[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 4886-4891]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




          CONGRESSIONAL PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS DISCUSSES FRACKING

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Pocan) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the Congressional 
Progressive Caucus, and we are here today to talk about the issue of 
fracturing, also known as fracking, and the need to have more 
regulation on fracking to protect our environment, our groundwater, our 
air, and the families who live around the over half-million wells that 
are across the country, and also talk a little bit about global 
warming.
  The Progressive Caucus has been at the forefront of talking about 
issues that are important to our environment. We have so much to do to 
stop the effects of global warming that are

[[Page 4887]]

happening. Climate change is real. It is one of the greatest threats 
that we have to our country and to our planet. There are increasing 
CO2 levels in our atmosphere, and if we continue to leave 
that unchecked, they carry very dire consequences for the future of the 
planet.
  Rising sea levels, unpredictable and dangerous weather patterns, and 
drought are all examples of the consequences of failing to take action 
to address this threat. For generations, those who have come before us 
have held the ideal that they should leave their descendants with a 
better life. This is an integral part of our American story.
  I joined the Safe Climate Caucus because I believe in leaving a safer 
environment for future generations of Americans. Stewardship of our 
environment, of the air we breathe and the water we drink, is essential 
to this commitment.
  That is why I am here today to voice my support for commonsense 
legislation that will end unnecessary exemptions that protect the oil 
and gas industry from basic regulations and instead extend protections 
for our families and communities in all areas that effect global 
warming. But specifically tonight, we want to talk a little bit about 
fracturing.
  I would like to first yield to a colleague, the gentlewoman from 
Wisconsin (Ms. Moore), a great poet. I think we are going to be 
entertained and informed through that entertainment.
  Ms. MOORE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the 
time. This is just a little short ditty because I am very concerned as 
a person who lives in an inner city environment, I have become 
intensely aware of how environmental injustice affects the health and 
safety of our communities.
  So I just wanted to talk a little bit about fracking this evening.

       As we frack, under intense pressure, we force a fissure 
     through the delicate veins of our unbound Earth and a black 
     hole forms, poisoning the valley and streams of our spirit.
       Man, don't you fear it? Wrecking the ecosystem and trekking 
     recklessly over pristine black loam.
       Man, don't you hear it? The harsh acid rain as it drains 
     into the vital marsh of our existence.
       Oh, but, of course, the coarse priority of wealth strips 
     our Earth's fertility and reservoir of life. Fracked and 
     cracked, lost, perhaps for all eternity.
       Alas, it is true, there is none so blind as he who will not 
     see.

  Mr. POCAN. I thank Representative Moore for that. Your poetry is 
always much appreciated not only on this floor, but also in our State 
of Wisconsin. Thank you for sharing today.
  Before I get to fracking, I want to talk about one part of global 
warming that recently got a little attention back home but serves as a 
debate when we talk on the floor of Congress. When I spoke before on 
the floor of Congress about the need to address global warming, one of 
the things I said, and this is about 6 weeks ago, was that in 
Wisconsin, ice fishermen are already noticing fewer days they can be 
out on our ice-covered lakes.
  Now, the conservative right in Wisconsin, they decided to have a 
field day. There was a shock jock in Milwaukee who decided to play up 
on this. He said, can you imagine in Wisconsin, where this winter we 
had days that were minus 22 degrees, real temperature, minus 40 and 50 
degrees with wind chill, how can we possibly be talking about fewer 
days of ice coverage. Based on that cold experience, clearly there is 
no global warming. Now I know that is not a scientist's statement, that 
is a shock jock, but they went with it and let it roll.
  Here is the reality. We are a planet that is warming. And that 
statement, despite the polar vortex that we experienced in Wisconsin 
and other parts of the country that gave us some really cold weather, 
that is exactly what we are talking about, these intense swings in the 
weather that can produce that.
  What was so interesting was when the conservative movement went so 
hard to say clearly there is no global warming--they are all climate 
change deniers that were out doing this attack--they decided to 
approach a group called PolitiFact. Now PolitiFact often takes things 
that politicians say and decides where the truth is. Sometimes it is in 
a TV commercial, sometimes it is in a speech. Specifically, they were 
asked to address that statement that I made, which was, ice fishermen 
are already noticing fewer days they can be out on our ice-covered 
lakes.
  Here is what they said. First of all, they rated that statement as 
true, and here is why. They said it is not just about this winter; it 
is about what has happened over all in winters in Wisconsin. There is a 
site called climatewisconsin.org that is done by a number of professors 
and other professionals in the field in Wisconsin. They have been 
tracking ice coverage on the lakes in Madison, Lake Mendota, and Lake 
Monona, going back 150 years. And you know what they found?

