[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 4791-4794]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            EPA REGULATIONS

  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, all of my colleagues, I think, know 
by now, after all of these months, almost years, how deeply I feel 
about the need to stop EPA regulation for a period of time so Congress 
can have the time we need to develop a smart energy policy, which we 
have not. It is enormously important to the people of West Virginia.
  Having said that--and I will say quite a lot more--I cannot tell you 
how strongly opposed I am to the McConnell-Inhofe amendment, not only 
because it goes too far, not only because it eviscerates EPA from some 
fundamental responsibilities it has--for example, CAFE standards--but 
it has absolutely no chance whatsoever of becoming law--none. Mine 
does. Theirs does not.
  Do we think we are going to pass, and the President is going to sign, 
something that eliminates EPA forever? Oh, they will say: Well, we can 
always change that in a couple years. No, it is not that. It is a 
theological decision to pick out a campaign issue for 2012, and that is 
fine because that is the way things go. But to destroy the EPA 
permanently is an act I have not seen since I came here. There will be 
people in many States, including my own, who think that is a wonderful 
idea, but I would ask them to think more deeply.
  The McConnell-Inhofe amendment makes a point, but it doesn't solve a 
problem. I am here to solve problems.

[[Page 4792]]

So is the Presiding Officer. The amendment would take away EPA's 
ability to address greenhouse gas emissions forever. It doesn't make 
any difference what happens 5 years, 10 years from now--all the nuances 
that have to be made in policy or in regulation; if the air starts 
cleaning up, maybe things can lighten up a little bit; if it doesn't 
clean up, maybe we have to do something. But they want to take away and 
put out of business forever the EPA, which looks out for the health and 
the safety of everyone who lives here, and it would be permanently 
banned from doing its job. Is this an adult amendment? It can't be.
  People must only be looking at the next election, or they must be 
afraid. To be afraid of voters is not a good thing. That is a quick way 
to lose. Telling the voters the truth--the Presiding Officer is pretty 
good at this--is what is more important in public policy. So they burn 
EPA forever. They can't do anything, no matter what we know or what we 
learn in the future about greenhouse emissions. They want the total 
elimination of EPA's role, with no other structure in place. Having 
nothing in place is irresponsible, unrealistic, and immature.
  What we need is a timeout to stop the imposition of EPA regulations--
regulations that don't allow for the development of clean technologies, 
and that would hurt the economy at a critical time in our recovery, but 
to do it in a way that keeps us all focused and working on a long-term 
energy policy which doesn't say close down. We should have a pause 
here, the pause that hopefully refreshes our ability to do clean energy 
policy. My bill would be effective from the date of its passage, were 
it to pass, so it would be 2 years. That is plenty of time to be able 
to come up with an energy policy. We have avoided doing that for so 
long now, and I think a lot of that is politics, and it is very sad.
  The Environmental Protection Agency, I have to say, including to my 
own constituents, is not a frivolous agency. It is the object of much 
scorn in my State and a lot of States that produce coal and probably in 
the minds of a lot of Senators. It was created to regulate pollution. 
We think back to wartime London where people couldn't see 5 feet in 
front of their faces. I think back to when I was a student in Japan for 
3 years at the end of the 1950s, and we couldn't see 3 feet in front of 
our faces. Now all of a sudden we can see for thousands of miles, so to 
speak, because the air is clean.
  Again, the Environmental Protection Agency is not a frivolous agency. 
It was created to regulate pollution. That is its job. Does that make 
it uncomfortable? Yes. Does that make me want to pass my amendment? 
Yes, to have a stop for a period of 2 years where they cannot go to 
stationary sources and others and say that you can't do anything. It is 
a pause, but at the end of the pause, it doesn't put EPA out of 
business--that would be crazy.
  It is Congress's job to legislate, and that includes energy policy--
granted, stipulated. I think the Presiding Officer would say that is 
lawyer's speak: It is stipulated. It makes it a fact. Congress passed 
the Clean Air Act in 1970 and has updated it in the decades that 
followed. Is the Clean Air Act perfect? Certainly not. Certainly not. 
Very few laws ever are, which is why we are always open to making them 
better. But eviscerating the EPA's ability to do its job forever is 
