To regulate commerce and amend the Natural Gas Act so as to provide increased supplies of natural gas, oil, and related products at reasonable prices to the consumer, and for other 1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2 TITLE II-EMERGENCY INTERIM RELIEF FOR Sec. 201. Fuel price rollback... 44 TITLE IV-EQUAL TREATMENT FOR SMALL PRODUCERS Sec. 401. Findings and purposes. Sec. 402. Availability and conditions of pipeline transportation--- Sec. 404. Access to Federal lands___ TITLE V-FAIR TREATMENT FOR RETAILERS OF 2 SEC. 2. (a) FINDINGS.-The Congress finds that 3 (1) The United States in the winter of 1973-1974 is 4 suffering, and is reasonably expected to suffer until such 5 time as practicable and reasonably priced alternative sources 6 are available, a shortage of energy supplies, especially re7 fined petroleum products. 8 (2) The shortage may not be as grave as the public 9 has been led to believe, but the price of available supplies 10 is far higher than had been predicted. The public has been 11 required to sacrifice while the multinational oil companies, 12 who are the principal suppliers, are enjoying unreasonably 13 high profits. For each one cent increase in the price per 3 1 gallon of gasoline, the oil industry receives more than 2 $1,000,000,000 in additional revenue. 3 (3) The multinational oil companies are also the 4 principal producers of natural gas. The supply, availability, 5 and the price to the consumer of this important energy 6 source are better than the situation with respect to oil and 7 refined petroleum products because the consumer is pro8 tected by provisions of the Natural Gas Act. 9 (4) The price of oil, natural gas, and other energy 10 supplies has a profound impact on the economy of the 11 Nation because energy is as basic to American economic 12 life as air and water are to physical life. Ever-increasing 13 energy prices will not serve to guarantee adequate supplies 14 of energy, but will injure the economic strength of the en15 tire national economy through inflation, rising unemploy16 ment, and the increased possibility of recession and de17 pression. 18 (5) The United States requires adequate and reliable 19 supplies of oil and natural gas to be available to consumers 20 at reasonable prices, to meet the present and future needs of 21 commerce and national security. 22 2 23 (6) The free market system of supply, demand, and 23 open competition among independent suppliers is the best 24 system for the allocation and pricing of scarce resources. 25 World oil prices are not set upon this basis but are fixed by 4 1 an oil-producing cartel. The resulting allocation is unfair and 2 the price levels are unreasonably high. 3 (b) PURPOSES.-It is therefore declared to be the pur 4 pose of the Congress in this Act to provide a consumer energy 5 action program that is comprehensive, practical, and fair 6 both to the public and the oil industry, which will distribute 7 more fairly the burdens of the energy shortage, infuse new 8 vitality and competition into the oil industry, and develop for the future increasing energy supplies at reasonable 10 prices. 9 15 SEC. 101. (a) Section 1 of the Natural Gas Act (15 16 U.S.C. 717) is amended by (1) redesignating subsections 17 (b) and (c) thereof as subsections (d) and (e) thereof; 18 and (2) inserting therein the following two new subsections: "(b) Congress further finds and declares that natural 19 and oil are "(1) located, developed, and produced by the application of similar techniques; "(2) used for the same purposes; "(3) in great demand to meet the Nation's grow ing energy needs while proved domestic reserves and production of both are inadequate to meet such needs; 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 5 "(4) located, developed, and produced to a large extent by the same persons (75 per centum of the natural gas produced in the United States is produced by the Nation's twenty-five largest oil companies); "(5) developed with funds drawn from interchangeable investment capital sources (investment capital has allegedly been diverted from development of natural gas to oil since there has been no prohibition against oil operations earning excessive rates of return whereas natural-gas operations have been limited to a reasonable rate of return); and "(6) located, developed, and produced by industries which, according to recent Federal Trade Commission studies and investigations, suffer from similar structural imperfections and patterns of anticompetitive behavior. In view of such imperfections and patterns, the free market cannot be relied upon to assure adequate supplies of either natural gas or oil to the consumer at reasonable prices. 20 "(c) Therefore, it is declared to be the policy of Con 21 gress to apply uniform economic regulation to both natural 22 gas and oil production to assure adequate supplies and avail23 ability at reasonable prices.". 24 25 (b) The Natural Gas Act (15 U.S.C. 717 et seq.), except sections 1, 2, and 7 thereof (15 U.S.C. 717, 717a, |