[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 113 (Thursday, August 1, 2013)]
[House]
[Pages H5285-H5288]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
ENERGY CONSUMERS RELIEF ACT OF 2013
General Leave
Mr. CASSIDY. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks
on the bill, H.R. 1582.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Louisiana?
There was no objection.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 315 and rule
XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House
on the state of the Union for the further consideration of the bill,
H.R. 1582.
Will the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Yoder) kindly take the chair.
{time} 1353
In the Committee of the Whole
Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the
Whole House on the state of the Union for the further consideration of
the bill (H.R. 1582) to protect consumers by prohibiting the
Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency from promulgating
as final certain energy-related rules that are estimated to cost more
than $1 billion and will cause significant adverse effects to the
economy, with Mr. Yoder (Acting Chair) in the chair.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The Acting CHAIR. When the Committee of the Whole rose on Wednesday,
July 31, 2013, a request for a recorded vote on amendment No. 3 printed
in part B of House Report 113-174 offered by the gentleman from
Virginia (Mr. Connolly) had been postponed.
Amendment No. 4 Offered by Mr. Woodall
The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 4
printed in part B of House Report 113-174.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
Page 2, lines 11 through 17, amend subparagraph (D) to read
as follows:
(D)(i) an estimate of the total benefits of the rule and
when such benefits are expected to be realized;
(ii) a description of the modeling, the calculations, the
assumptions, and the limitations due to uncertainty,
speculation, or lack of information associated with the
estimates under this subparagraph; and
(iii) a certification that all data and documents relied
upon by the Agency in developing such estimates--
(I) have been preserved; and
(II) are available for review by the public on the Agency's
Web site, except to the extent to which publication of such
data and documents would constitute disclosure of
confidential information in violation of applicable Federal
law;
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 315, the gentleman
from Georgia (Mr. Woodall) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Georgia.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume
to talk about an amendment that recognizes that knowledge is power.
So often today, we've talked about what we can do to make the
government more accountable to the people. One of those things is
entailed in the underlying bill that says, for these big rules that
make a big difference, tell us what it is that you did. How did you
come to this decision that this is the rule that you want to implement?
My amendment goes one step further and asks for the underlying data on
which that decision was made. We want to know what those calculations
were.
It's going to be a good step forward if we can get agencies to share
with us their modeling, but one step further would be those
calculations that went into the modeling and came out of the modeling.
What about the underlying data, Mr. Chairman? How in the world can we
be in a conversation with the American people as the Congress with the
agencies if we don't have access to the underlying data?
This is not a trade secret. This is not private information. This is
the information that the agency uses to promulgate these rules that
will then govern the entire United States of America. We simply say, if
the disclosure of that data won't violate any laws, if it won't violate
any trade secrets, if it's not going to be in violation of any
applicable Federal laws, share that with America, post that on your Web
page so that anyone who is interested in understanding how it is that
these decisions that often go on behind closed doors, that often go on
without the oversight of the public, not just what did you decide, but
how did you decide it.
It's very difficult, whether you're a Republican or whether you're a
Democrat, to hold the considered experts at these agencies accountable
if you can't see the underlying data that went into their calculations.
It's a simple amendment that says please share that with us. We're not
questioning your expertise. We simply want to be a part of that
process.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from California is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, as I rise in opposition
to this amendment, the supporters would claim that it's about
transparency. What it's really about is not transparency. It's about a
way to block or delay critical EPA rules. That's what this whole bill
is all about. The amendment does the same thing. They use
[[Page H5286]]
rhetoric about transparency to cloud the amendment's true impact.
The amendment would prevent EPA from using the best science available
when implementing its public health laws. It accomplishes this by not
allowing EPA to rely on any scientific study unless the agency can
publish, on its Web site, all of the underlying data associated with
that study.
Today, EPA prides itself on using the best science available. The
Agency understands that ideology will not stand the test of time, but
science will; and their rules and regulations have to be based on the
science, so they gladly inform stakeholders and the public about the
studies upon which they rely.