       Overall, the average number of days of ice cover on the 
     Madison lakes has decreased by around 29 to 35 days over the 
     past 150 years.

  Not my words; these are scientists with knowledge, people who work 
specifically in the field who are measuring our lakes. So when people 
talk about climate change and they want to deny the facts, the science, 
that over 95 percent of scientists who work in this field clearly have 
said we have a climate that is changing because we have global warming 
because of human activity, well, this is just one example where a 
simple 1-minute speech on the floor talking about climate change became 
a shock jock's material for weeks to talk about why doesn't Congressman 
Pocan come home and see the weather.
  Well, I get home every chance I can. Every single weekend, I am home 
in Wisconsin. When we are not here, I am in Wisconsin. Trust me, I 
would prefer to spend my time in the district talking to the people of 
the district that I represent. I get back there.
  Yes, we had cold days. But to determine everything based on a few 
cold days, that is not science, that is just rhetoric. And that is 
exactly what PolitiFact found. That their charges were rhetoric, and we 
are seeing a serious climate change. And when you actually test 150 
years of ice coverage in the State of Wisconsin, we now have 29 to 35 
fewer days because of global warming.
  So before we start talking about fracturing, I wanted to put that out 
there because it is all a part of why we are talking about this subject 
today.
  At this point, I would yield to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. 
Ellison), the cochair of the Progressive Caucus.
  Mr. ELLISON. I appreciate the gentleman for yielding. Congressman 
Pocan has been just a beacon, a voice for working Americans all over 
the country. Our States are next to each other, and we share a lot. I 
am honored to be here with you today.
  We are going to talk about fracking, but I just want to set the stage 
for the conversation. You know, we are in the United States House of 
Representatives and we have had stagnant wages for 40 years, yet we 
can't see a way, a bill to raise the minimum wage on the House floor.
  We see that unemployment insurance has been stalled since December 
28, 2013. Mr. Pocan has made this point abundantly clear, and over 2 
million people are now without that unemployment insurance support, and 
yet we still see no action on the House floor here.
  We see our infrastructure crumbling across the United States. In 
Minnesota, we saw our I-35 bridge fall into the Mississippi River. We 
have seen water mains break and problems with grids, and yet we see no 
action here on the House floor.
  We all thought we were going to get some action on immigration 
reform. In fact, even the Speaker, to his credit, said I have some 
principles out there, let's talk about how we move forward. The Senate 
already has moved forward. Yet no sooner than the Speaker said he had 
some principles he wanted to start working on did he come back and say 
he can't trust Obama so we can't have an immigration bill.
  It is outrageous how little substantive work we have done on this 
floor of the House of Representatives: no to immigration reform; no to 
unemployment insurance; no to raising the

[[Page 4888]]

