Obama Wants to Open Alaska Petrol Reserve

President Obama plans to open Alaska's National Petroleum Reserve to new drilling, he said in his weekly radio address. The plan would also fast-track environmental assessment of petroleum exploration in some portions of the Atlantic and extend leases to oil companies who stopped working in the Gulf of Mexico and Arctic Ocean because of the moratorium on offshore drilling following the BP disaster. House Republicans dismissed the plan as weak. The U.S. consumes nearly 25 percent of the world's daily crude oil output but contains only 2 percent of its reserves, and analysts say increased domestic production won't drive down prices substantially. The proposal does not include drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.