The underlying data to peer-reviewed studies is often not published.
That's because the data sets underlying peer-reviewed scientific
studies are the property of the scientists that spend their careers
gathering that information. The EPA cannot require the scientists to
give up their private information. Oftentimes, those studies involve
going to a lot of people and trying to find out the impact of certain
exposure to pollutants. Those people agree to the study on the basis
that this information about them will not be made public. But this
amendment would say it would be impossible for EPA to use gold-standard
scientific studies available to them unless they post this other data
on their Web site.
Why do we want to prevent EPA from using high-quality scientific
studies to set new pollution standards?
{time} 1400
This is an issue that came up many years ago. In 1997, EPA used a
study conducted by researchers at Harvard to set a new air quality
standard for particulate matter. They did a rigorous peer-reviewed
study that was conducted over a period of 16 years. The Harvard people
showed conclusively that exposure to particulate matter in the air can
kill people, while polluters said: We don't want EPA to issue this
rule, it's going to cost us money.
So they said that EPA should publish all of the Harvard scientists'
data, claiming that the scientists were keeping a secret. Well, the
data is the work product and property of the Harvard scientists, not
EPA. The agency couldn't release that information. They're relying on
the Harvard scientists to give independent scientists access to the
data after the scientists signed a confidentiality agreement. So
independent scientists spent the next 3 years reanalyzing the data, and
came to exactly the same conclusion.
There should be no objection to EPA relying on studies like this one.
It's a long-term study with a huge sample. This is exactly the kind of
rigorous review we expect of EPA. I urge opposition to this amendment.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 15 seconds to say nothing
can be further from the truth. There is a specific provision in this
amendment that says you shall not disclose anything for which the
disclosure would violate your commitments under Federal law. All we're
asking is for whatever EPA saw, whatever the agency saw to make their
decision. If it was good enough for the agency, shouldn't it be good
enough for Congress as well?
With that, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr.
Cassidy).
Mr. CASSIDY. Mr. Chairman, I cannot understand why somebody would
object to this. The bill is about transparency, and this amplifies that
transparency. EPA can impose rules which cost tens or even hundreds of
billions of dollars on the U.S. economy. Those expenses translate into
jobs lost.
Having access to the underlying information, and the estimates of
cost and benefits, is critical to know why that is. And as my colleague
said, there is no reason to have to reveal information about
individuals. And let me just point to the medical literature. In the
medical literature, there is a push that when the Federal Government
funds research, that that underlying data is made subject, is made
available to the general public. When the FDA reviews drugs, FDA will
look at underlying data. So why would we require it for medications,
which obviously affect many people, but not for the EPA. Having
methodology which is transparent is absolutely essential in modern
scientific literature. I don't see why there is an objection to it
unless the hope is that EPA can satisfy an ideological bent without
having to justify it.
This amendment will provide more transparency for EPA's billion-
dollar rules. I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on the amendment and
``yes'' on the underlying bill. The American people cannot afford to
have jobs shipped overseas or have their economy otherwise wrecked.
More rationality, transparency, and accountability must be brought to
the EPA and its rulemaking process.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, the fact of the matter is that EPA does not
have this underlying data. It doesn't belong to EPA. It belongs to the
scientists who did the study.
Consider this issue in a different context. If a pharmaceutical
manufacturer wants to bring a new product to market, they would never
be required to post all of their underlying data on the public Web site
in order for FDA to rely on it. There's no other agency that would be
held to such an unreasonable requirement as this amendment would impose
on EPA. They review the data, but they don't put it on their Web site.
EPA does not have the underlying data, and they can't require that the
owners of the underlying data who did the study, often based on
confidential agreements for those who participate in the study, they
can't require that study be given to them. They are relying on the
scientific data and the study results.
I think all this would do is make it more difficult for EPA to
protect the public health.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, how much time remains?