minimum wage; and no to all these key things that Americans really, 
really need. What is the idea here? What is the idea when we won't do 
anything other than politically charged bills to sort of make a point? 
I mean, what is that all about?
  Well, today we are going to talk a little bit about fracking, but I 
ask the question, Mr. Speaker: When are we going to get to some real 
work around here? We cannot be in this House of Representatives with a 
responsibility to discharge the duties of the American people, and we 
are completely unresponsive under this Republican leadership to what 
the American people want. People are unemployed. People need a raise. 
People need a better life, and we are not doing anything to help.
  In fact, the only time we ever care about NEPA, which is 
environmental review, is if it is going to block monuments that the 
President may want to decide to establish. Every other time, it is a 
``job-killing regulation.'' It is total lingo, total rhetoric, and it 
is just really a shame. I am getting to the point, Mr. Speaker, and I 
want to yield back to the gentleman so we can begin talking about 
fracking, but it is really getting frustrating.
  We know we are here with different political points of view. I am a 
proud, progressive liberal, absolutely. Just like Hubert H. Humphrey, 
LBJ, Martin Luther King, I admired them all, and I am not apologizing 
to anybody for being as progressive liberal as I am. But that doesn't 
stop me from talking to a conservative Republican as long as we are 
both trying to solve the problem. But they are not trying to solve 
anything.
  I am happy to talk to Republicans with their conservative views. We 
will haggle it out, and we will meet somewhere in the middle. It will 
not be everything I want, and it will not do everything they want, but 
we will do something.
  Where are we at? No immigration, nothing. Where are we at with UI, 
people are suffering, 2 million strong? Nowhere. Where are we at on 
raising the minimum wage, which has been sliding as inflation goes up, 
and we have lower minimum wage than we did since the 1950s when you 
adjust it for inflation? Nothing. We are just not meeting the needs of 
the American people.
  We have tried to repeal ObamaCare--I even hate that phrasing--the 
Affordable Care Act, 53 times. This is an outrage.
  We shut down the government for 16 days for the one purpose of 
stopping people getting access to health care, and yet it feels like we 
are in ``Star Wars,'' Mr. Speaker.
  I just had to share those views and just share my thoughts that it is 
time, high time, for us to get to work, to stop this party of no 
business, to stop this obstructionism and bring our values, different 
though they are, to this debate and come up with something to meet the 
needs of the American people.
  I thank the gentleman for letting me share my views on those matters.

                              {time}  1730

  Mr. POCAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Ellison. I share your concern. I 
came to Congress as a new Member, thinking that we are going to get 
some important work done for the country.
  I remember, in history class, I believe it was the Congress of 1948 
that got so little done that they were dubbed the do-nothing Congress--
well, because they did nothing, right? So they get the label. That do-
nothing Congress passed 350 bills. That is it.
  Our Congress last year passed 62 bills.
  Mr. ELLISON. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. POCAN. Absolutely.
  Mr. ELLISON. If we were the do-nothing Congress of the 1940s, that 
would be more activity than we have right now. We are the do-nothing 
Congress. We are the do-nothing Congress. Our goal is to improve the 
lives of Americans. I would be surprised if it was even half of the 60 
that we actually did pass.
  It is hard to get a label, gentlemen, to what you would call worse 
than the do-nothing Congress. I don't know what the label would be to 
establish to us. It has been a highly unproductive Congress.
  What was interesting, at the end of January, I got on the elevator 
with a Republican who I won't name, and I said: We have been here for 
two weeks again, and we haven't done anything.
  The response I got is: Don't worry. It will get better in 3 or 4 
years.
  I don't know about you, gentleman, but I didn't come to Congress to 
wait 3 or 4 years. We have real work to do.
  Mr. ELLISON. That's right.
  Mr. POCAN. Whether it be the fact that we have discharge petitions 
now on raising the minimum wage, so that people can be lifted out of 
poverty who are working hard every single day, playing by the rules, 
and just trying to get by; by extending unemployment benefits to the 
millions of people in the country who have lost those extended 
benefits--including a gentleman from Mount Horeb, Wisconsin, who was my 
guest right here in this Chamber for the State of the Union.
  He was my guest. He had lost his benefits at the end of December. He 
was a steamfitter, worked hard all of his life, played by the rules, 
and because of not extending the emergency benefits, they are in dire 
financial straits.
  His wife wrote me an email. This is how we found out about them. 
Their daughter wanted to bring a friend over for dinner, and they said: 
I don't know if we can afford another plate at the table.
  They have their home up for sale because they don't want to be 
foreclosed on. This is the reality of Congress not acting.
  Today, we now have a discharge petition on immigration reform, 
something that will effect millions and millions of people across this 
country. This Congress is not acting.
  What we are going to talk about in just a little bit are 5 bills that 
effect fracking--fracturing--to make sure that everyone can have 
cleaner air, cleaner water and that people can actually know what 
toxins are going in the ground when so many people live so close to 
these wells across the country.
  There is more of an agenda that the Progressive Caucus is working on 
and that we are trying to put out there. Again, I think, gentlemen, we 
would be remiss if we didn't talk about, just very briefly, the 
Progressive Caucus' budget, the better-off budget, to make sure people 
are better actually investing in infrastructure, to actually invest in 
research and development, to actually invest in education, and to get 
people back to work now.
  Mr. ELLISON. If the gentleman would yield about the better-off 
budget?
  All I want to say about the better-off budget is that it is going 
make Americans better off. That is what the better-off budget does.
  The better-off budget toplines 8.8 million jobs--8.8 million jobs--in 
3 years. That is what we do by making infrastructures in education and 
infrastructure, putting people back to work, making sure that public 
employees, teachers, police officers, people like that, stay on the 
job. This is what the better-off budget does.
  Now, the Republicans are going to come in here with a budget, and 
they are going to brag about how much deficit reduction it does. We 
have already been reducing the deficit significantly, by the way; but 
they are going to talk about what they have cut.
  They are going say: oh, we cut food stamps, we cut Head Start, we cut 
medical research, we cut research on Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, and 
things like that. They are going to brag about how many people they 
have left behind.
  I think that the real thing is that, as we invested 8.8 million jobs, 
our better-off budget actually has deficit reductions to a tune of 
about $4 trillion in 10 years because, as people are working, they are 
paying taxes, and we are growing ourselves out of the debt and deficit 
picture.
  That is why even some conservative groups have said that this is a 
good budget because we are being responsible about the debt, not 
because we are pointing straight at it, but because we are pointing 
straight at putting people back to work, people are working, people are 
paying taxes, and we

