[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 116 (Wednesday, August 1, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H5608-H5609]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1940
          FARMERS UNDERTAKE ENVIRONMENTAL LAND STEWARDSHIP ACT

  Mr. CRAWFORD. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 3158) to direct the Administrator of the Environmental 
Protection Agency to change the Spill Prevention, Control, and 
Countermeasure rule with respect to certain farms, as amended.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                               H.R. 3158

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Farmers Undertake 
     Environmental Land Stewardship Act'' or the ``FUELS Act''.

     SEC. 2. APPLICABILITY OF SPILL PREVENTION, CONTROL, AND 
                   COUNTERMEASURE RULE.

       (a) In General.--The Administrator, in implementing the 
     Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure rule with 
     respect to any farm, shall--
       (1) require certification of compliance with such rule by--
       (A) a professional engineer for a farm with--
       (i) an individual tank with an aboveground storage capacity 
     greater than 10,000 gallons;
       (ii) an aggregate aboveground storage capacity greater than 
     or equal to 42,000 gallons; or
       (iii) a history that includes a spill, as determined by the 
     Administrator; or
       (B) the owner or operator of the farm (via self-
     certification) for a farm with--
       (i) an aggregate aboveground storage capacity greater than 
     10,000 gallons but less than 42,000 gallons; and
       (ii) no history of spills, as determined by the 
     Administrator; and
       (2) exempt from all requirements of such rule any farm--
       (A) with an aggregate aboveground storage capacity of less 
     than or equal to 10,000 gallons; and
       (B) no history of spills, as determined by the 
     Administrator.
       (b) Calculation of Aggregate Aboveground Storage 
     Capacity.--For the purposes of subsection (a), the aggregate 
     aboveground storage capacity of a farm excludes all 
     containers on separate parcels that have a capacity that is 
     less than 1,320 gallons.

     SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.

       In this Act, the following terms apply:
       (1) Administrator.--The term ``Administrator'' means the 
     Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.
       (2) Farm.--The term ``farm'' has the meaning given such 
     term in section 112.2 of title 40, Code of Federal 
     Regulations.
       (3) Gallon.--The term ``gallon'' refers to a United States 
     liquid gallon.
       (4) Spill prevention, control, and countermeasure rule.--
     The term ``Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure 
     rule'' means the regulation promulgated by the Environmental 
     Protection Agency under part 112 of title 40, Code of Federal 
     Regulations.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Arkansas (Mr. Crawford) and the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Boswell) each 
will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Arkansas.


                             General Leave

  Mr. CRAWFORD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous materials on H.R. 3158.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Arkansas?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. CRAWFORD. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I'd like to thank Members from both parties who joined 
in cosponsoring this bipartisan bill that will provide regulatory 
relief to our family farmers, in particular, my colleague, Mr. Boswell. 
Thank you very much.
  The EPA-mandated Oil Spill Prevention, Control and Countermeasure 
program, or SPCC, requires that oil storage facilities with a capacity 
of over 1,320 gallons make costly infrastructure modifications to 
reduce the possibility of oil spills.
  The regulations require farmers to construct a containment facility, 
like a dike or a basin, which must retain 110 percent of the fuel in 
the container. These mandated infrastructure improvements--along with 
the necessary inspection and certification by a specially licensed 
professional engineer--will cost many farmers tens of thousands of 
dollars. In some cases, compliance costs could reach higher than 
$60,000 for a single farmer in my district.
  The SPCC program dates back to 1973, shortly after the Clean Water 
Act was signed into law. In the last decade, it has strictly come down 
on agriculture, and the rules have been amended, delayed, and extended 
dozens of times, creating enormous confusion in the farming community. 
On top of that, the EPA has failed to engage in effective outreach to 
producers and cooperatives on SPCC application.
  In 2009, the EPA lifted a 2006 rule that suspended compliance 
requirements for small farms with oil storage of 10,000 gallons or 
less. The rule applies to more than just fuel. In fact, it applies to 
hydraulic oil, adjuvant oil, crop oil, vegetable oil, and even animal 
fat. It was scheduled to go into effect this past November.
  Last summer, I headed up an effort to send a bipartisan letter with 
over 100 cosigners to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson highlighting 
problems with the program and requesting a permanent fix. At the very 
least, I requested a delay so farmers impacted by last year's natural 
disasters would have more time to comply. The EPA responded only a few 
weeks before the November deadline and issued a statement saying they 
would not begin enforcement until May of 2013. While we were thankful 
for the delay, this action still didn't do anything to fix the burden 
on small farms. It just kicked the can down the road.
  The FUELS Act is simple. It revises the SPCC regulations to be 
reflective of a producer's spill risk and financial resources. The 
exemption level would be adjusted upward from an unworkable 1,320 
gallons of oil storage to an amount that would protect small farms--
10,000 gallons. The proposal would also place a greater degree of 
responsibility on farmers and ranchers to self-certify compliance if 
their storage facilities exceed the exemption level. To add another 
layer of environmental protection, the producer must be able to 
demonstrate that he or she has no history of oil spills.
  Mr. Speaker, this legislation is necessary because the existing 
regulations are not only burdensome to small farmers; they're 
unenforceable. According to USDA, the current regulations would bring 
more than 70 percent of farms into the SPCC regulatory net.

