House Committee Acts To Stop President’s de facto Drilling Moratorium

The House Natural Resources Committee marked up three bills on Wednesday that would require the Obama Administration to stop its obstructive tactics and start producing more oil and natural gas from federal Outer Continental Shelf areas.  Committee Democrats dragged out the mark-up for nine hours by offering and insisting on recorded votes on a series of amendments to weaken or gut the three bills—H. R. 1229, 1230, and 1231.  None of their amendments was adopted.

It is expected that the House will pass all three bills in May.  Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (R-Wash.) plans to introduce additional bills in the next few months to increase domestic oil and gas production on federal lands in Alaska and the Rocky Mountains as part of House Republicans’ American Energy Initiative.

House Leadership Tacitly Endorses Excellent EPA Strategy

Environment and Energy News reported this week that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) did not rule out attaching something like the Energy Tax Prevention Act (H. R. 910) to the bill to raise the federal debt ceiling.  H. R. 910 would block the Environmental Protection Agency from using the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.  It passed the House last week on a 255 to 172 vote, but failed as an amendment in the Senate on a 50 to 50 vote.

Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee and main sponsor of H. R. 910, made similar remarks earlier in the week: “No debt limit is going to pass by itself. You’ll have to have some significant pieces with it.”

House Committee Counters Coal Crackdown

The House Energy and Commerce Committee held subcommittee hearings this week on the proposed coal ash rule and on the proposed utility, boiler, and cement Maximum Available Control Technology (or MACT) rules.

Rep. David McKinley (R-WV) has introduced a bill, H. R. 1391, to deny EPA the authority to regulate coal ash as a hazardous waste under the Solid Waste Disposal Act.  Coal ash has many industrial uses, including as a replacement for part of the Portland cement in concrete and in drywall.  Classifying coal ash as a hazardous waste would threaten its commercial use and thereby raise costs of producing coal-fired power.

It has been reported that bills will be introduced next month to block or delay EPA’s proposed three Clean Air Act MACT rules.  Each rule would have devastating economic effects.

For example, Rep. Greg Walden (R-Oreg.) at the hearing raised the example in his district (and in my home county of Baker County, Oregon) of a cement plant that has spent $20 million to install technology to reduce mercury emissions by 95%.  Under the proposed cement MACT rule, the plant would be required to reduce mercury emissions by 98.5%.

Achieving the additional 3.5% reduction would be too expensive and therefore the plant will probably be shut down if the rule goes into effect.  With the closure of the National Forests to commercial timber production, the Ash Grove cement plant is the largest employer (after the taxpayer-funded Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, and local school district) in the county.

The House of Representatives this afternoon passed H. R. 910, the Energy Tax Prevention Act, by a vote of 255 to 172.  Nineteen Democrats voted Yes.  No Republicans voted No.  This is a remarkable turnaround from the last Congress when on 26th June 2009 the House voted 219 to 212 to pass the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill.

The Energy Tax Prevention Act, sponsored by Rep. Fred. Upton (R-Mich.), the Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, would prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency from using the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and thereby put a potentially huge indirect tax on American consumers and businesses.   Coal, oil, and natural gas produce carbon dioxide, the principal greenhouse gas, when burned.  Those three fuels provide over 80% of the energy used in America.  Thus regulating carbon dioxide emissions essentially puts the EPA in charge of running the U. S. economy.

This is just the first step in stopping the Obama Administration’s attempt to raise energy prices .  The House bill now heads to the Senate, where yesterday an attempt to add the Energy Tax Prevention Act (introduced in the Senate as S. 482 by Senator James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma) as an amendment to another bill was defeated on a 50-50 vote.  Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s amendment would have required 60 votes to be attached to S. 493.  Four Democrats joined 46 Republicans in voting for the amendment–Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, and Mark Pryor of Arkansas.  Senator Susan Collins of Maine was the only Republican to vote No.

The strong House vote in favor of the Energy Tax Prevention Act should build new momentum to pass it in the Senate later this year.  Of course, the White House has already issued a veto threat, which shows that President Obama is not interested in creating new jobs and restoring prosperity to America.  Congress has now rejected cap-and-tax resoundingly, but the President still hopes to achieve through backdoor regulation his goals of skyrocketing electric rates and gasoline prices at the $10 a gallon European level.