nonsense. It is childlike: I will take my football and I am going home. 
It feels good.
  Some folks will get up and cheer, standing up for coal. We know what 
this does. This is standing up for natural gas. We have a lot of 
natural gas in West Virginia. Natural gas has 50 percent of the carbon 
dioxide that coal does. So people think that by doing this, people are 
going to go ahead and burn coal in powerplants and other places. They 
are not. North Carolina already has 12 powerplants which are being 
switched from coal to natural gas--probably more by now. That was about 
a year ago. Ohio is doing some of the same. Other States are doing some 
of the same. Natural gas is abundantly plentiful. I like natural gas. 
It is a terrific thing. It is 50 percent as dirty as coal, but it is 
less dirty and it is cheaper. So powerplants are going to that.
  I am trying to figure out in my mind, How does that help West 
Virginians? How does that help West Virginia coal operators or, more 
importantly to me, coal miners? If people are suddenly making up their 
mind that they are going--and I have had the president of American 
Electric Power tell me this directly: Of course we will switch to 
natural gas. He put it more succinctly. He said: I would use banana 
peels if they could produce heat. They don't stay with coal out of 
loyalty. They have to deal with certainty. Here we create permanent 
punting about what the landscape is going to be for energy use and the 
making of electric power in our country.
  Again, may I please bring up once again that this bill has no chance 
of becoming law--the McConnell-Inhofe bill has no chance of becoming 
law. So why do they do it? They have to know that. I don't think it 
will pass here. It certainly isn't going to pass at the White House. In 
politics you can say, Oh, I wish there were a Republican President in 
the White House. There isn't. There is a Democratic one. He is not 
going to let this happen. He is not going to have an executive agency 
with an enormous amount to do with CAFE standards and all kinds of 
regulations obliterated, eviscerated, eliminated. He won't do that. He 
will veto it if it should ever get that far.
  So what is going on in their minds? What do they think they are 
doing? Are they trying to impress their constituents, holding high a 
banner saying, Look, I am courageous; I will get rid of this whole EPA 
thing and we can all celebrate together? Pretty shortsighted, I would 
say. Pretty shortsighted. Feel good? Yes. Do good? No.
  I think it is well known in West Virginia we have very serious 
disagreements with EPA. I say all kinds of things about the EPA 
constantly in all kinds of situations, but people do care about clean 
air. They do care about clean water also. It is not a sin. Sometimes in 
America you can get the best of both worlds. We want a strong future 
for clean coal and we want a national energy policy that protects and 
promotes clean coal.
  Let me make a point. When I say the words ``clean coal,'' the only 
hearing of that is ``coal.'' People don't hear the word ``clean.'' So I 
have to make a point here. Don't blame coal miners for this. Coal 
miners go into the mines every day in these unbelievably difficult 
situations and they mine the coal that is there. It has been there for 
a billion years that God put there. That is their job. Maybe it is high 
ash; maybe it is low ash. Maybe it is high sulfur; maybe it is low 
sulfur. They mine what is there, and then that gets shipped to a 
powerplant or to other countries for steel-making purposes.
  One of the ironies about all of this is some of the loudest anti my 
amendment--my little 2-year amendment that stops at the end of 2 
years--comes from coal operators who actually don't ship much coal to 
powerplants. They ship most of their coal, because it is low sulfur, 
overseas to the growing market in South Korea and China and a lot of 
other places, including Japan. So what difference does it make to them? 
None. But they want to be in the chorus so they join the chorus about 
let's get rid of EPA. They are not affected. They are mainlining it 
right overseas and making tons of money because it is very low sulfur 
coal and very good for making steel.
  We know if coal is frozen in time the way Senators McConnell and 
Inhofe are proposing, it will be rapidly eclipsed by other energy 
sources. Oh, yes, most especially natural gas. We have so much natural 
gas in West Virginia that you could swim in it if you could get about 
10, 15 feet underground. I like natural gas. It is a great asset to 
have it in Marcellus Shale. The problems of fracking can be solved, and 
will be through technology. But that is what is going to happen. Then 
our coal miners are going to look at some of their representatives on 
both sides of the aisle here and in the House and they are going to 
say, Now wait a second. I thought you were protecting me. How come I am 
not mining coal? How come some of these powerplants have

