Providing for Congressional Disapproval of the Rule Submitted By the Environmental Protection Agency Relating to ``Oil and Natural Gas Sector: Emission Standards for New, Reconstructed, and Modified Sources Review''

Floor Speech

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Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 486, I call up the joint resolution (S.J. Res. 14) providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Environmental Protection Agency relating to ``Oil and Natural Gas Sector: Emission Standards for New, Reconstructed, and Modified Sources Review'', and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

The Clerk read the title of the joint resolution.

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Mr. PALLONE. Res. 14.

Mr. Speaker, today, we are here to consider S.J. Res. 14, a joint resolution providing for congressional disapproval of the Environmental Protection Agency's 2020 methane rescission rule. This Trump EPA action removed direct Federal limits on methane pollution from new and modified oil and gas facilities, essentially increasing pollution and exacerbating the climate crisis.

While we are voting on the Senate version of this joint resolution today, I want to thank my colleagues, Representatives DeGette, Peters, and Lamb, for leading this effort in the House. The House version of this resolution advanced out of the Energy and Commerce Committee earlier this month.

Mr. Speaker, methane is a potent climate-disrupting greenhouse gas that is responsible for approximately one-third of our warming and resulting climate disruption. Addressing methane is an urgent and essential step to mitigate climate change.

The greatest and most cost-effective way to curb methane pollution over the next decade is through the fossil fuel sector, which is the largest industrial source of methane emissions in the United States.

Under the Clean Air Act, the EPA has a responsibility and obligation to protect public health and welfare from dangerous climate pollution like methane. But because of the Trump rescission rule, there are now no clean air protections in place to curb dangerous methane pollution from the oil and gas sector.

What is more, the Trump rule created massive regulatory loopholes that shield the vast majority of climate pollution produced by the oil and gas industry from critical Federal standards for years to come.

The Trump action was a thinly veiled attempt to block regulation of the worst oil and gas industry actors at the expense of our health, our safety, and our planet; and it came at a time when we need these protections more than ever.

Mr. Speaker, without bold action to curb emissions from the hundreds of thousands of sources in the oil and gas sector, methane pollution will continue to cause significant harm to public health, threaten the stability of our economy, and compromise the well-being of future generations and the planet.

That is why this joint resolution disapproving of the rescission rule and reinstating the 2016 Obama-era methane standards is so important.

Ambitiously addressing methane can yield tremendous climate, public health, and financial benefits across the country. It is why we see an outpouring of support from business and consumer groups, State and Tribal officials, local government officials, outdoor recreation and tourism leaders, environmental and conservation groups, and health and faith leaders. We even have significant support from within the oil and gas industry itself.

So, today, we are using the Congressional Review Act to soundly reject and nullify one of the most egregious environmental rollbacks of the Trump administration.

With today's vote, Congress stops the significant retreat we witnessed during the previous administration in the fight against climate change, and we reinstate an essential tool for addressing the harm a warming world means for our communities, our health, our economy, and the planet.

With today's vote, Congress restores the robust Clean Air Act pollution standards established in 2012 and 2016, while clearing a path for stronger protections in the future.

With today's vote, Mr. Speaker, Congress recognizes the danger methane poses, as well as the economic opportunity and certainty created with commonsense and cost-effective limits on this pollution.

Since the Senate already passed S.J. Res. 14 with a bipartisan vote of 52-42, it is now up to the House to do the same so we can send this resolution to the President's desk.

For the sake of our communities, our families, our country, and our future, I strongly urge all Members to join me in supporting this joint resolution.

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Mr. PALLONE. DeGette), your neighbor and the prime sponsor of this legislation.

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Mr. PALLONE. Leger Fernandez), who also represents one of my favorite places, Santa Fe.

Ms. LEGER FERNANDEZ. Mr. Speaker, I do welcome everybody in this Chamber to New Mexico, which is indeed one of the beautiful places that I get to call home. But you know what, New Mexico, my beautiful place I call home is also ground zero for the climate crisis.

The West is experiencing a devastating drought, coupled with damaging wildfires, and these are caused, undoubtedly, by the climate crisis we are experiencing. My beautiful State is also home to both the Permian and the San Juan Basins. And because of that, we also have some of the highest levels of methane pollution. We also have some of the highest levels of asthma rates among our beautiful children.

And every bit of methane that is released is wasted. It is wasted. It is a valuable resource that is released into the air by methane venting, through flaring, and simply because they have not maintained their sites.

But methane that is released and flared and leaked is also a resource upon which my State cannot collect severance taxes, upon which my State cannot collect royalties. And so when that methane is leaked and flared and vented, those same children who are suffering from those high asthma rates, they lose the resources that should go into our public education.

Mr. Speaker, I will say that my State--which needs every little nickel and dime, because we are a poor State, and which relies on those oil and gas revenues--what did we do? We recently enacted some of our own rules to curb methane emissions from oil and gas activity, and these rules are now considered to be the best in the country.

If New Mexico can lead the way, we can follow it here in Congress, because taking action at the Federal level is reasonable, it is common sense.

