and geophysical tests, the means and facilities for gathering and analyzing its own information about potential reserves under the Outer Continental Shelf? Do you object to providing the Government with that capability?

Mr. SIMON. Basically, we do that in the Geological Survey now, the extent of which is rather small and I think it should be expanded.

Chairman PROXMIRE. So that we should rely more on the Federal Government in that way than we do.

Chairman PROXMIRE. Just one point I would like to call your attention to and ask how you feel about it. Senator Nelson, my colleague from Wisconsin, has introduced a bill to provide something like the following: The bill would establish three categories of information within an energy information system in order to elicit as much information from corporations about the energy situation as possible. The first category would be public, the second confidential, the third secret. Each category of information would be stored in a separate library. Everyone would have access to the public library, only Government officials needing the data for official purposes would have access to the confidential library, while the secret library would be closed to all except the limited number of personnel needed to compile the data in that library for anonymous statistics.

What do you think of that kind of approach? Would it be helpful? Mr. SIMON. Yes, it would be, and we are working with this committee right now on this piece of legislation.

Chairman PROXMIRE. So you in general support the principle. Mr. SIMON. We have not come down-the principle, fine. The principle is supported. What we have to do is now get down to the specifics of it and that is what we are working on right now with them.

Chairman PROXMIRE. Congressman Conable.

Representative CONABLE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Simon, we would carry on this interrogation at some length and, of course, we would like to if we had the time and you had the time to do so. The American public is extremely confused on this issue as to whether a shortage exists, how serious it is and what it means to them and I think it is terribly important that your office be as open and as accessible as you have made it during the past few weeks. You have been either appearing before some interrogation or holding press conferences or putting out statements daily, I believe, and I hope you will continue that. Energy is so central in our lives that we need this information, need it desperately, and I hope you will continue to be as open as you have been and will make every effort to get this information, complete information in as simple a form as possible because it is coming out now in piecemeal form and people write from a point of view or talk from a point of view and, therefore, the public feels as though it is being whipsawed about this information. So some sort of a central reporting agency is necessary. I do not know who it will be if it is not you in your office and I hope you will keep the tremendous importance of this to the credibility of Government and to the credibility of the public laws have have to make relating to energy which we obviously can no longer take for granted.

I have no particular additional questions in view of the further pressure on everybody's time here except I am somewhat surprised at your statement about the economic feasibility of developing oil shale at current levels. My understanding was that this involves a ton of oil shale for a barrel of oil and that fully to exploit this resource would require digging something of the equivalent of Suez Canal daily. I find it difficult to believe that if we have that kind of

environmental problem as well as that kind of a problem of materials handling that it can be done at this level. I think we have to be realistic about these things and I think also that those of us in Congress who have to concern ourselves particularly with the long-term shortages-we cannot do a great deal about the shortterm shortages but we can about the long-term-have got to get as accurate information as possible about this sort of alternative, and so if there is any further information you can put in the record about the economic feasibility of these alternative sources, I think it would be of considerable use to the committee since we are a Joint Committee.

Mr. SIMON. Yes, sir. I agree with you, Mr. Conable, and let me explain that part of the answer, of course, rests in the fact that they are indeed financing these plants and they are financeable once the environmental constraints are met, and it is judgmental on their part also whether or not it is going to be economically feasible. They will not know until they try it. We have the uncontrolled system as far as pricing is concerned on new oil at present and, of course, that is partial incentive, but basically they are assuring us, various private interests that are willing to go out and spend their money to build these plants, that it can be done in this present range of prices.

Now, only time is going to tell whether that is true or not but on your first point which is what I consider the most critical, that the American people in their confusion, and I can understand that with the many statements that have been made, and their anger over the high prices

Representative CONABLE. If I may interrupt at that point, according to the papers we are all going home to find out what the American public is thinking nowadays. That is pretty hilarious because we go home every weekend anyway and we get about a little Congressman from upstate New York gets 1,000 letters in a week in the mail, so we do not exist in a vacuum as it is, but one thing that has been interesting to me as I ride around back home listening to the radio and reading the newspaper and watching television occasionally, is that there is simply a tremendous mass of contradictory information beleaguering the minds of the public particularly on something so important as this. They are not only confused, they are angry that there seems to be almost a conspiracy to confuse them about this and that I must say, is one thing I have learned at home that I did not expect to learn because I was not aware of what the people back home were hearing until I started listening to local news. I am not indicting you or our local news sources. They are every bit as good as anyone else in the country. They have a great system. I am simply saying the way it is coming out certainly is confusing and I hope you will do all you can to mitigate that condition.

