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Policy

Energy: Tough Questions Not Likely To Be Addressed

by Jeff Johnson
January 21, 2013 | A version of this story appeared in Volume 91, Issue 3

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The heads of a blue donkey and a red elephant angrily stare each other down.
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Concerning energy, the questions and problems facing Congress and the nation are as obvious as they are profound. The fate of nuclear waste, the need to modernize and expand the electricity grid, the balance of domestic use and export of U.S. natural gas reserves, and the proper levels of government support for new technologies are but a few of them. Whether today’s sharply divided and highly partisan Congress will have the ability or will to legislatively address these issues remains in question.

One of the key energy committees—the Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee—has a new chairman and a new set of priorities. With the retirement from the Senate of longtime committee Chairman Sen. Jeff Bingaman Jr. (D-N.M.), Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) will now lead the body. Wyden has more than 30 years of experience in Congress, 16 of them in the Senate. On the minority side, leadership stands pat with Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) as the committee’s ranking minority member.

Over the years, Wyden has shown wide interest in energy issues, which are particularly important in the Northwest. Topics have ranged from wind energy and hydropower to the cleanup of the Department of Energy’s former atomic bomb plant in Hanford, Wash. Wyden’s staff listed a potpourri of possible energy themes the committee may address. They include natural gas development, reform of the royalty program on federal lands, federal incentives for clean energy development, nuclear waste handling, and an examination of DOE’s clean energy development programs.

Top priority will be domestic natural gas production and possible gas exports. Several gas export sites have been proposed for the Pacific Northwest, and Wyden has voiced concern that the ever-growing U.S. supply of natural gas should remain available to U.S. industries and not be lost through exports. Staff members say the chairman wants to ensure the resource is developed in a manner that both is environmentally sound and avoids a public backlash that could curb development. His staff stress that Wyden doesn’t oppose exports but is concerned about how production is maintained.

Along with natural gas, aides say, Wyden will seek an examination of federal royalty programs, including the possibility of royalty sharing with states. The royalty review is likely to involve more than on- and offshore oil and gas production and could include royalties for development of timber and renewable energy projects on federal lands. Wyden’s goal is to stabilize royalties and share them with resource-dependent communities near federal lands, providing communities with royalties and a financial cushion based on such lands.

On the House of Representatives side, energy, jobs, and economics will continue to be the focus of the Energy & Commerce Committee. Staff say the committee will maintain its past efforts “of protecting businesses and consumers from harmful Environmental Protection Agency regulations.” Like last year, the committee will hold another series of Clean Air Act forums, staff say, to examine implementation of the act’s regulations and include testimony from state and industry EPA critics.

Other subjects likely to be addressed include U.S. energy independence, energy-related permitting decisions, oil and gas exports, the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard, and federal energy spending, staff say. Committee Republicans say they will continue their criticism of EPA, DOE, and Obama Administration energy policies and possibly pass legislation to block environmental regulations and stop DOE support for clean energy programs. As in the last Congress, the bills are unlikely to be taken up by the Senate.

Another energy-related House committee—the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee—is also likely to continue its investigation of federal programs. Over the past two years, the committee has been deeply involved in investigating DOE programs, particularly renewable energy loans. Early this month, the committee was reorganized and the number of subcommittees cut from seven to five, Rep. Darrell E. Issa (D-Calif.), committee chairman, announced.

Committee staff outlined several potential government subjects worthy of committee oversight and investigations in addition to DOE’s energy programs, such as efforts on oil and gas fracturing and the new natural gas boom. Signaling a continuation of the committee’s aggressive oversight of EPA, Issa announced on Jan. 4 his intention to subpoena EPA documents pertaining to the agency’s investigation of potential pollution from a large-scale mining operation in Bristol Bay, Alaska.

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