[[Page 4889]]

are dealing with our fiscal picture. So the better-off budget is 
definitely worth people reading about. It is an awesome budget.
  A few things I just want to mention about the better-off budget, and 
then we can talk about it another time. We also require in our budget 
that the amount of money going to our spy agencies, our intelligence 
agencies, the topline be revealed, not the nuts and bolts and the guts 
of it, but just in these days of NSA spying and things like that, I 
think it is important to have budget accountability, so that people 
really know.
  This is something that we hope people will really look at and feel 
that Congress is actually exercising its proper role in doing oversight 
with this.
  The other thing is there was a huge fight over chained CPI. This is 
that form of CPI, this measure of inflation, which literally cut 
benefits for people who are older Americans, people who are on 
disability benefits, and people who are on survivor benefits. It cuts 
their benefit over time.
  CPI-E, another measure of inflation that actually enhances retirement 
benefit because it really reflects the real cost associated with making 
a living in the United States, so we put CPI-E in our budget, which we 
believe is a far better measure of what is really going on in days of 
retirement insecurity brought about because of decisions of the 
Republican Caucus.
  It is important that we really invest in making sure that we have 
some retirement security.
  So those are just a few lines on the better-off budget, but I do want 
to thank you for raising it.
  Mr. POCAN. Thank you, Mr. Ellison, for all your leadership and your 
cochairing the Progressive Caucus.
  One other thing that is in that budget, in addition to growing us out 
of the economic problems we have had in this country that we have 
slowly been rebounding out of, we also take away the subsidies to oil 
and gas companies, which save this country money that we can invest in 
creating jobs, but also deals directly with the issue at hand, which is 
the issue of fracking.
  What is fracking? It is hydraulic fracturing, or it is called 
fracking. Is a process of drilling by injecting a fluid, which is a 
chemical water-sand mix, into the ground, at a very high pressure, in 
order to fracture shale rocks to release natural gas inside. That is 
the basic concept behind fracking. There are about a half a million 
active natural gas wells in the United States right now.
  Here is what is involved in the process that I think people don't 
really realize: Every single gas well requires an average of 400 tanker 
trucks to carry water and supplies to the site. It takes 1 to 8 million 
gallons of water to complete each fracturing job.
  To run all the active wells in the U.S., that would be 72 trillion--
trillion with a t-r--trillion gallons of water and 360 billion gallons 
of chemicals that are used in this process. The water is brought in, it 
is mixed with sand in a chemical mix to create a fracturing fluid.
  Now, one of the things I think that people don't realize is we don't 
know what is in that fracturing fluid because the companies say that it 
is proprietary. If they gave up that information, it is a secret sauce 
that they put together that allows them to do this; and if they 
disclose that, somehow, a competitor could find out what it is.
  The problem is that also means you and I don't know what those toxic 
chemicals are. We have an idea, in some cases, what is used, but the 
exact mix, you don't know in any specific well.
  So you have 40,000 gallons of chemicals used per fracturing, with up 
to 600 chemicals in any fracking fluid, which has known carcinogens and 
toxins. This fracking fluid has been pressure injected into the ground 
through a drilled pipeline about 10,000 feet deep.
  The mixture reaches the end of the well, where the high pressure 
causes the nearby shale rock to crack, creating fissures where the 
natural gas can flow into the wells. Only about 30 or 50 percent of the 
fracturing fluid is ever recovered. The rest of the toxic mix is left 
