|
 |
 |
|
E2 Morning Roundup: Reid sets lame duck energy showdown, Salazar to lay out drilling strategy, oil sands battle heats up, senators weigh Obama’s piecemeal climate approach, and much more
Senate to vote on natural gas, electric vehicle plan
The lame duck session might have some energy. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) confirmed Wednesday that lawmakers will take another swing at energy legislation before the year is out.
As the Senate left town, he filed for cloture – or ending debate – on legislation he quietly introduced last week that contains tax incentives and other programs to spur deployment of natural gas-powered and electric vehicles. A test vote on the bill will occur as soon as November 17.
Senate Democratic leaders had earlier tied some natural gas and advanced vehicles provisions – and a home efficiency rebate program – to wider oil spill response legislation.
But that plan faltered over the summer as several provisions in the oil spill measure – notably removing liability limits for companies responsible for oil spills – faced big hurdles among many Republicans and some Democrats.
On tap Thursday: Salazar to lay out energy, drilling safety agenda
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar will give a speech this morning on energy policy and Interior programs to ensure the safety of offshore drilling in the wake of the BP oil spill.
The agency is expected to roll out new rig safety rules this week, and the speech also comes as Salazar is weighing – under immense political and industry pressure – how to ease the moratorium on deepwater projects. Interior is widely expected to lift or ease the ban before its scheduled late November expiration.
Michael Bromwich, Interior’s top offshore drilling regulator, is slated to provide a report to Salazar as soon as today that provides recommendations for addressing the moratorium. Salazar speaks at 10:30 a.m. at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
Dow Jones reports that Salazar’s speech “will be widely watched for clues about the government's plans for new offshore drilling rules and on lifting a four-month-old ban on deepwater drilling.”
The Washington Post reports that Salazar is “getting ready to take his finger off what he has called the ‘pause’ button on deepwater oil drilling, with environmentalists and oil industry executives alike worried about what comes next.”
Renewable power backers aren’t giving up
Back to Capitol Hill: Advocates of a renewable electricity standard, or RES, are not giving up their fight for a slot in the lame duck energy agenda.
“What we are trying to do is, one by one, get commitments here in the Senate to see if there is a way – or any way – for us to get an RES done by the end of the year,” Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), told The Hill Wednesday.
He met this week with groups backing Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Jeff Bingaman’s (D-N.M.) bill that would require many utilities to supply 15 percent of their power from wind and other renewable sources by 2021, although about a fourth of the mandate could be met with energy efficiency measures.
The recess strategy, in brief
“I and the other co-sponsors of the bill will continue talking to our colleagues from now until we get to the point in the lame duck when we might have a shot at passing an RES,” Dorgan said.
Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) co-sponsored Bingaman’s bill, and three other Republicans have signed on thus far. The total number of formal co-sponsors is 28, though more are pending.
Several renewable energy trade groups and environmentalists are backing the lame duck RES push, even though the bill is weaker than many advocates have sought in the past.
Here’s the broad game plan, courtesy of one off-the-Hill advocate close to the effort: “For the recess, expect RES advocates to continue to talk to Senators and their staffs, build supporters and work with leadership to schedule floor time in the lame duck. RES efforts will also move into the states, activating local companies and RES-supporting groups to reach their Senators – whether to shore up supporters or convince them to sign on.”
But Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) this week downplayed the odds of an RES moving in the lame duck.
Graham goes nuclear on the RES
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is no fan of the renewables-only plan, and floated legislation Wednesday to create a wider “clean energy standard” that gives credit to nuclear power, and coal plants if they can capture and store carbon emissions (a technology that’s not yet commercialized).
He argues that the Bingaman-Brownback plan “is too quick to pick winners and losers in the clean energy race.”
Graham said Wednesday that his plan is unlikely to come up this year. But an immediate question is whether having his alternative floating around will siphon political support from the renewables-only bill.
When asked whether his idea would undermine the effort to get 60 votes for Bingaman-Brownback, Graham said he hoped “this is an idea that people can gravitate around in the business community and the environmental community because it does create challenges but it allows the challenges to be met by more technologies coming into play."
At least one of the four Republicans supporting Bingaman-Brownback – Nevada Sen. John Ensign – said he likes what he hears in Graham’s proposal. “I would say I haven’t seen the Graham plan but I certainly like those concepts,” he told E2.
Nothing to fear but fear itself?
“I don’t anticipate any Republicans coming off,” said Marchant Wentworth, deputy legislative director at the Union of Concerned Scientists, which backs the Bingaman approach.
While some might suggest that some Republicans would simply use the Graham proposal as an excuse not to have to vote for the Bingaman-Brownback version, Wentworth countered: “Would that come from members that are going to vote no on Bingaman anyway? I would think so.”
He also noted that Brownback has said he has two other Republicans “in his pocket that are leaning towards supporting this thing.” Wentworth did not know who those Republicans are. Grassroots lobbyists favoring the effort held a meeting Wednesday morning with staff for Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), who is considering the bill, one advocate said.
Bingaman and Brownback have also picked up the support of two more Democratic senators – Daniel Akaka of Hawaii and Charles Schumer of New York, the vice chairman of the Democratic caucus.
Oil sands fight heats up
A skirmish in the wider climate policy fight is unfolding over an obscure 2007 law.
The American Petroleum Institute and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday leapt into the legal fray over whether the Pentagon is violating the law that prevents federal agencies from buying alternative fuels with more carbon emissions than conventional oil-based fuels.
Environmental groups in June sued the Pentagon in a California federal court, alleging that Defense Department contracts with refineries that process Canadian oil sands violate the law, which was tucked into a much broader energy bill that passed three years ago. The Sierra Club and the Southern Allince for Clean Energy brought the case.