Late in the 111^th Congress, Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) was building bipartisan support for a Resolution of Disapproval under the Congressional Review Act that would strip the Environmental Protection Agency of its authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

Due to a parliamentary quirk, the Resolution needed only a majority to pass (that is, it wouldn’t necessitate 60 votes to beat a filibuster) and it was entitled to a vote, so the Democratic leadership in the Senate could not sweep it under a rug. Moreover, there are 23 Senate Democrats up for re-election in 2012, and the political mood of the country in the summer of 2010 was shifting right. (This was evidenced by the GOP’s success in last November’s elections.) As such, an EPA reform bill was an attractive vote for many Senate Democrats from purple states, where the EPA is held is lower esteem than in, say, California or New York. As a result of these factors, Sen. Murkowski’s Resolution appeared to have good prospects.

Enter Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV). Just as Sen. Murkowski’s Resolution was gaining steam, Sen. Rockefeller introduced legislation that would delay the EPA’s regulation of greenhouse gases for two years, rather than repeal its authority outright (as Sen. Murkowski’s Resolution would have done).

By introducing this lesser measure, Sen. Rockefeller provided Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) an opportunity. Sen. Reid had been in a bind. He didn’t want Sen. Murkowski’s Resolution to pass, because it would upset the DNP’s environmentalist base. But he recognized the tough political position of his colleagues.

Sen. Reid’s solution was to promise to hold a vote on the Rockefeller bill, at some unspecified future date. This provided Democratic Senators political cover from having to make a tough decision on the Murkowski Resolution. They could voice their support for Rockefeller’s measure, and thereby prove to their constituents that they want to reign in the EPA, without having to take a controversial vote. As a result of Sen. Reid’s promise, Senator Murkowski’s Resolution failed in the Senate, by a 53-47 vote.

Naturally, the Senate Majority Leader proceeded to break his promise. The 111^th Congress ended without a vote on EPA reform. Reid had used Rockefeller’s legislation for political expediency, and then discarded it.

In the 112^th Congress, it’s déjà vu all over again. This time around, it’s Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) and Representative Fred Upton (R-MI) who are building bipartisan support to stop the EPA from regulating greenhouse gases. They co-wrote a bill, H.R. 910 (the Energy Tax Prevention Act of 2011), that would have the same effect as the Murkowski Resolution. Last week, they gained the support of two senior House Democrats (Rep. Colin Peterson (D-MN)and Rep. Nick Rahall (D-WV)), and this week, the legislation passed out of the Energy and Commerce Committee with strong bipartisan support.

On Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell unexpectedly introduced the Energy Tax Prevention Act of 2011 as an amendment to S. 493, legislation that provides federal funding for research and development programs for small businesses. As was the case in the last Congress, EPA reform has good political prospects in the upper chamber, due to the fact that 23 Senate Democrats are up for re-election in 2012, and also because the paramount concern of voters is the economy.

So Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was in a bind, again. And again, he turned to Rockefeller. Last night Rockefeller indicated he will offer his legislation to delay EPA climate regulations as an amendment to S. 493. According to an Energy and Environment News report this morning (subscription required), Senate leadership is thinking about offering the Rockefeller amendment “side by side” with the McConnell amendment. That way, some politically vulnerable Senate Democrats could vote for the Rockefeller effort, and some could vote for the McConnell amendment. Neither measure would pass, but all Senate Democrats get to vote for EPA reform, and thereby attain political coverage.

As of noon today, the vote on S. 493 had yet to take place. It is unclear from the latest news reports whether Senate leadership intends to hold a vote today or after next week’s recess. [Update: It is now being reported that the vote will be delayed until after next week's recess]

While I can’t fault Senate Majority Leader Reid for this cynical strategy (it’s his job), I don’t see how West Virginians aren’t appalled by their senior Senator’s actions. Thanks to the Obama administration’s war on coal, the entire West Virginia Congressional delegation supports H.R. 910/McConnell amendment…except for Senator Jay Rockefeller.

Worse still, it’s not as if Rockefeller is sitting out the debate; rather, he’s actively undermining EPA reform—for the second time! His constituents are getting hammered by this Administration’s EPA, more so than any other state in America. Yet he continues to spurn the interests of West Virginians in order to carry Harry Reid’s water.