[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 143 (Friday, September 23, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1715]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  TRANSPARENCY IN REGULATORY ANALYSIS OF IMPACTS ON THE NATION ACT OF 
                                  2011

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                         HON. CHRIS VAN HOLLEN

                              of maryland

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, September 22, 2011

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the state of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 2401) to 
     require analyses of the cumulative and incremental impacts of 
     certain rules and actions of the Environmental Protection 
     Agency, and for other purposes:

  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chair, today's legislation continues the 
majority's relentless assault on the Clean Air Act and our nation's 
public health.
  Let's be clear: clean air is not--and has never been--the enemy of 
economic growth. If history has taught us anything, it is that a 
healthy environment and a healthy economy go hand in hand. Since 1970, 
the Clean Air Act has reduced air pollutants by 60 percent while the 
economy has grown by over 200 percent, with economic benefits expected 
to reach $2 trillion by 2010--exceeding costs by more than 30 to 1.
  Rather than building on this bipartisan record of cost-effective 
environmental achievement, today's legislation proposes to block two of 
the most important Clean Air Act rules in decades: the mercury and air 
toxics rule and the cross-state air pollution rule.
  The proposed mercury and air toxics standards would prevent more than 
90% of the mercury from coal-fired power plants to be emitted into the 
air by 2015--and it would reduce fine particle emissions by 29 percent. 
More than half of the nation's coal-fired power plants already deploy 
the technology necessary to meet these standards, whose adoption will 
prevent 17,000 premature deaths and 120,000 cases of asthma a year.
  The long overdue cross-state air pollution rule would require 27 
upwind states to reduce their sulfur dioxide emissions by 75 percent 
and their nitrogen oxide emissions by 54 percent. These reductions will 
prevent an additional 34,000 premature deaths and 400,000 cases of 
asthma each year and the ``good neighbor'' principle it represents is 
especially important to downwind states like my home state of Maryland, 
which currently must bear the brunt of air pollution that blows in from 
other states.
  The economic and public health benefits from both of these rules far 
outstrip the cost of the pollution control technology necessary to 
achieve them--a fact the one-sided ``study'' in this legislation is 
deliberately designed to obscure. And the pollution control technology 
itself will drive investment and job creation for professionals like 
engineers, electricians, pipefitters and boilermakers whose expertise 
and labor will be needed to install it. It's a clear win for our 
economy and a clear win for our public health.
  I urge a no vote.

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