As Don Schreiber, one of my constituents and a rancher in New Mexico who has those issues on his site says, ``New Mexicans built our oil and gas infrastructure, and these same communities can now design, manufacture, and install the technology to monitor and prevent methane emissions.''

Because you know what? Regulation spurs innovation, and we are looking forward to that innovation and those good jobs that will come from the methane regulation that we will have now when we overturn this rule.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, Senator Heinrich, for introducing and advancing this legislation in the Senate, and my great colleagues here, Representatives DeGette, Lamb, and Pallone for advancing and championing the cause of my wonderful children and students and State here on this rule.

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Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. PALLONE. Leger Fernandez).

Ms. LEGER FERNANDEZ. Mr. Speaker, I would also like to bring to this body's attention that this resolution will actually put New Mexico on the same playing field as the rest of the country because, as I noted earlier, New Mexico has now adopted some of the strictest methane regulations in the country.

And those regulations, similar to what we are seeing now, were adopted in consultation and with the support of many in the oil and gas industry who participated in the rulemaking, who recognize that it is in their best interest to operate in a manner that is safe, in a manner that does not lose this precious resource. That is how we came to our regulations in New Mexico.

But we are at a disadvantage in New Mexico because, as it was noted earlier, if some States have nice, good regulations with regard to methane emissions and others don't, then in the Permian Basin, for example, what would stop a company from saying: I am going to drill in Texas and not in New Mexico because they are protecting our environment in New Mexico?

So what I look forward to seeing is having New Mexico be at the same place as the rest of the country, so that we are not losing our drilling to Texas, who doesn't have it. Mr. Speaker, I like the idea of everybody has the same set of rules.

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Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, can I inquire as to how much time is remaining on each side?
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Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close if the gentleman is.

Mr. Speaker, it is quickly becoming clear that the greatest potential to curb methane, and thus climate change, in the next decade is in the fossil fuel sector.

The U.N. Environment Program and the Climate and Clean Air Coalition published the ``Global Methane Assessment'' just last month, and they found that fast and ambitious methane mitigation is one of the best strategies available today to deliver immediate and long-lasting benefits for climate, agriculture, human, and ecosystem health.

They also found that rapid and dramatic methane pollution cuts could both slow global warming and prevent a quarter-million deaths every year.

Also, reduction measures used to curb methane from the oil and gas sector would also cost the least or, in some cases, even have negative costs, as captured methane can be resold for revenue in the oil and gas sector.

These relatively inexpensive methane reduction methods are possible with currently available technology, like fixing leaks in gas pipelines and stopping venting in gas drilling.

These findings support what many already know to be true, that ambitiously addressing methane pollution can yield tremendous climate, public health, and financial--and I stress ``and financial''--benefits across the economy. This is why we see most of the oil and gas companies supporting this resolution.

Disapproving a rule that would lead to an increase in methane pollution, and reinstating the 2016 rule's commonsense and cost- effective safeguards, should be an easy ``yes'' vote. For that reason, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I am here today to oppose S.J. Res. 14, the Methane rule Congressional Review Act repeal. The Democrat majority and the Administration are not passing this legislation for climate change, they are passing it to support big oil and foreign petrol dictators. We are in a weird place in this Nation when the action of hurting American energy development in favor of foreign development is celebrated by the majority, but that is where we are today. While my Majority colleagues are celebrating this as a massive win, the reality is the only people winning from this action are people who don't need wins, and the losers are the American people.

By repealing this common sense balanced rule, this Congress will now put the agencies in a place with fewer tools, fewer options, and on a path for a rule which will directly harm most of our nation's oil and gas producers, while leaving the world's worst actors free to continue polluting the globe. America's oil industry isn't made up of supermajor oil players, much of America's oil comes from small and mid-sized producers. The rules proposed by the Obama Administration would have decimated that sector of the oil and gas industry with burdensome costs and massive paperwork requirements, all for a fractional impact on methane emissions. The rule drafted by the Trump Administration recognized this and would have protected all industry while at the same time working to lower our national methane emissions. However, as a result of this action today the Democrat Majority is deciding that they want to side against small businesses and join the side of Big Oil pushing costly, burdensome, and ineffective methane regulations on all American producers. The result will be an oil and gas industry dominated by bigger and bigger oil companies using their size and buying ability to squeeze out small producers.

But Big Oil isn't the only winner Democrats are picking today. Foreign petrol dictators are winners as well. Not a single foreign producer is obligated to meet our methane rules for their production. So while the result of this bill will be to squeeze small oil and gas producers in Bakersfield and Kern, California, the foreign, Russian and Saudi imports that make up a majority of the California oil consumption will be untouched. There isn't a single Aramco, Saudi, oil well in the world that will comply with the methane rule that will be produced as a result of this action today. But there will be millions and billions of barrels of Saudi oil consumed in California over the next decades.

Again, don't let the majority fool you today, this action isn't about reducing methane emissions or impacting climate change, this action is about Big Government supporting Big Oil and giving foreign petrol dictatorships an advantage over American producers. That is why I am voting no on this bill and urge all my colleagues to do the same.

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Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

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