2007 GOP debate in Dearborn, Michigan, Oct. 9: on Energy & Oil

Fred Thompson: Get ethanol market up, then let free market take over

A: Ultimately it will be the free market. But I think that we're in a situation now where we've got to use everything that's available to us. I think renewables and alternatives are a part of that picture. I don't look for it to last forever. When the industry gets up and running and on its feet again, I don't see the need for what we're doing now.

John McCain: Climate change is real; nuclear power is solution

John McCain: Public pressure on oil industry to invest in alternatives

A: I would hope that they would use those profits to further the cause of alternate energy, nuclear power, a lot of other ways that we have to employ in order to eliminate our dependence on foreign oil.

Q: Do you support drilling/exploration off the coasts of Florida and California? A: I wouldn't drill off the coast of Florida unless the people of Florida wanted to. And I wouldn't drill off the coast of California unless the people of California wanted to, and I wouldn't drill in the Grand Canyon unless the people in Arizona wanted to.

Q: But you wouldn't require the oil industry to use its profits to help pursue alternative energy?

A: I would not require them to. But I think that public pressure and a lot of other things, including a national security requirement that we reduce and eliminate our dependence on foreign oil.

Mike Huckabee: Ethanol & biofuels are part of future energy

A: I think ethanol and all biofuels are going to be an important part of the future energy needs of the country, but the accelerated pace at which we get there is critical for national security as well as for our own economic interest. We've got to come to the place where everything is on the table--nuclear, biofuels, ethanol, wind, solar--any and everything this country can produce. We once had a president who said, "Let's go to the moon in 10 years," and we were there in eight. And we did that when we started with a technology of bottle rockets when we got the thing launched. And we all saw that we can do it.

Mitt Romney: Develop energy technology like nuclear or liquefied coal

Rudy Giuliani: Don't draw the line anywhere--advance all technologies

A: I think Iran would be a lot more of a paper tiger if we were more energy independent. You could go on into a lot of examples like that. This is a matter of national security. You've got to support all the alternatives. There's no magic bullet here--biofuels, nuclear power. We haven't licensed a nuclear power plant in 30 years. We haven't had a new refinery in 30 years. We're on hold. Hydroelectric power, solar power, wind power, conservation-- we have to support all of these things. The president has to treat this like putting a man on the moon.

Q: But where do you draw the line? Do you support drilling off the coast of Florida, California?

A: You don't draw the line anywhere. What you do is you work with people to try to advance all of these technologies. Long-term damage to our environment would be a mistake, that would be an overreaction. You have to make sound judgments, and you have to advance these new technologies.

Sam Brownback: Energy security: drill every place you can find resources

Q: On the issue of exploration, you said yes to the coast of Florida, and you say yes to ANWR?

A: I voted yes for ANWR, and I would support those in other places, environmentally sound. We have to do it in environmentally sound fashion.

Tom Tancredo: Drill off the coasts of Florida and California