Blog - Articles Tagged 'Energy'

• S.1 – American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

A bill to create jobs, restore economic growth, and strengthen America’s middle class through measures that modernize the nation’s infrastructure, enhance America’s energy independence, expand educational opportunities, preserve and improve affordable health care, provide tax relief, and protect those in greatest need, and for other purposes.

• S.2 – Middle Class Opportunity Act of 2009

A bill to improve the lives of middle class families and provide them with greater opportunity to achieve the American dream.

• S.3 – Homeowner Protection and Wall Street Accountability Act of 2009
  
  A bill to protect homeowners and consumers by reducing foreclosures, ensuring the availability of credit for homeowners, businesses, and consumers, and reforming the financial regulatory system, and for other purposes.

• S.4 – Comprehensive Health Reform Act of 2009

A bill to guarantee affordable, quality health coverage for all Americans, and for other purposes.

• S.5 – Cleaner, Greener, and Smarter Act of 2009

A bill to improve the economy and security of the United States by reducing the dependence of the United States on foreign and unsustainable energy sources and the risks of global warming, and for other purposes.

• S.6 – Restoring America’s Power Act of 2009

A bill to restore and enhance the national security of the United States.

• S.7 – Education Opportunity Act of 2009

A bill to expand educational opportunities for all Americans by increasing access to high-quality early childhood education and after school programs, advancing reform in elementary and secondary education, strengthening mathematics and science instruction, and ensuring that higher education is more affordable, and for other purposes.

• S.8 – Returning Government to the American People Act

A bill to return the Government to the people by reviewing controversial “midnight regulations” issued in the waning days of the Bush Administration.

• S.9 – Stronger Economy, Stronger Borders Act of 2009

A bill to strengthen the United States economy, provide for more effective border and employment enforcement, and for other purposes.

• S.10 – Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009

A bill to restore fiscal discipline and begin to address the long-term fiscal challenges facing the United States, and for other purposes.

TAPPED broke this list on Tuesday, and they have some more information on some of these bills from a Democratic aide on the hill.

The full text of these bills hasn’t been published by the Government Printing Office yet, but it should be available within the next 24 hours or so. Check back at the “see full bill text” link on the OpenCongress bill pages. In the meantime, you might want to start tracking some of these with your “My OpenCongress” account (login or register) to be alerted to any legislative action that is taken and every new blog post or news article is published about them.

These first 10 Senate bills are mainly symbolic. They’re a statement of the Democrats’ legislative priorities at this point for the next two years, but any legislative action that’s taken on these measures could very well come in a different form. The first ten Senate bills of the last session included some measures that were enacted (minimum wage increase, ethics reform), some that were vetoed by President Bush (funding for stem cell research) and some that were hotly debated but never passed Congress (comprehensive immigration reform).

UPDATE: Way more info on all these bills from the Democratic Policy Committee. Be sure to check it out.

The House Committee on Rules has just concluded their epic hearing to lay out the ground rules for Wednesday’s debate of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Here is a complete list of the amendments that will receive votes on Wednesday by the full House of Representatives, as determined tonight by the Rules Committee (sponsors listed in brackets):

>* #178 – Would amend the aviation, highway, rail, and transit priority consideration and “use-it-or-lose-it” provisions to require that 50 percent of the funds be obligated within 90 days. [Rep. James Oberstar [D, MN-8]]


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>* #199 – Would require that the Secretary require, as a condition of receiving funding under Title XIII of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, that the demonstration projects utilize Internet-based or other open protocols and standards if available and appropriate, and would require that grants recipients utilize Internet-based or other open protocols and standards. [Rep. Edward Markey [D, MA-7]]


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>* #95 – Would clarify that federal funds received by States under the bill for highway maintenance shall not be used to replace existing funds in place for transportation projects. [Rep. William Shuster [R, PA-9]]


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>* #70 – Would increase transit capital funding by $3 billion. [Rep. Jerrold Nadler [D, NY-8], Rep. Peter DeFazio [D, OR-4], Rep. Daniel Lipinski [D, IL-3], Rep. Michael McMahon [D, NY-13], Rep. Keith Ellison [D, MN-5]]


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>* #109 – Would strike the appropriations provisions from the bill. [Rep. Randy Neugebauer [R, TX-19]]


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>* #172 – Would provide that job training funds may be used for broadband deployment and related activities provided in the bill. [Rep. Maxine Waters [D, CA-35]]


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>* #132 – Would strike funding for Amtrak. [Rep. Jeff Flake [R, AZ-6]]


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>* #198 – Would expand the Berry Amendment Extension Act to include DHS to require the government to purchase uniforms for more than one hundred thousand uniformed employees from textile and apparel manufacturers. [Rep. Larry Kissell [D, NC-8]]


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>* #22 – Would insert the text of the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act (H.R. 985 in the 110th Congress) regarding protections for federal employees who report waste, fraud, and abuse. [Rep. Todd Platts [R, PA-19], Rep. Christopher Van Hollen [D, MD-8]]


