Washington, D.C. – Senate Energy & Natural Resources Chairman Pete V. Domenici today said the sums identified in Budget Chairman Gregg’s Mark on the budget resolution are doable. He praised Gregg for assuming federal ANWR receipts of $2.5 billion over five years in the mark made public in the committee this afternoon. Domenici, former chairman and senior member of the Budget Committee, issued the following statement: Chairman Gregg identified $2 billion for mandatory spending in the energy bill and $4.5 billion for energy taxes. I think these numbers are tough but doable. I will work to craft a bipartisan bill in committee that stays within those spending guidelines. I congratulate the Chairman for assuming ANWR receipts in his mark. I will join Chairman Gregg and other senators concerned about rising energy prices to keep ANWR instructions in the resolution, both in committee and on the Senate floor next week. I will vigorously oppose any motion to strike. This week and next, I will make visits to several senators to discuss what I saw in Alaska this past weekend. I lead a congressional delegation of two cabinet secretaries and five senators to the North Slope to visit with the Inupiat people, see the cleanest energy development in the world and walk the tundra in ANWR’s 1002 Area, where we are considering development of more than 10 billion barrels of oil. I will take Inupiat guests – representatives of the only Native Alaskans to live in ANWR – with me on these visits. We must develop our greatest onshore oil reserve. At its peak and at this price, ANWR oil can pump nearly $20 billion a year into our economy, creating hundreds of thousands of jobs and easing these steep prices. Economically, environmentally, ANWR makes sense. For me, ANWR is now or never.