House Ends Oil, Gas Drilling Ban Off East, West Coasts

The House, responding to growing public demand for more domestic energy, voted Wednesday to end a quarter-century ban on oil and natural gas drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, giving Republicans a major victory on energy policy.

A 1-year extension of the ban was left off a $630 billion-plus stopgap government spending bill that President Bush had threatened to veto, possibly shutting down the government, if the drilling ban was included.

The bill was approved 370-58. It goes to the Senate, where it is likely to be approved within the next few days, also without the drilling ban.

The decision to avoid a fight with the White House over offshore drilling marks a major shift by Democrats on energy policy. It's also a reflection that the GOP argument for more domestic energy production had found a support among voters this election year, even though coastal states long have worried that offshore drilling might cause spills, soil beaches and threaten their tourist businesses.

Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain of Arizona has made expanded offshore drilling a key part of his campaign, saying access to an estimated 18 billion barrels of oil in the off-limits Outer Continental Shelf is needed if the country is to become more energy independent.

McCain's Democratic presidential rival, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, also has endorsed limited expansion of offshore drilling, but only as part of a broader energy package that boosts use of alternative energy sources and increases efficiency.

Lifting the offshore ban does not mean drilling in the offshore waters is imminent, but it could set the stage for the Interior Department to offer leases in some Atlantic federal waters as early as 2011 under its current five-year offshore drilling plan.

Waters off the western beaches of Florida remain off limits to energy development, at least until 2022, under a law Congress passed two years ago that opened 8.3 million acres of the east-central Gulf to drilling.