in the ground, and it is not biodegradable.
  Also, during this process, methane gas and toxic chemicals leach out 
of the system and contaminate our nearby groundwater. Methane 
concentrations are 17 times higher in drinking water wells near 
fracturing sites than normal wells.
  You may remember--I believe Time magazine had it, and I have seen it 
on TV--where people in Pennsylvania, in some cases, near wells, have 
turned on their drinking water and a match and lit the drinking water 
on fire from what has been released into the groundwater from fracking 
wells.
  This contaminated well water is then used for drinking water, like I 
explained, in these nearby communities, and there have been over a 
thousand documented cases of water contamination next to areas of gas 
drilling, as well as cases of sensory, respiratory, and neurological 
damage due to ingested contaminated water.
  In the end, the hydraulic fracking produces about 300,000 barrels of 
natural gas a day, but the price is numerous environmental, safety, and 
health hazards that we have to deal with.
  I yield time to Mr. Ellison.
  Mr. ELLISON. Certainly. I think it is really important for the 
gentleman to bring us to this conversation about fracking today. It is 
a lot of courage that you bring to this debate as well.
  The interests that are really promoting fracking are powerful, 
wealthy, energy companies; and opposing them, you know, is something 
that, I believe, is something that not everybody would do. I think 
raising real questions about how this is affecting the health and the 
environment are critical.
  I had the occasion of talking with a number of people in my office 
who came and told me really amazing stories about what their 
experiences with fracking were. One gentleman actually told me a story 
about the lighting of the fire coming out of the faucet in the sink.
  Another told me a story about how his cows drank the water that was 
contaminated with the fracking fluid, and those cows died. Another 
individual told me how, when they made complaints about it, there was 
just a lack of responsiveness.
  These are folks who--before they came to my office, I didn't know 
them--but they wanted to talk to me about a problem of common concern, 
so I said: Sure. Share with me what you know.
  What they shared with me caused me to do my own research. I was 
particularly disturbed by the fact that the process, particularly the 
fluid that is used, is not something that we can know. I think you are 
talking about injecting a fluid into the ground that is causing the 
natural gas to come up, and yet, it has proprietary protections.
  Now, how can we safeguard the public interest if we don't even know 
what is in that stuff? If nothing in there is harmful, why don't they 
want to share what is in that stuff?
  At the end of day, there are stories of regular citizens, cropping up 
all over this country, about dead farm animals, toxic drinking water, 
fire coming out of the water faucet, and all sorts of things. It has 
happened to people who thought that they could lead a good life, trying 
to farm, trying to live in rural America, and yet, the answers just are 
not coming for them.
  I remain very concerned. I believe that we do have a public interest 
in knowing much more about this process. A few years ago, Mr. Speaker, 
we were sort of sold that natural gas would be the answer to get off 
petroleum, but what we didn't know is all the health hazards that were 
involved with trying to make that conversion.
  It is absolutely essential that we, as the American people, get to 
the bottom of the health risks associated with all of the ingredients 
of fracking. These same folks who came to my office, Mr. Speaker, made 
complaints about skin irritation, nasal irritation, eye problems, 
chronic issues; they talk about farm animals and other sorts of issues 
that they have lost. It is just something that I think is crying out 
for real answers.
  If Congress does not stand up and say, look, we have got to figure 
out