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Georgia has 1\1/4\ minutes
remaining.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time to
say that I think I speak for most of America that says I understand the
government has to make decisions, but since the government is making
those decisions on my behalf, shouldn't the government share with me
the data that it uses to make those decisions?
The gentleman says this is going to hold EPA to a higher standard
than the other agencies. I would say to the gentleman, you can look
forward to me being back with this same amendment for absolutely every
agency.
All we're saying is if you've seen the data, if you've utilized the
data, if you believe this is sound enough science on which to base a
regulation that is going to cost not $1, not $100, not $1,000, not $1
million, but more than $1 billion, isn't it worth sharing with the
American people how you reached that conclusion?
Mr. Chairman, the work that we do here, we should be proud enough of
to share with absolutely anyone who asks. This is about transparency.
And even if you don't support the underlying bill--I'm a strong
supporter, but even if you don't--you should support in the context of
transparency providing the underlying materials to the American public
that went into this decisionmaking process.
Mr. Chairman, this is a great step forward as a transparency tool for
the American public to restore that faith in government that has been
lost.
I rise in strong support of the underlying bill and ask my colleagues
to support the amendment.
I yield back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR (Mr. Fortenberry). The question is on the amendment
offered by the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall).
The amendment was agreed to.
The Acting CHAIR. The Chair understands that amendment No. 5 will not
be offered.
Amendment No. 6 Offered by Mr. Murphy of Pennsylvania
The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 6
printed in part B of House Report 113-174.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the
desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the committee print, add the following
section:
SEC. 5. PROHIBITION ON USE OF SOCIAL COST OF CARBON IN
ANALYSIS.
(a) In General.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law
or any executive
[[Page H5287]]
order, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection
Agency may not use the social cost of carbon in order to
incorporate social benefits of reducing carbon dioxide
emissions, or for any other reason, in any cost-benefit
analysis relating to an energy-related rule that is estimated
to cost more than $1 billion unless and until a Federal law
is enacted authorizing such use.
(b) Definition.--In this section, the term ``social cost of
carbon'' means the social cost of carbon as described in the
technical support document entitled ``Technical Support
Document: Technical Update of the Social Cost of Carbon for
Regulatory Impact Analysis Under Executive Order 12866'',
published by the Interagency Working Group on Social Cost of
Carbon, United States Government, in May 2013, or any
successor or substantially related document, or any other
estimate of the monetized damages associated with an
incremental increase in carbon dioxide emissions in a given
year.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 315, the gentleman
from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murphy) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.
I have an amendment in order that would prohibit the EPA from using
``social cost of carbon'' estimates for any energy-related rule that
costs more than $1 billion unless and until a Federal law is enacted
authorizing such use.
The administration slipped into a rule about microwave ovens a new
prediction for the cost of carbon dioxide between now and the year
2300. Despite the profound implications to the economy and the families
who make a living from coal, there was no public debate, no stakeholder
comment, no vote in Congress on this new estimate.
In southwestern Pennsylvania, coal is our heritage. It fires the
steel mills that built the Empire State Building, the St. Louis Arch,
and the Golden Gate Bridge. But that heritage and prosperity is
threatened by this new regulation. We've already seen what the social
cost of the war on coal is today--the cost is jobs.
Three weeks ago, more than 380 workers at the Hatfield's Ferry and
Mitchell power plants in Pennsylvania were told they are losing their
jobs. The plants had to shut down under EPA regulations after they had
spent hundreds of millions of dollars in new environmental
modernizations.
More than 15 organizations representing workers and stakeholders
endorse my amendment because these groups share my concern that this
bypassed congressional oversight and will put hundreds of thousands of
miners, boilermakers, factory workers, laborers, railroaders,
electricians, operating engineers, steamfitters and machinists out of
work.
My amendment says Congress, not the EPA, decides regulations by
considering what this means to the families and workers. The EPA's
policies have real-world consequences. Annual coal production in
central Appalachia is dropping sharply--by more than half in just 5
years' time. There are towns where mines are shutting down, where a
staggering 41 percent of the residents fall below the poverty line.