API, the Chamber and the National Petrochemical & Refiners Association petitioned the federal district court to intervene in the case on the Pentagon’s side. According to an API summary of the filing, the “fungible nature of crude oil makes it impossible for the Pentagon to determine which fuels are derived from oil sands crude, preventing it from being able to comply,” with Section 526 of the 2007 law.
While producing oil sands is more carbon-intensive than conventional oil, API also claims that overall emissions from the production, refining, transport and use of oil sands – the so-called wells-to-wheels emissions – are comparable to other grades of crude oil used in the U.S.
Multi-front battle
With the collapse of broad climate change legislation in Congress, look for such battles to become more central in shaping climate policy.
“What you are going to see the environmental movement doing over the course of the next several months is basically diversifying the number of areas in which we will be working to slow greenhouse gas emissions and tackle the climate threat,” said Tony Iallonardo, a spokesman for the National Wildlife Federation.
“Tar sands and other dirty fuels are an excellent example,” he said, also noting efforts to preserve state-based programs and EPA’s regulatory authority. NWF is fighting pipeline proposals that would enable increased U.S. oil sands imports.
2011 energy outlook: Chunky
President Obama’s comment that he might pursue energy and climate policy in “chunks” rather than a big comprehensive bill is generating plenty of Capitol Hill chatter.
Several Senate Democrats said they’re ready to let go of the kind of sweeping measure that narrowly passed the House in 2009 but hit a brick wall in the Senate this year.
“Whether we do it in pieces or we do it in a more comprehensive fashion, we need to put in place a policy that reduces our dependence on foreign oil and fossil fuels,” said Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) in the Capitol Wednesday.
“If a piecemeal approach gets us to those goals, so be it, if it takes a comprehensive approach, that works for me as well,” he added.
“We are going to get it done, one way or the other – chunks or big chunks,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), chairwoman of the Environment and Public Works Committee.
Obama, indeed, is not the first person to express support for a pro-chunks strategy. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) last week said bluntly, “We don’t do comprehensive well,” in explaining that the Senate needs to take up piecemeal energy plans that have some bipartisan support. And Reid also played the “piecemeal” card when arguing in August that efforts to tackle climate change in the next Congress should start with a narrow approach.
Dissent!
But not everyone is warm to the chunks idea. “I think it is a self-fulfilling prophecy when the President of the United States gives up on a large and comprehensive bill and says that chunks are necessary,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.).
He sees drawbacks to a piecemeal approach. “It will take a lot more work, it limits the options for compromise, but on the other hand it may be that they feel that’s all they can accomplish,” he said when asked if it’s a good idea.
Senate blocks recess appointments with deal between Dems, GOP
The Hill’s Alexander Bolton reports that Senate Democrats agreed Wednesday night to a Republican demand to block President Obama from making recess appointments while Congress is out of town campaigning for the midterm elections.
That means the White House could not – even if administration officials wanted to – quickly short-circuit Sen. Mary Landrieu’s (D-La.) hold on Senate confirmation for Jacob Lew, the nominee for Office of Management and Budget director.
Landrieu, who is angry about the freeze on deepwater oil-and-gas drilling, expects negotiations with the administration to continue for weeks.
The drilling ban fight gets Biblical
Landrieu says that the temporary deepwater ban and the slow pace of shallow-water drilling permits are a major blow to the Gulf Coast economy.
She hopes her hold is having an impact, and for good measure, evoked the struggle of Moses, as depicted in Exodus 8:1.
“It’s intended to call attention, to put pressure and to speed up the release of the hostages,” she said Wednesday. “Let my people go. Let them go. Let them get back to work, and hopefully it’s helping.”
Secret to Senate success? Just show up
Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska) Wednesday gave some insight into the secret of being a successful senator – or at least making sure nothing bad happens to your state, legislatively speaking.
Referring to the failed Senate climate talks this year at an energy event hosted by National Journal, Begich said, “They had meetings every Tuesday and I participated. … I’m not sure I was invited, but I showed up because what I’ve learned around the Senate is if you don’t show up more than likely something’s happening to you.”
On tap Thursday II: Warning signs on rare earth minerals
A Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee panel will explore concerns that the U.S. could lose access to Chinese rare earth minerals that are vital to manufacturing wind turbines, electric vehicles and other clean energy technologies.
Lawmakers and Obama administration officials are focusing on how to bolster domestic supplies. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), who will chair the hearing, will warn that “we are not just dependent on other countries for the ore; we depend on others for many refining steps of the supply chain.”
Ensuring a secure supply of strategic minerals is “paramount,” she plans to say in opening remarks, warning that China is on track to absorb all of its production of rare earths as soon as 2012.
House passes rare earth bill
Across the Capitol, the House on Wednesday easily passed Rep. Kathy Dahlkemper’s (D-Pa.) bill to beef up Energy Department R&D, demonstration and application programs to create a secure supply of the materials. It also authorizes federal loan guarantees for projects to mine and develop rare earth minerals. The vote was 325-98.
In case you missed E2 Wire yesterday
Check out our Wednesday posts:
Sen. Rockefeller admits he can't overcome a White House veto of EPA reg delay
Capps, Markey push Senate on spill commission subpoena power
Rockefeller: Mine safety bill has 'less of a chance' next year
Poll: Murkowski in dead heat with Miller in Alaska Senate race
Landrieu sees weeks of talks over hold on nomination for head of OMB
Bingaman: No time left to change renewable energy bill
Murkowski remains in Alaska, misses Stevens's funeral and GOP caucus meeting
Sen. Graham will ‘block any effort’ to slow oil sands imports
Reid, Coburn in floor spat over shark bill
Tips, comments or complaints? Please send them to
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
and
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Follow us on Twitter: @E2wire and @DarrenGoode