[[Page 4890]]

what the environmental health impacts on fracking are on our citizens, 
then who is now going to?
  Europe has already asked some tough questions about how fracking 
works. Europe has already said: Well, wait a minute. We need to know a 
little bit more about this.
  In some places, the practice has been banned. I really believe that 
this is an appalling situation, calling out for answers, and it is our 
public duty to get those answers.
  I appreciate the time to talk about my exposure, my discussions with 
people who have experienced fracking firsthand.
  I also need to mention one other thing that I forgot. One gentleman 
talked about the frequency of earthquakes near the fracking area. When 
he tried to figure out and when he asked questions about, well, is the 
fracking causing the earthquakes because, before you were fracking, 
there were no earthquakes, he really was stonewalled and didn't get any 
answers.
  It makes sense--you are doing something to disrupt the ground, you 
are shooting a substance into the ground causing these sort of issues, 
like tremors in the Earth; and then this farmer who talked to me could 
not get any answers and could not get much responsiveness.
  Again, this is something I remain concerned about and look forward to 
people Facebooking, Tweeting, and writing regular old emails and snail 
mails telling their stories about what they are going through, so that 
we can make a case. The true, real investigation needs to take place, 
and we can actually look out for the public interest.

                              {time}  1745

  Mr. POCAN. Thank you, Mr. Ellison.
  It is not just members of the Progressive Caucus, Democrats, or 
concerned citizens who live near these wells who are talking about 
this. There actually was a recent investigation that was done by The 
Weather Channel, the Center for Public Integrity, and InsideClimate 
News that found numerous violations on current sites.
  At one, they found, for example, that the State of Texas, that they 
know ``almost nothing'' about the pollution that one of these shale 
drilling wells causes. They said that thousands of Texas oil and gas 
facilities are allowed to self-audit their emissions, meaning they 
don't have to report them to the State. They go on to talk about 
pollution complaints. They also said in another study in the U.K. and 
Pennsylvania that they looked at multiple data sets of wells in 
Pennsylvania to determine the rate of well failures, and they found 
that one-third of a data set of 3,500 wells were reported for 
environmental violations between 2008 and 2011.
  So, while we have special exemptions in clean water and in clean air 
laws for this process, we are finding severe violations by groups like 
The Weather Channel--hardly someone who is biased--who actually look at 
these facilities. Then when you actually look at the list of chemicals, 
at some of the known 600 chemicals that go into these mixes, and when 
you look at the actual effects--the colors--that are on here, you have 
got chemicals that lead to skin, eye, and sensory organ problems, 
problems with respiratory, in gastrointestinal, in the brain and 
nervous systems, the immune systems, with the kidney, cardiovascular 
and blood, with carcinogens, mutagens, developmental, reproductive, and 
endocrine disrupters. These are the types of effects that can happen 
from the chemicals that we are not even allowed to know that are 
happening.
  I think one of the most telling parts of this is that 15.3 million 
people in this country live within a mile of one of these wells that 
have been drilled since the year 2000. That is more than the entire 
State of Michigan. These are people who live near a well who don't have 
the public information that they need to know for their families' 
safety.
  Members of this caucus, the Progressive Caucus, have worked on five 
bills that have been kind of called the ``frac pack,'' which address 
specific concerns that we have on the regulation of this. We are not 
saying that you are going to stop this completely, but we should know 
what we are doing, not proceed until you know what you are doing and 
make sure we provide the clean air, the clean water and the 
notification requirements so that we actually know what we are doing 
before we proceed. I would like to go over those bills if I could. I 
would like to just give you a little idea of some of the bills that are 
out there.
  One bill by Representative Diana DeGette, from the State of Colorado, 
is called the FRAC Act. That bill would close the so-called 
``Halliburton loophole.'' That loophole protects the special sauce 
recipe of chemicals that they use for this fracturing process. It also 
