Concerned about skyrocketing gas prices for consumers and businesses, on Wednesday U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, announced she’s backing legislation to make U.S. antitrust laws apply to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

OPEC’s decision earlier this month to cut production 1 million barrels a day is responsible for the “exponential increases in gasoline prices” now exceeding $2 a gallon, Snowe said. She is concerned the high prices could hurt Mainers, the state’s tourism industry and the economic recovery under way nationwide, Snowe said.

If the so-called NOPEC legislation that Snowe is backing becomes law, it would authorize the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission to charge OPEC with price-fixing violations under the U.S. antitrust laws, Snowe said in a statement Wednesday.

“But for certain legal technicalities, OPEC’s collusive practices to restrain competition would clearly violate the Sherman Antitrust Act,” she said. “Now is the time to close this gaping loophole, and this legislation does just that. It’s clear to me, my colleagues in the Senate and the Bush administration that OPEC is intentionally inflicting an unfair financial burden upon American consumers.”

Other members of Maine’s congressional delegation say they are also anxious about rising gas prices. They favor measures that would: mandate more fuel-efficient vehicles, develop ways to reduce the country’s dependence on foreign oil, and temporarily forgo depositing more oil into the federal oil reserve.

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said Congress should view the high prices “as a wake-up call to the need to take aggressive action to reduce our dependence on OPEC.” With more conservation efforts, the United States could save more than 1 million barrels of oil per day by simply enacting “reasonable fuel economy standards,” she said.

E-mailed complaints

Collins’ office has been getting a “steady stream of e-mails about the high gas prices” in recent weeks, said spokeswoman Elissa Canlas.

Collins also favors putting no more oil into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve over the next year and a half, putting more fuel on the market. “We could reduce gasoline prices by up to 25 cents per gallon by deferring the purchase of 53 million barrels of oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve over the next year and a half,” Collins said. She said that could be done without threatening national security.

Maine U.S. Rep. Tom Allen said Wednesday the answer lies in more aggressive conservation. For the short-term, Allen agreed with Collins that more oil should not go in the strategic reserve.

And he and U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud, D-Maine, said they favor creating a second reserve for times like these, when supplies dwindle and prices spike. Such a Gasoline Availability Stabilization reserve, modeled after the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, would release gas in times of high demand or to keep prices lower, said Michaud spokeswoman Monica Castellanos.

On Tuesday, Michaud signed on to a House resolution urging Bush to push OPEC to increase production and to suspend delivery to the national oil reserve, which is being filled at more than twice its normal level, Michaud said.

The resolve also calls for increased spending to develop renewable energy and for immediate, new solutions to reduce gas prices and the nation’s dependence on foreign oil, Michaud said.

The current historic prices illustrate the need for an energy policy, something lacking in the Bush administration, said Allen spokesman Mark Sullivan.

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