The social cost of carbon and the wider war on coal is a war on the
American worker and their family.
Let me show you the real cost of the EPA's rules. Those who oppose
this amendment ignore the health effects on those living in poverty,
who are twice as likely to have a risk of depression, asthma, obesity,
diabetes, heart attacks, and other health effects. Poverty leads to
devastated communities, early death, and lost dreams of a generation of
Americans and their children.
Many of us can remember Bobby Kennedy's walk through those broken
Appalachian coal towns back in the 1960s to illustrate the abject
poverty where families and children were living. I worked and
volunteered in those towns, trying to help families hang on to some
sort of semblance of hope in a hard-scrabble life.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Too often their hope failed, and now history is about to repeat
itself. First, jobs are lost by the tens of thousands and, after that,
the hundreds of thousands. And when people lose their jobs, we give
them unemployment compensation. They go hungry; we give them food
stamps. They lose unemployment; we give them welfare. They lose their
homes; we give them public housing. They lose their dignity and pride,
and the government has nothing left to give--nothing--when all these
folks ever really wanted was a job--a job and a chance for the American
dream not shattered by the EPA.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from California is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. WAXMAN. The Murphy amendment denies that carbon pollution is
harmful. It prohibits the Environmental Protection Agency from
considering the costs of climate change when analyzing the impacts of
its rules. According to this amendment, the cost of carbon pollution is
zero. Well, that's science denial at its worst. We are telling EPA the
cost of carbon pollution is zero. It's like waving a magic wand. We are
going to decree that climate change imposes no costs at all.
The House Republicans can vote for this amendment. They can try to
block EPA from recognizing the damage caused by climate change, but
they cannot overturn the laws of nature. We should be heeding the
warnings of the world's leading climate scientists, not denying
reality.
In the real world, scientific instruments accurately measure the
levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the levels trapped in
ancient ice. Those measurements tell us that carbon dioxide levels just
hit 400 parts per million this spring, and that's the highest levels in
the last 3 million years. In the real world, higher levels of heat-
trapping carbon pollution are warming the planet and changing the
climate. We are experiencing more record-breaking temperatures, worse
droughts, longer wildfire seasons with more intense wildfires, and an
increased number of intense storms, more flooding, and rapidly rising
sea levels. Pretend it doesn't happen. Pretend that's not the reality.
On the other hand, as the proponent of this amendment suggested,
let's look at the impact on the family that may lose its job. Well, I
think that ought to be under consideration, but let's not have an
amendment that would ignore the cost of carbon pollution.
We are seeing the effect of climate change not some time in the
future but right now. And we're being told it's not going to get better
by itself; it's going to get worse. Scientists have been telling us for
years. EPA and other Federal agencies have a responsibility to
calculate the cost of climate change and take them into account when
they issue new standards. That's common sense, and that was the clear
message from the Government Accountability Office when it added climate
change to its high-risk list earlier this year, and that's exactly what
the Obama administration is doing.
{time} 1415
They have an interagency task force that worked, over the course of
several years, to estimate the cost of the harm from carbon pollution.
It incorporated the latest scientific and technical information.
I'm sorry people lose their jobs, but they don't have to lose their
jobs. If an industry is told to reduce carbon emissions, they don't
have to fire people. They can develop and buy the technology that would
reduce that pollution.
So to help those polluters not have to do that, we're going to
pretend there's no cost. Mr. Murphy's amendment would require the
government to assume zero harm, zero cost from carbon pollution and
climate change.
I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment. It's based on magical
thinking. Don't be a science-denier. Vote against the amendment.
Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, how much time do we have
left on our side?
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Pennsylvania has 2\1/2\ minutes
remaining. The gentleman from California has 1 minute remaining.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I now yield 1 minute to the
gentlewoman from West Virginia (Mrs.
