Senate Panel Holds Hearing on Warner-Lieberman Climate Bill

The Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Subcommittee on Private Sector and Consumer Solutions to Global Warming and Wildlife Protection held "A Hearing to Examine America's Climate Security Act of 2007" yesterday to consider climate control legislation.

Senators Senator Joe Lieberman (I/D-Conn.) and John Warner (R-Va.), Chairman and Ranking Member of the subcommittee respectively, introduced the bill (S.2191) last week.  

Senator Lieberman opened the Subcommittee hearing to other members of the EPW Committee, and as a result, there was an unusually high participation level (and long opening statements) with Senators Bond (R-MO), Alexander (R-Tenn.), Sanders (I-Vt.), Barasso (R-Wyo.), Carper (D-Del.), Craig (R-Idaho), Baucus (D-Mont.), Inhofe (R-Okla.), Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Isakson (R-Ga.), and Voinovich (R-Ohio) all attending. 

In their opening statements, most of the Republican members raised the issue of nuclear energy and the bill's failure to include provisions to increase utilization of nuclear power.  Other concerns mentioned in opening statements included lack of provisions for clean coal technology, economic impacts, increased energy prices as a result of enactment, and the lack of leakage protection or prevention of off-shoring. 

Democratic Senators Carper, Whitehouse, and Sanders expressed concerns that the bill did not go far enough in reducing emissions.  Senator Carper specifically expressed concern that the bill did not include provisions to reduce NOx, SOx, and mercury emissions. 

A significant boost to Senators Lieberman and Warner’s efforts came from Senator Baucus indicating that he would support the Act.  The witnesses for the hearing were Kevin Anton, President of Alcoa Materials Management, and founding member of USCAP; Frances Beinecke, President of the National Resources Defense Council and another founding member of USCAP. Also, William Moomaw, Ph.D., Director of Tufts University Institute for the Environment; Will Roehm, Vice President of the Montana Grain Grower's Association; and Paul Cicio, Executive Director of the Industrial Energy Consumers of America. 

Cicio was the only minority witness at the hearing, and the only witness who did not express support for the legislation.  Despite their general support, the witnesses did point out several issues of relevance to the cement industry that should be addressed before passage of the bill. 

Anton requested that provisions regarding credit for early action be strengthened.  Moomaw suggested that stricter building codes be adopted.  While Cicio mainly argued that strict cap and trade emissions programs will cause an increase in natural gas use and price, he also pointed out that energy intensive manufacturing industries would be hurt by international imports, causing companies to move jobs and plants off shore. 

While U.S. companies would be required to purchase allowances beginning in 2008, importers would not be required to do so until 2012.  He further testified that the bill's requirement for international importers to purchase allowances would be in violation of World Trade Organization rules.  The bill is scheduled to be marked up in subcommittee  Thursday, November 1, followed by two full Senate Environment & Public Works Committee hearings and a mark-up, according to a spokesperson for U.S. Senate Environment and Public Work Committee Chair Barbara Boxer (D. Calif.).

Contact David Hubbard, Andy O'Hare or Kevin Walgenbach.

Dam Rehabilitation and Repair Act Introduced in Senate

Senator Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) yesterday introduced the Dam Rehabilitation and Repair Act of 2007 (S. 2238) to amend the National Dam Safety Program Act and establish a program to provide grant assistance to states for the rehabilitation and repair of publicly owned deficient dams. 

The proposed federal cost share would be 65/35.  The bill authorizes $10 million in FY 2008 and up to $100 million in FY 2011.  It would also authorize funding of Federal Emergency Management Administration personnel to administer the program.  In addition to Senator Inouye, Senators George Voinovich (R-Ohio), Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), and Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) cosponsored the legislation.

Contact John Sullivan.

Senate Panel Holds Hearing on Freight Rail Regulation

On October 23, the Senate Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety and Security Subcommittee held an oversight hearing on the operation of the Surface Transportation Board (STB) and ongoing efforts related to the commercial regulation of railroads.  The witnesses provided their perspectives on the STB and its effectiveness in balancing the commercial needs of railroads and their customers. 

Both Subcommittee Chairman Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) and Ranking Member Gordon Smith (R-Ore. )were present throughout the hearing.  Also present were Senators John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.V.), Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), David Vitter (R-La.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), John Thune (R-S.D.), and Mark Pryor (D-Ark.).

The witnesses at the hearing were Charles Nottingham, Chairman of the Surface Transportation Board; Jay Etta Hecker, Director of the Physical Infrastructure Team, U.S. Government Accountability Office; C. Wick Moorman, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Norfolk Southern Corporation; David McGregor, Senior Vice President, NAFTA Logistics, BASF Corporation; John Ficker, President of the National Industrial Transportation League; Robert Carlson, President of the North Dakota Farmers Union; and Glenn English, Corporate Executive Officer of the National Rural Electric Cooperatives Association. 

Click here for the testimony of all witnesses.

Nottingham listed various actions that the STB has undertaken in the 14 months that he has been Chairman, and then asserted that the STB is the most active regulatory agency in the federal government.  Director Hecker testified that captivity and lack of competition remain problems in the national rail system.  She indicated that captive rail customers do not have an effective remedy at the STB. 

Moorman stated that the ability of the railroads to make the huge capital investments needed over the coming years will depend totally on the actions of Congress and the STB.  He explained the monopoly power of the railroads; the effect of this monopoly power on American manufacturing; and the railroad practice of using their leverage over captive facilities to obtain the transportation business of facilities with competitive transportation alternatives. 

Ficker asserted that the best solution to the problems between the railroads and rail customers was a private sector solution negotiated between the railroads and rail customers.  He reported that the NITLeague was working on such a solution with the Association of American Railroads.  Mr. Carlson described the problems of agriculture with today's railroads and the lack of remedies at the STB.  Mr. English made it very clear that rail customers have been waiting for decades for justice with respect to the captive rail issue.

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