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>* #89 – Would require that the Recovery.gov website contain links and other information on how to access job information created at or by entities receiving funding under the bill; including links to local employment agencies, state, local, and other public agencies receiving recovery funds, and private firms contracted to perform work funded by the bill. [Rep. Harry Teague [D, NM-2]]


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>* #195 – Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute. (REVISED) Would strike everything after enacting clause and adds income tax rate deductions for bottom two income tax brackets, alternative minimum tax relief, small business deduction, bonus depreciation, small business expensing, expanded carryback of net operating losses, improved home buyer credit, unemployment benefit tax exemption, health insurance premium deduction, repeal of 3 percent withholding requirement for government contractors, extension of unemployment benefits, and a Sense of Congress against tax increases to offset outlays. [Rep. David Camp [R, MI-4], Rep. Eric Cantor [R, VA-7]]

These amendments will each get 10 minutes of debate (except the last one, which will get 60) and will be adopted to the bill if they receive a majority vote.

Also included in the rules package is a five-part amendment that will be considered adopted to the stimulus bill by the House when the package is approved. It removes a couple of items from the bill – family planning money, National Mall revitalization – that President Obama had personally asked congressional Democrats to remove because of GOP criticisms:

>The amendment (1) requires that not later than 45 days after the date of enactment, funds provided to any State or agency thereof, the Governor of the State, or the State legislature by means of a statement submitted by its leadership, shall certify that the State will request and use funds provided by this Act. Funding to the State will be for public and private entities within the State either by formula or at the State’s discretion; (2) waives the local matching requirements and the salary caps for the COPS hiring program in fiscal years 2009 and 2010; (3) designates $15 million for the Historic Preservation Fund within the National Park Service for the renovation and preservation of buildings on Historically Black Colleges and Universities campuses and waives the institutional match for projects under this provision; (4) strikes funding for the National Mall Revitalization Fund; and (5) strikes section 5004 regarding family planning.

Following up on my list of exemplary Democrats, here is a list of the seven Republican Senators who voted with the majority of their party (against the assumed administration position) on all 29 roll call votes regarding the stimulus:

Sen. John McCain [R, AZ]

Sen. Saxby Chambliss [R, GA]

Sen. John Isakson [R, GA]

Sen. Michael Crapo [R, ID]

Sen. James Risch [R, ID]

Sen. John Thune [R, SD]

Sen. Orrin Hatch [R, UT]

The Democratic amendment that picked of the most Republican support was Sen. Maria Cantwell’s (D-WA) S.Amdt.274, “to improve provisions relating to energy tax incentives and provisions relating manufacturing tax incentives for energy property.”

The AIG bonus scandal is burning through the media universe, but Congress is also continuing work on the legislative agenda. Some of the big pieces in the coming months will be on the energy front. New details were recently released about a proposed renewable energy standard (which would require utilities to produce a percentage of their power via renewable sources, like solar and wind). How that RES bill will move through the House and, more importantly, the Senate, is a bit confusing and very political. So, here’s an OpenCongress primer on the looming energy/climate change battle.

For starters, let’s look at the big-name players in the game. In the House, you’re talking about Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. He waged a successful campaign to uproot former Energy Committee Chair Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) at the start of the 111th Congress, and there’s general agreement that climate change legislation was one reason why. Waxman is an ally of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), and will play a major role in shaping any energy or climate change legislation in the House. Also keep an eye on Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), who introduced an RES bill last month.

In the Senate, things start to get complicated. Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) is chair of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Bingaman introduced renewable energy standard legislation in the 110th Congress, which was removed from a larger energy bill amid Republican opposition. Bingaman wants to proceed on separate bills for RES, for energy in general, and for climate change (likely in the form of a cap-and-trade bill).

Until recently, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) seemed to be fine with that idea. After President Barack Obama called for climate change legislation during his address to Congress, however, Reid changed his tune. He is now pushing for a comprehensive bill that will include all three elements. Bingaman has argued that each piece of the agenda will require finesse to reach the 60-vote Senate cloture threshold, and he’s reluctant to combine the different objectives.

The wildcard in all this might be the Obama Administration itself. In February, an Obama energy adviser not-so-subtly warned that the Environmental Protection Agency may impose regulations on emissions from cars and smokestacks (as a result of a 2007 Supreme Court ruling). That’s an option with little appeal to lawmakers, and one that might encourage them to work quickly to pass climate change legislation, a renewable energy standard, or both.

You can stay tuned to this space for more, and you can always track what’s happening in these issue areas through OpenCongress. If you’re a registered user, check out climate change, energy or more than 4,000 other issues.

Image (used under a Creative Commons license) by Chandra Marsono.