protects the companies that drill for natural gas from disclosing those 
chemicals involved in the fracking operations, which would normally be 
required by our clean water laws that we have at the Federal level. It 
has three major provisions:
  One, it repeals the exemptions granted to oil, gas, and geothermal 
fracking operations under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Let's make sure 
our water is safe as the Safe Drinking Water Act says;
  Second, it would make sure that all fracking operations would be 
required to disclose to the State as well as the public the fracking 
chemical cocktail intended for use prior to the commencement of any 
operations--not after your water is set on fire, not after your cows 
are sick, not after your family has problems, but prior to the use of 
those chemicals;
  Finally, if a medical emergency should arise, any fracking operation 
would be required to disclose the exact chemical formula of any 
compounds utilized.
  It is a pretty basic set of ideas that would make sure that you have 
at least information to know.
  There are four other bills.
  Another bill that is part of the frac pack is the BREATHE Act, 
introduced by Representative Cartwright from Pennsylvania and 
Representative Polis from Colorado. It would close the loopholes of the 
Clean Air Act that currently exempt the oil and gas industry from 
essential protections from toxic air pollution, as those studies have 
been proven from the wells they tested in Pennsylvania. The bill would 
also require that toxic emissions of multiple related smelt sources be 
aggregated to determine total emissions, just like other industries 
have to, so they are not exempted in other ways, and it makes sure, 
with all fracking operations that release pollutants, including 
benzene, that we have protections in these areas.
  Another bill is the CLEANER Act, which has been introduced, again, by 
Representative Cartwright from Pennsylvania and Representative Jared 
Huffman from California. This bill would specifically protect the 
environment and the public health by closing a loophole in the Resource 
Conservation and Recovery Act, which currently prevents adequate, 
consistent regulation of harmful waste associated with oil and natural 
gas production and, particularly, with fracking, and it has a few other 
compounds specifically related to that.
  The next bill is the FRESHER Act, introduced, again, by 
Representative Cartwright from Pennsylvania. This would close the 
loophole in the Clean Water Act, and it would require oil and gas 
producers to obtain the standard permits necessary for activities that 
increase storm water runoff and risk water pollution. Treat them like 
everybody else so that we know what is going on in the process. It also 
makes oil and gas companies play by the exact same rules that apply to 
other industries, and it conducts a basic study to further make sure 
that we understand what they are using.
  The final bill that is part of the frac pack is a bill called the 
SHARED Act, introduced by Jan Schakowsky from the State of Illinois. 
This bill would provide further protection for public health by 
requiring water testing before fracking begins, and it would help 
document any drinking water contamination within a mile's radius of a 
site operation.
  Now, none of these are crazy ideas, saying we are absolutely closing 
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every operation because we don't like it. It is saying let's make sure 
they follow the law like any other industry would follow the law when 
it comes to our clean water and our clean air and that we know what 
toxic compounds are being put into the groundwater since we know so 
much of it is left there, especially when you live nearby, like 15.3 
million Americans do. Those are simple bills that we have put out there 
that we are hoping this body will take up, because it is important that 
we provide those safeguards for the people across the country.
  Mr. ELLISON. I do appreciate the gentleman for going over all of 
those bills, which, I think, will bring about transparency, 
accountability, disclosure--all things that are just basic fairness 
issues.
  In the United States, we pride ourselves on having due process and 
fairness and accountability, and I think every one of those bills has a 
lot of merit and should be carefully considered because they will allow 
Americans to make decisions about whether this practice of hydraulic 
fracking is something that we need to just continue to let happen as it 
happens now.
  There is an idea in economics, which is, if you make the money, you 
need to pay the cost, right? If you are going to internalize the 