[[Page H5288]]
Capito), the number two coal-producing State in America.
Mrs. CAPITO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of my colleague
Mr. Murphy's amendment and in opposition to the EPA's arbitrary,
backdoor approach to regulating carbon dioxide emissions. These
regulations would and are having a catastrophic effect on jobs and
economic activity across the country, especially in our coal-producing
States such as West Virginia and Pennsylvania.
The administration's new Social Cost of Carbon calculation is nothing
more than a gimmick used to circumvent Congress so that job-killing
regulations and an anti-domestic energy agenda can move forward.
Perhaps to no one's surprise, just as the administration is stepping
up its efforts to issue regulations aimed at closing existing plants
and stopping new ones, it decided, without public comment or
transparency, to increase the cost of carbon by 44 percent. The fact
is, U.S. carbon emissions from the energy sector have fallen in the
last 4 of 5 years.
I am not willing to sacrifice West Virginia jobs to the
administration's ideological efforts. I ask my colleagues to put jobs
ahead of politics and pass the Murphy amendment.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton).
(Mr. Barton asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. BARTON. I want to thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania.
Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Murphy amendment, and I
also want to say we should vote for that in conjunction with the
gentleman from Georgia's amendment that was just heard previously.
If you walk into a greenhouse anywhere in America, do you know what
the average carbon concentration will be? It won't be 350 parts per
million. It won't be 400 parts per million. It will be over 1,000 parts
per million. We have records that indicate the CO2
concentration in the upper atmosphere has been as high as 5,000 to
6,000 parts per million in the past.
The gentleman from California and those adherents of his philosophy
would have you believe that having a carbon concentration between 350
and 400 parts per million is somehow cataclysmic. Nothing could be
further from the truth.
And this new cost of carbon calculation that the EPA and the DOE have
begun to include needs to be, at a minimum, made transparent. I think
it's fine until we have the facts that it shouldn't be allowed at all.
So vote for the Murphy amendment.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, this is not my philosophy
that would lead me to urge that we reduce carbon emissions. It's based
on the science. Thousands of peer-reviewed scientific studies have
indicated that carbon causes problems. It causes health effects, and it
threatens the climate.
The homeowners in Arizona, Texas, Colorado, and California who have
seen their homes ravaged by drought-stoked wildfires know the cost of
carbon pollution. The families of brave firefighters know the cost of
carbon pollution.
The farmers and ranchers suffering the effects of prolonged drought,
many of whom have lost entire crops or been forced to sell their
livestock, know the cost of carbon pollution. And the thousands who
lost businesses and homes after Hurricane Sandy slammed into the east
coast know the cost of carbon pollution.
That cost is not based on a philosophy. It's based on the science and
the reality.
Reject this magical-thinking amendment. Don't be a science-denier.
Vote against the amendment and the underlying bill.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, this isn't about denying
science; this is about denying jobs and denying opportunity.
The underlying amendment here is supported by the boilermakers, the
electrical workers, the operating engineers, the carpenters, and United
Mine Workers, the American Energy Alliance, National Mining
Association, National Taxpayers Union, and Chamber of Commerce because
they want jobs and they don't want poverty.
And poverty, Mr. Chairman, is the number one threat to the
environment. Poverty is the number one threat to public health. It's
time Congress took charge of regulations and not unregulated divisions
of the government.
Mr. Chairman, I ask Members to support this amendment.
I yield back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murphy).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the ayes
appeared to have it.
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Pennsylvania
will be postponed.
Mr. CASSIDY. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.
The motion was agreed to.
Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr.
Woodall) having assumed the chair, Mr. Fortenberry, Acting Chair of the
Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, reported that
that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 1582) to
protect consumers by prohibiting the Administrator of the Environmental
Protection Agency from promulgating as final certain energy-related
rules that are estimated to cost more than $1 billion and will cause
significant adverse effects to the economy, had come to no resolution
thereon.
____________________