[[Page 4793]]

now switched to natural gas, in the majority, let's say, a few years 
from now?
  So McConnell-Inhofe as an amendment codifies the vicious uncertainty 
that is threatening coal today. Electric utilities are right now 
making, as I have indicated, investment decisions based upon that 
uncertainty. It is a bad place from which to make a decision. And with 
very few exceptions, logically--that means they are not building or 
rebuilding coal-fired plants--natural gas will overtake coal. West 
Virginia wins in either case because we have so much coal, we have so 
much natural gas. But in this particular amendment, I am trying to 
protect coal miners and their jobs by having carbon capture and 
sequestration, by having a policy, and there are others that are out 
there. We already have two in West Virginia which are taking more than 
90 percent of the carbon out of coal. They are at work. American 
Electric Power Company, Dow Chemical Company, they are both doing that, 
both making money out of it, and yes, the government helps. But they 
are taking more than 90 percent of the carbon out of coal. Doesn't that 
turn coal into clean coal? Isn't clean coal what we want? Isn't that 
what we have to have?
  This is all part of a drive for an energy future for West Virginia 
coal miners and others, other people around the country, for a clean 
energy future. In effect, my amendment is a timeout. It is the timeout 
we need. It is the only option on the table that can pass. It can pass. 
It is fine to bring an amendment here which makes us feel good--
muscular, antigovernment, let's make government smaller; let's get rid 
of government--and swell your chest and feel good and put out a great 
press release, but then it ends up not passing the Senate or it ends up 
getting vetoed. One of the two is going to happen. So it is a 
nonstarter.
  I think a lot of those on the other side of the aisle are going to 
throw the vote for political purposes, as I indicated. If we can 
remember back to the Omnibus Act in December of last year, the Chamber 
of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the coal 
association, all Republicans had agreed to vote for my 2-year 
amendment.
  It was a timeout amendment. All of them. The papers calculated who it 
was, how we would get the 60 votes, and we got there. And then what 
happened--and this is a little bit in the weeds, and I apologize for 
that--but all of a sudden, nine Republicans withdrew from that omnibus 
agreement, so there was no way for it to come up. Why? I don't know. 
Was that the beginning of a massive plan of thinking that we are going 
to make this an issue for the next 2 years so we can wipe out more 
Democratic seats? It certainly doesn't have anything to do with energy 
policy.
  As I say, my amendment said that for a period of 2 years, the EPA 
will not have the power to enforce greenhouse gas rules on stationary 
sources, including powerplants, manufacturers, and refineries. So they 
cannot do anything for a period of 2 years--regulatory--about 
powerplants, manufacturing companies, or refineries--for 2 years. The 
moratorium would last for 2 years, and then it would stop. Why? Because 
2 years is, in fact, enough time, if we can get ourselves together 
around here, for serious people to come up with a serious energy policy 
that includes clean coal and everything else on the face of the Earth 
that works to get our country off of foreign oil.
  Two years is enough time to develop a plan to build the carbon 
capture and sequestration technologies and get them accepted by Wall 
Street, which will fund them endlessly once they are convinced they are 
working on a sufficient scale. As I say, this is being demonstrated by 
the American Electric Power Company and the Dow Chemical Company in 
West Virginia right now. I will repeat that they are taking 90 percent 
of the carbon out of coal. It sounds like a good deal, to me. Natural 
gas has 50 percent carbon. Clean coal would have 10 percent carbon. 
Which is a better deal? I think the second one is. My amendment would 
lead to that.
  I would say 2 years is enough time to get past this pointless debate 
about whether climate science is real and find common ground and find 
solutions that create jobs, protect the air we breath, and make us 
energy independent.
  Two years is enough time to take the big decisions about greenhouse 
gases out of the hands of the regulators at EPA and put them back in 
the hands of Congress. Greenhouse gas emissions are an enormously 
important issue, but they are not the only problem we face, and they 
cannot be allowed to take precedence over every other matter that 
affects our people. We really can find ways to solve this problem, 
protect our core industries, and lessen the costs.
  The joint CAFE rule--it is a big deal--between the EPA and the 
Department of Transportation is a case in point and relevant to the 
debate today because it is also undermined by the McConnell-Inhofe 
amendment. The CAFE rule saves Americans billions of gallons of 
gasoline and reduces our dependence on foreign oil. It does it very 
explicitly. It keeps going up. The air gets cleaner. I think the figure 
is that transportation overall is something like 50, 60--maybe a little 
more--percent of our air pollution problems. CAFE standards become very 
important.
  Most of us believe strongly that we need to make our cars more 
efficient, not just for the environment but also because of the high 
cost of gasoline and its impact on every American family, not to 
mention our national security. But under the McConnell-Inhofe 
amendment, EPA could never again work on fuel-efficiency standards. The 
recent progress we have made, which is so widely supported by industry 
and the American people, could be undermined. This is not a solution; 
it is a permanent punt--or maybe a stunt. I will not support that.
  Last year, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle 
overwhelmingly declared their support for my amendment, as I said. The 
daily newspapers had come out on the Hill and calculated the 60 votes 
that I had to overcome a filibuster. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce was 
all for it.
  Suddenly, some seem to want to have a fight more than a policy, and 
they want to have a fight for the next election more than a policy, 
more than they want to work together to solve the problem. Suddenly, 
they say: Stopping the EPA for 2 years isn't good enough; we can stop 
them permanently. Folks back home would love that. They say they would 
rather stand by and do nothing if they can't stop the EPA forever. In 
effect, that is correct. They think the American people will not see 
through that.
  My amendment has been around for over a year now. People know what it 
does. So to call this a cover vote is disingenuous at best.
  EPA's regulations that came into effect this year say that if a 
company wants to retrofit an existing one or build a new powerplant or 
factory, they now have to find ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. 
Because of these new rules, companies won't build that new factory, 
that new powerplant, or employ some of the millions of Americans who 
are out of work. That is why I believe these regulations need to be 
suspended. That is in my amendment.
  Senator Inhofe has repeatedly argued that Congress needs to make 
these decisions. I agree with that. My bill would give Congress the 
time it needs to discuss the options, and my approach creates a 
reasonable timeout. Doing away with EPA authority doesn't give clarity; 
it indefinitely kicks the can down the road. My amendment, which 
unfortunately will come whenever it comes, no doubt won't do 
particularly well because all of the folks on the other side and some, 
unfortunately, on this side will vote for that because they think it 
sounds kind of neat. It probably won't do very well, but that doesn't 
mean it is not right.
  Let's have real solutions, such as clean coal that must play a role 
in meeting our energy needs, and let's be sensible and bipartisan about 
it. West Virginia is ready to provide that coal, and so are a lot of 
other States.

[[Page 4794]]

  I urge my colleagues to support my amendment and quickly turn to a 
discussion about our Nation's energy future.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. McCaskill). The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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