profits, you should internalize the costs of what you are doing. If you 
are going to make a lemonade stand, then you should buy the lemons; you 
should get the water; you should put in whatever sweetener you have; 
you should clean up after yourself after you make the lemonade; and you 
should deal with problems that you cause in the sale of your lemonade. 
Yet, when it comes to fracking, the profits are absolutely 
internalized, but the cost is forced on everyone else.
  How is that good, free market economics to say that we are going to 
keep the money we make by getting this natural gas but that we are not 
going to clean up after ourselves and that we are not going to tell 
everybody what we are doing even though it affects them?
  I mean, there is just something very unfair about the way fracking is 
being done right now. So I think that this set of bills, the frac pack, 
and this Special Order are really important.
  Again, I really urge people, Mr. Speaker, to let their voices be 
heard because we were told that this is the clean energy future--
fracking, natural gas--that it is much cleaner than petroleum. It is. 
Natural gas is cleaner. It is still a fossil fuel, though, and there 
are still social and economic and environmental and health costs as a 
result of the way we get this natural gas.
  Unfortunately, I do have to go to another meeting, but I want to say, 
Mr. Speaker, that there are other ways to power our world. Let us have 
a real conversation about investing in renewable energy, in zero waste, 
in living in societies that have more transit options, that are more 
walkable so we use less, that we make our buildings much more fuel 
efficient.
  One of the sad days in Washington was when President Ronald Reagan 
took down the solar panels that Jimmy Carter had put up on the White 
House. That was too bad. That was unfortunate that that decision was 
made. Think about if, in the seventies, we had been moving aggressively 
into renewables. Think about the world we would live in if we truly had 
recycling, composting, reuse. Right now, according to the scientists, 
we have put so much CO2 up into the atmosphere that we are 
changing the climate. So who knows if the action that we take now will 
be enough. We had better take that action. We dare not avoid taking 
that action. I just think to myself that these things like fracking are 
not the only answer. Oil and gas exploration is not the only answer. 
There are other things we can do to power our world, and I absolutely 
urge us to do it.
  I just want to wrap up by saying, too, that, when we think about what 
we are going to use our tax dollars to subsidize, we are subsidizing 
the fossil fuel industry. Bernie Sanders and I worked on a bill called 
the End Polluter Welfare Act. We have documented up to about $110 
billion worth of subsidies to the oil and gas industry, which is six 
times the subsidy that goes to renewable energy sources--solar, wind. 
It is high time we started investing in the wind and in the Sun and in 
the wave technology and in other forms of technology that can help us 
power our world that don't have these ugly, costly, expensive 
externalities.
  I would ask the gentleman to excuse me now, but thank you for hosting 
this very important Special Order on raising questions around fracking.
  Mr. POCAN. Again, thank you, Representative Ellison, for all of the 
work you do with the Progressive Caucus.
  This was a Special Order hour tonight to talk about why we need to 
have safer practices around hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in this 
country. For the 15.3 million people who live within a mile of the 
wells, for everyone who has to eventually suffer the effects of the 
environment and the health pollutants that are put out by this, there 
are bills that are introduced in this body that can make sure that we 
regulate this better, that can make sure they are not exempt from clean 
air and clean water protections, and that disclose the toxins that are 
used so that we can make sure that this process is safer, healthier, 
and better for everyone.
  Mr. Speaker, I would just like to add as a reminder to everyone, 
which is also important, that March 31 is the deadline for signing up 
for the Affordable Care Act. There are extensions. If you have tried to 
do it and if you can't get it done, there is a little bit of an 
extension at this time, but you need to do it by March 31. I think we 
have got some of my colleagues who are going to be talking about that 
in just a little bit, but I would like to encourage everyone to take 
advantage of that while they have time in the remaining week.
  With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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