42 U.S.C. § 13412 — Oil shale

(a) Program direction. The Secretary must run a 5-year program, following sections 13541 and 13542, on extracting and converting oil shale into fuel — covering research and development on both eastern and western oil shale deposits. (b) Program goals. The program's goals are: (1) support technology that's both economically competitive and environmentally acceptable for making liquid fuel from oil shale; (2) learn more about disposing of oil shale waste in an environmentally acceptable way; (3) learn more about the chemistry and reaction speed of oil shale retorting (the heating process that releases oil); (4) better understand the engineering needed to design and scale up oil shale extraction and conversion technology; (5) improve oil shale mining techniques; and (6) work together with universities and other private organizations. (c) Eastern oil shale program. As part of this program, the Secretary must run a program of applied research — working with universities and private companies — on eastern oil shale that could reduce U.S. dependence on energy imports. The Secretary must consider including, in that program, applied research being done as of October 24, 1992, by universities and other private groups already working on eastern oil shale retorting and related processes. This program must be cost-shared with universities and private industry as much as possible. (d) Western oil shale program. The Secretary must also run a program on extracting oil from western oil shale. If it makes sense, this includes setting up and using at least one field testing center to test, evaluate, and improve oil shale technology in the field. In picking a site for such a center, the Secretary must consider places that already have oil shale mining and processing infrastructure. Sixty days before establishing any such center, the Secretary must report to Congress about it. (e) Authorization of appropriations. Congress authorized $5,250,000 for fiscal year 1993 and $6,000,000 for fiscal year 1994 to carry out this section.