After a more than monthlong break, the U.S. Congress will reconvene and take up a raft of energy-related items, including voting on legislation to block oil and gas development in certain federal areas.
During the week of Sept. 9, the U.S. House of Representatives will consider H.R. 205, or the Protecting and Securing Florida's Coastline Act of 2019. The bill, co-sponsored by Republicans and Democrats from coastal states, would permanently extend a moratorium on oil and gas leasing in certain parts of the Gulf of Mexico.
The U.S. Capitol Dome is seen behind the Peace Monument statue in Washington, D.C. |
The House also has a vote scheduled this week on H.R. 1146, or the Arctic Cultural and Coastal Plain Protection Act, which would repeal a provision of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 that opened up areas of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development. Furthermore, House lawmakers will consider H.R. 1941, the Coastal and Marine Economies Protection Act, which would prohibit the U.S. Interior Department from leasing or pre-leasing the Atlantic and Pacific outer continental shelves for oil and gas extraction.
"These bills will help protect our environment and the economies of coastal communities that rely on tourism, outdoor recreation, and fishing," House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said in a Sept. 5 letter to House members.
Since retaking control of the House in early 2019, Democrats have prioritized bills to address climate change and limit fossil fuel production from federal lands and waters. Many of those measures have stalled in the U.S. Senate, where the GOP majority has opposed more sweeping climate proposals, but coastal legislators from both parties have resisted the push to open up more offshore areas to drilling, particularly in the Gulf of Mexico.
Other fall priorities
A Sept. 30 deadline looms for Congress to approve fiscal year 2020 funding for federal agencies. Although the House has passed several spending bills, including for the U.S. Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency, the Senate has held off on introducing its own version of the legislation amid a stalemate on overall budget caps.
But after Congress approved a two-year debt ceiling increase and government funding package in early August, the Senate is ready to roll out its own appropriations measures. The Senate Committee on Appropriations has scheduled a Sept. 12 markup of several fiscal year 2020 spending bills, including for energy and water development.
Lawmakers in the House and Senate tax-writing committees also could release proposals in September to create or extend tax credits for certain energy resources.
Renewable power groups and energy storage advocates were disappointed with the tax extenders packages that House and Senate tax-writing committees have introduced in 2019. But the head of the House Committee on Ways and Means has said he hopes to introduce legislation later in 2019 to offer more incentives for clean energy. And the Senate Committee on Finance has pledged to release legislation soon to address expired or soon-to-extinguish energy tax credits that may include expanded incentives for energy storage.
"Lobbyists are looking for a vehicle to attach four proposals of interest to the renewable energy market: a solar [investment tax credit] extension, more time for offshore wind projects to start construction to qualify for tax credits, a tax credit for standalone storage, and freer transferability of renewable energy tax credits," said Keith Martin, a tax and project finance lawyer for Norton Rose Fulbright.
FERC may have busy fall
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission could take action soon on a number of big-ticket proceedings, FERC Chairman Neil Chatterjee said during a recent speech.
The commission is made up of a 2-1 GOP majority following the late-August departure of Democratic Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur. Despite having only three members, the commission could have an update soon on its long-simmering grid resilience proceeding (FERC docket AD18-7) and may move on a broad inquiry regarding how the agency sets the base rate of return on equity for electric utilities (FERC dockets PL19-4, PL19-3), Chatterjee said. The agency also could revise its implementing regulations for the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act, a law that requires utilities to buy power from small renewable energy facilities.
Chatterjee declined to discuss the status of the PJM Interconnection's proposal to overhaul its capacity market rules to address the price-suppressive impact of subsidized resources. But pressure has mounted on the agency to make a decision after it postponed a capacity auction that PJM had scheduled for August for the 2022-2023 delivery year.
DOJ targets automaker deal
Democrats in Congress slammed the U.S. Department of Justice over its newly opened antitrust investigation into a voluntary agreement that the state of California signed with several automakers on vehicle fuel economy targets.