House Democrats introduced a gigantic cap-and-trade climate change bill to Congress last week and it’s getting it’s first big action TODAY. At 1 pm EST, the House Energy and Commerce Committee will begin the mark-up process. You can tune in to a live broadcast here. This committee work is where the most important tweaking takes generally place. Follow Congress Matters for mark-up liveblogging.

Apparently, Republicans are planning on submitting 450 amendments during the markup. A lot of them look like classic “gotcha” amendments, aka “poison-pills.”

H.R. 2454 – American Clean Energy And Security Act of 2009

After seeing the absurd list of amendments Republicans submitted to the American Clean Energy And Security Act during committee markup, it’s pretty obvious that they are going to try to delay the process however they can.

One dilatory tactic Republicans can use would require the full 946-page bill and its 450 Republican-offered amendments to be read aloud in full by committee staff. Generally, the committee dispenses with the section-by-section reading of the bill during the amendment process under a unanimous consent agreement. But if Republicans object to the motion to dispense with the reading of the sections and amendments, the committee has no choice but to proceed with the reading.

House Energy and Commerce Committee Democrats have found a novel solution – they have hired a speed reader as a member of their staff, and he’s standing by, ready to rock the mic if need be. The Wall Street Journal reports:

A committee spokeswoman said the young man, who’s doing door duty at the hearing as he awaits his possible call to the microphone, was hired to help career staff. After years of practice, the panel’s clerks can certainly read rapidly, but she says the speed reader is a lot faster.

“Judging by the size of the amendments, I can read a page about every 34 seconds,” said the newly hired “staff assistant” who declined to give his name. Based on that count, it would take around nine hours to read the entire bill.

Personally, I’m looking forward to the part on hydrochlorofluorocarbons.

UPDATE: This happened:

I was expecting this to take even longer, but apparently Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee backed off their threats and posturing to delay progress on the Waxman-Markley climate change bill and it has been approved by the committee.

Kate Sheppard at Grist reports:

After months of grueling hearings and deliberations, the House Energy and Commerce Committee passed the Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill by a vote of 33-25 on Thursday evening. It’s a landmark occasion, the first time a serious climate bill has made it this far in the House.

The vote fell largely along party lines, with only one Republican voting yes—Mary Bono Mack (Calif.)—and four Democrats voting no—John Barrow (Ga.), Jim Matheson (Utah), Charlie Melancon (La.), and Mike Ross (Ark.). But the Dems who did support the bill represent diverse constituencies—coal states, industrial districts, and agricultural areas, as well as coastal regions.

As the bill was debated this week, Republicans on the committee offered dozens of amendments intended to weaken it or kill it entirely, but Democrats stood united behind the bill, approving only one insignificant GOP amendment. That’s thanks to hard work done ahead of time by Committee Chair Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and his bill coauthor, Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who negotiated at length with moderate Democrats to craft a bill they could support. (Most Republicans had made it clear that their opposition to the bill was nonnegotiable.)

Democrats want to bring the bill to the full House floor sometime before Congress’s month-long August recess. First it has to move through several other committees, where, Sheppard notes, it will face many attempts at fundamental alteration and watering-down from both Democrats and Republicans. The Energy and Commerce Committee’s approval belies the bill’s actual vulnerability. For example, Congress Daily ($) reports that some Democrats that voted for the bill in the committee did so with plans to try to weaken it during full House consideration, for example by “softening the bill’s cap-and-trade 2020 emission reduction target.” Environmental groups like Greenpeace have already ditched the bill because, they say, its 17 percent reduction target by 2020 is too weak considering the climatic situation.

The bill as passed by the Energy and Commerce Committee is already much weaker than what many environmental advocate and many in the global community would prefer. The Economist, for example, points out that 85 percent of the carbon pollution permits under the bill’s cap-and-trade scheme will be given away for free rather than being sold at auction. This violates the basic “polluter pays” concept of environmental accounting that would protect the public from the costs of the program, and it takes away hundreds of billions that President Obama has been figuring into his budget numbers. Obama had been calling for 100 percent of the permits to be sold at auction with a big chuck of the revenues going into a program to help consumers pay for energy cost increases that will ensue form the legislation.

The bill’s supporters in Congress, of course, say that providing the permits for free is necessary to win the votes of members of Congress from coal-producing states and the like. But the end result is a bill that raises the deficit beyond President Obama’s budget outline (which means more taxes at some future point) and increases energy costs for consumers while giving massive handouts to big business.

Well, this one’s definitely worth following as it moves through the legislative maze. You can track the bill on OpenCongress by subscribing to its actions RSS feed or going to the bill page and adding it to your “My OpenCongress” account (click the “+” button on the tab at the top of the page). You can also subscribe through OpenCongress to RSS feeds for relevant news and blog coverage of the bill.

Marketplace’s Paddy Hirsch goes over the basics of cap and trade. This is the, essentially, the policy mechanism at the center of the climate change bill going through Congress, the American Clean Energy And Security Act of 2009.

Meet Cap ’n Trade from Marketplace on Vimeo.