[[Page H5609]]

This is more than 1.5 million farms in the SPCC regulatory net next 
year alone.
  The University of Arkansas, Division of Agriculture did a study 
recently concluding that the FUELS Act would exempt over 80 percent of 
producers from SPCC compliance. It could save, in my home State, up to 
$240 million in costs. Over the entire country, it could save small 
farmers up to $3.36 billion.
  This year, the ag sector of the economy is facing a crisis. Over two-
thirds of the Nation is being impacted by drought, and farm revenue has 
dropped substantially. Food costs are projected to skyrocket for 
consumers. On top of that, the fate of a multiyear farm bill is still 
unknown, creating long-term uncertainty for the agriculture community. 
The last thing the government should be doing right now is imposing a 
regulation on producers that could cost our Nation's family farmers up 
to $3.36 billion during next year's planting season. There is 
absolutely no justification for such an expensive regulation, 
especially when the EPA cannot provide data or even anecdotal evidence 
of agriculture spills.
  By nature of occupation, family farmers are already careful stewards 
of the land and water. No one has more at stake than those who work on 
the ground from which they derive their livelihood.
  I urge adoption of H.R. 3158 and reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BOSWELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Crawford, I believe that you pretty much covered the details of 
this. And I see the gentleman sitting beside you there and I'm sure 
he's going to add to it, so I don't think I'll spend a lot of time 
repeating what you said. But I want you to know that as a hands-on 
farmer producer, I appreciate the efforts you put into this to bring 
this forward because there are just too many times we see where the 
farmers in your State, my State, and across the country are burdened 
with these extra expenses and criteria that they don't really need. 
Because you know, I know, and I think those of us that are familiar 
with the farming industry, we are stewards of the land. We don't want 
to ruin the land; we certainly don't want to ruin the water.
  So this is a good thing to come forth with this piece of legislation, 
to put a practical sense, practical application to the situation. It's 
been delayed and delayed and delayed.
  It refers to American farmers. American farmers are very much 
dedicated to what they represent. And again, those that, as I do and as 
I'm sure you do and others, when we have fuel on the farm for whatever 
reason--to run the tractors, the combines, the irrigation pumps, or 
whatever--we're very careful. The cost of the fuel and the exposure of 
it being stolen or something is something we don't have a lot of excess 
sitting around these days anyway. Those that are large operators, seems 
to me like quite a few of them have got a tank wagon.
  So I appreciate what you've offered up here, and I'm very supportive 
of it.
  With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CRAWFORD. Again, thank you, Mr. Boswell, not only for your 
support, but your real-world common sense as an ag producer. I 
appreciate it.
  I'd just like to yield 2 minutes to my esteemed colleague from 
Oklahoma (Mr. Lankford) and thank him for his patience.
  Mr. LANKFORD. I may not even use all 2 minutes of that, but I do want 
to be able to just tell the story a little bit of an Oklahoma farm.
  The things that they're up against right now are common to farms all 
across the Midwest. They're dealing with drought right now. They're 
dealing with the threat of new dust particulate rules coming down from 
the EPA. They just fought through a battle to try to be able to have 
family farms be able to function with their own kids working on their 
family farms or their grandparents' farms, or their cousin's farm down 
the road--is that permissible or not--point source pollution rules that 
are coming down on them. Farm truck distance rules, if they want to 
drive 151 miles in their farm truck and the new regulations they deal 
with on it. All these different regulations.
  And then imagine the Federal Government contacting them and saying, 
on top of all those rules and all those threatened rules, now you need 
to go find a professional engineer to check out your fuel tank, and we 
want to send a regulator to be able to evaluate it. And we want you to 
have a whole new set of rules around your tank as well. It assumes 
family farms and farmers don't take care of their land. Nothing could 
be further from the truth.
  A family farm, and farms all around the country, these are 
individuals that they farm that land, they take care of that land, that 
water is very important to them. Many of them live on well water 
itself, and so a spill into their groundwater is incredibly important 
to them for their own personal family as well. They're great stewards 
of the land; that's how they make their living.
  In addition to that, they're careful guardians of their storage tank 
because that tank itself, if it spills, they lose a tremendous amount 
of money; and the margins on a farm are not very high.
  I'd like to stand with my colleagues, as well, to say let's respect 
the farmer for what they're doing already on their land and not send 
someone from Washington to come check out their farm and check out 
their tank and be able to evaluate all those things. Let's allow some 
trust to the commonsense folks in the country that take care of our 
food and take care of the land and water every single day.
  With that, I'd urge my colleagues to support this.

                              {time}  1950

  Mr. BOSWELL. Mr. Speaker, we have no other speakers.
  In closing, I feel like we've defined what the need is. This will be 
very helpful to the Nation's producers, and it's a step in the right 
direction. So I will urge agreement and support of H.R. 3158. And thank 
you again for bringing this forth.
  I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. CRAWFORD. Mr. Speaker, again my thanks to the gentleman from Iowa 
and to those who spoke tonight. I just urge my colleagues to join me in 
supporting this important legislation.
  I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Crawford) that the House suspend the rules 
and pass the bill, H.R. 3158, as amended.
  The question was taken; and (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the 
rules were suspended and the bill, as amended, was passed.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

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