The agreement, which California reached in late July with Ford Motor Co., Honda Motor Co. Ltd., Volkswagen AG and Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, seeks to largely preserve fuel economy and greenhouse gas emission standards for cars and light-duty trucks that were established under the Obama administration. The pact responded to the Trump administration's soon-to-be-finalized rollback of corporate average fuel economy and greenhouse gas standards for cars and light-duty trucks.
"This investigation is nothing but an attempt by the Trump administration to retaliate against these companies and stoke fear in others," Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Ranking Member Tom Carper, D-Del., said. Carper called the California agreement "valid" and said that "instead of governing by intimidation, the Trump administration should accept that automakers want this administration to abandon its reckless and illegal proposal and strike an agreement with California that gives them certainty and predictability while fostering the development of the next generation of cleaner vehicles."
At the same time, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Transportation sent a memo Sept. 6 to the California Air Resources Board, or CARB, putting the state "on notice" that the voluntary framework with the four automakers "appears to be inconsistent with Federal law." The EPA and DOT said Congress "squarely vested the authority to set fuel economy standards for new motor vehicles, and nationwide standards for [greenhouse gas] vehicle emissions, with the Federal government, not with California or any other state."
The federal agencies asked California to "act immediately to disassociate CARB from the commitments made by the four automakers," saying the commitments "may result in legal consequences given the limits placed in Federal law on California's authority."
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| US Congress |
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| Sept. 10 | The House Committee on Small Business' Subcommittee on Rural Development, Agriculture, Trade, and Entrepreneurship will hold a hearing on "Growing the Clean Energy Economy." |
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| Sept. 10 | The House Committee on Natural Resources will hold a hearing to examine the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's proposed reorganization and relocation of its headquarters to Grand Junction, Colo. |
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| Sept. 10 | The House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis will hold a hearing on "Solving the Climate Crisis: Manufacturing Jobs for America's Workers." |
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| Sept. 11 | The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources' Subcommittee on Energy will hold a hearing to examine nine bills, including S. 1821, the Marine Energy Research and Development Act of 2019; S. 2095, the Enhancing Grid Security through Public-Private Partnerships Act; and S. 2368, the Nuclear Energy Renewal Act of 2019. |
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| Sept. 11 | The House Committee on Financial Services' Subcommittee on National Security, International Development, and Monetary Policy will host a hearing to examine the macroeconomic impacts of climate change. |
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| Sept. 12 | The Senate Committee on Appropriations will hold a markup of its fiscal year 2020 spending bill for energy and water development. |
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Industry events |
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| Sept. 10 | Politico will host a conversation in Washington, D.C., on what is ahead for clean energy in the U.S. Congress, with speakers including U.S. Reps. Scott Peters, D-Calif., and Tom Reed, R-N.Y. |
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| Sept. 11 | The Nuclear Innovation Alliance will hold a panel discussion titled "In Search of a SpaceX for Nuclear Energy" at the Russell U.S. Senate Office Building in Washington, D.C. |
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| Sept. 12 | The Center for Strategic and International Studies' Energy and National Security Programs's Energy in America project will explore the evolution and impact of oil and gas development in the Permian Basin. The talk will take place at CSIS's Washington, D.C., headquarters. |
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| Sept. 12 | The Women's Council on Energy and the Environment will host Mary Streett, Bp PLC's senior vice president of U.S. communications and external affairs, at the U.S. Energy Association in Washington, D.C. |
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| Sept. 13 | The National Capital Area Chapter of the U.S. Association for Energy Economics will host Christine Tezak, managing director of ClearView Energy Partners, for its September lunch in Washington, D.C. Tezak will discuss whether U.S. power capacity markets have "outlived their utility." |
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Notable stories from last week
Democrats target fossil fuels, express nuclear worries at climate town hall
Sanders walking into 'buzzsaw' with plan to boost US clean energy output
DC gridlock bleeding into historically bipartisan pipeline safety bill
Coal union calls for federal support, Trump tweet for miners' pensions


