DALLAS — Senator John McCain is set to say in Texas today that conservation is no longer a “moral luxury’’ or a “personal virtue’’ and that the next president must break with the energy policies of the current and past administrations to free America from its dependence on foreign oil.

In a major energy speech that implicitly criticizes Vice President Dick Cheney, who dismissed conservation as a “personal virtue’’ in 2001, Mr. McCain is to call for a variety of means to increase production, including lifting a federal ban on offshore oil and gas drilling and building new refineries and nuclear reactors.

But the speech, or at least the excerpts provided in advance by Mr. McCain’s campaign, does not dwell in detail on conservation measures.

Instead, Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, is to provide an audience of Houston oil executives with more details of his proposal to lift the federal moratorium on offshore oil and gas exploration in states that want it. Mr. McCain’s position is welcome news for the oil industry, which has called for years for the ban to be lifted.

“With gasoline running at more than four bucks a gallon, many do not have the luxury of waiting on the far-off plans of futurists and politicians,’’ Mr. McCain plans to say. “We have proven oil reserves of at least 21 billion barrels in the United States. But a broad federal moratorium stands in the way of energy exploration and production, and I believe it is time for the federal government to lift these restrictions and to put our own reserves to use.’’ Mr. McCain first made public his position on the moratorium on Monday in Virginia.

In his remarks in Houston, Mr. McCain also plans to cite investment firms and oil ministers who predict a not-distant future of $200 for a barrel of oil and up to $7 for a gallon of gas.

“Somehow the United States, in so many ways the most self-reliant of nations, has allowed and at times even encouraged this state of affairs,’’ Mr. McCain is to say. “This was a troubling situation 35 years ago. It was an alarming situation 20 years ago. It is a dangerous situation today.’’

In his prepared remarks, Mr. McCain criticizes his Democratic opponent, Senator Barack Obama, for supporting a windfall profit taxes on oil. “If the plan sounds familiar, it’s because that was President Jimmy Carter’s big idea, too, and a lot of good it did us,’’ Mr. McCain plans to say, adding that such a tax would hinder domestic exploration and that he is “all for recycling, but it’s better applied to paper and plastic than to the failed policies of the 1970s.’’

In the speech, Mr. McCain also intends to renew his call for new nuclear reactors in the United States, where none have been built for more than three decades. “One nation today has plans to build almost 50 new reactors by 2020,’’ Mr. McCain is to say. “Another country plans to build 26 major nuclear stations. A third nation plans to build enough nuclear plants to meet one quarter of all the electricity needs of its people — a population of more than a billion people. Those three countries are China, Russia, and India. And if they have the vision to set and carry out great goals in energy policy, then why don’t we?’’

The Democratic National Committee responded that Mr. McCain’s speech “will cave in to his friends in the oil and gas industry’’ and that he would be offering “more of the same failed Bush policies that have driven energy prices through the roof.’’