Mr. SIMON. We will continue to be as open and responsive to getting the facts as I said right at the outset before the American people and at times there are reasons we cannot answer a specific question and that is frankly because we do not know, but we are working terribly hard to get the system into place that will satisfy

Chairman PROXMIRE. Mr. Simon, I have no more questions. Before you go, I would like to join with Mr. Conable in thanking you very much for your most impressive presentation, your obvious knowledge and understanding of this, and intelligence, and determination to get information. At the same time, it seems to me that we are left with some curiosity as to how serious a shortage we have. You say we have an energy crisis. We probably do but when we do not know really what the situation is because we have not learned from the companies, we have to send auditors out now to audit and verify the information we get, as you say, we have an abysmal lack of information about the 80 percent of the reserves and potential petroleum that the Government itself controls, very little information in that area, so it is very hard to come to a conclusion about how serious this crisis is and, therefore, what policy steps we have to take.

Finally, I also am concerned about what seems to me to be in all fairness a softness with respect to price. I appreciate that this is a very, very tough problem but I can tell you that is the problem that is really concerning the American consumer. The millions of people who have to buy gasoline and buy fuel oil for their house, that price going up constantly, and they do want to know that there must be some limit because it is getting to a point where people are going to have a great deal of difficulty getting to work and small business is going to have a lot of trouble operating because they simply cannot afford to do so.

I earnestly hope that we can arrive at a policy which can assure people that the price will not go above some definite reasonable limit. I know you are doing the best you can and I think that best is very good. I am very grateful to you.

Mr. SIMON. Thank you very much.

Chairman PROXMIRE. Thank you.

Our next witness is Ralph Nader.

Mr. Nader, I very much appreciate your willingness to come on such short notice and, of course, neither you nor Mr. Simon nor witnesses who appear today are required to provide statements because you were given very little notice. If you have a statement available I would be able to follow your presentation when you deliver it. If you do not, of course, that is understandable. Go right ahead.

STATEMENT OF RALPH NADER, CONSUMER ADVOCATE

Mr. NADER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to discuss this alleged energy problem from a consumer standpoint because I do not think the administration has focused on the consumer's interests other than to impose the principal sacrifice on the consumer.

Chairman PROXMIRE. Other than what?

Mr. NADER. Other than impose the principal sacrifice on the con

sumer.

There have been, earlier in 1973, detailed reports indicating that this energy crisis has been a created one. A principal report appeared in July in the Philadelphia Inquirer based on a long investi

gataion by two of its investigative reporters. I could commend that to your attention as one of the best invetigative reports on this problem.

That was in July 1973, well before the stepped-up developments in the fall of last year.

Now, the words "energy crisis" are used very frequently without adequate definition. I think it is an energy crisis for consumers who are being subjected to billions of dollars of unarmed robbery by the oil companies in collusion with governmental support. It is most certainly not an energy crisis for the oil industry. Almost everything that has happened in the last few years, particularly in the last few months, will redound or are redounding or have redounded to the benefit of the oil companies. For example, prices have increased rapidly. Profits have increased rapidly. The tax system regarding oil industry activities overseas is increasing the benefits enormously. The writeoffs, for example, which the oil companies are taking on their U.S. Federal taxes via their payments of royalties and other expenditures abroad are increasing as the price per barrel abroad increases.

The pressure by the oil companies to eliminate or reduce pollution controls is initiated by this so-called energy crisis. The independent competitors, the gas stations and the independent refineries, are being put under severe pressure and in some cases driven out of business by the activities of the oil major, one of their principal objectives.

The pressure to develop, without adequate environmental controls, offshore drilling, particularly in the area around Florida and on the Atlantic Coast, is increasing to the point where the oil industry may succeed here as well.

The desire to increase the level of prices so that synthetics can become competitive, particularly from coal, is also another objective of the oil companies who have been buying up coal companies at a rapid rate in recent years.

I think in order to understand the administration's energy policy, one has to understand the chief implementer of that policy, who is William Simon. And in order to understand William Simon, one has to go behind the public relations facade that has created an aura of independent, decisive decisionmaking on his part. To understand Mr. Simon, one has to understand Mr. William A. Johnson, who is his principal economic and policy adviser. Mr. Johnson's beliefs, statements, and feelings are in accord with the most extremist representations of the American Petroleum Institute. I have seen him in action personally and have also observed a littlenoticed speech dated September 13, 1973, which he delivered to an industry conference. And here was one of his principal conclusions. This is a man working for the U.S. Government whose presumed priorities should be the welfare of the consumer. He stated in that speech:

Our short-term difficulties with gas, coal and oil are very likely the result of various ill-conceived policies of Federal, State and local governments. For years we have been sacrificing the long-term interests of the nation to secure short-run objectives as unrealistically low prices for consumers and the too rapid application of environmental costs and restrictions. Now, unfortunately, we are paying for those policies.