Obama Seeks to End Oil, Gas Industry Tax Breaks

clipped from www.reuters.com President Barack Obama's budget outline calls for eliminating substantial tax breaks and increasing fees for the oil and natural gas industry. Obama's plan, which must still be approved by Congress, would levy an excise tax on Gulf of Mexico oil and gas that would provide the government with $5.3 billion in revenue from 2011 to 2019. The new tax would close a loophole that the administration says has given oil companies excessive royalty relief. The proposal would also place a fee on nonproducing energy leases on federal lands expected to raise $1.2 billion between 2010 to 2019.

That fee would replace the "use it or lose it" provision that Democrats have tried to place on leases of federal land.

"The tax breaks Obama intends to repeal for the oil and natural gas industry include the manufacturing tax credit, the enhanced oil recovery tax credit and the marginal well tax credit," the report tells us.