Lower Energy Costs Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. HUFFMAN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to House Republicans' polluters over people act, H.R. 1.

This dangerous bill appears to be doubling down on dirty fossil fuels to pad the profits of polluters and Big Oil. Our Republican friends seem to be oblivious to the fact that, as we speak, there are communities in this country devastated by extreme weather events, from deadly tornadoes to life-threatening atmospheric rivers to unprecedented snowfall. Instead of legislating with an eye toward the future, our colleagues across the aisle are bringing up a bill that pretends there is no climate crisis.

Scientists agree that action on climate is literally life or death. The recent IPCC report that just came out reminds us that we are out of time. It is now or never if we want to spare our kids from a future that includes more frequent and even worse extreme weather events and more climate-driven food insecurity.

The world's best climate scientists call this a climate time bomb. Our Republican colleagues call it a hoax, and they produce bills like this.

My colleagues seem to want to talk about speeding up permitting. Great, let's talk about permitting.

Democrats just secured $1 billion for permitting streamlining in the Inflation Reduction Act for that very purpose. Let me remind you, not a single Republican voted for that bill, which was actually a solution to accelerating clean energy.

What are they trying to do instead?

They are trying to claw back the funding that we approved. They are trying to slow down permitting and do the exact opposite of what they claim that they want to see with their so-called permitting reform package.

If they want to protect this planet for future generations, then anyone who cares about that really needs to read the fine print of this bill because it would force agencies to hold oil and gas lease sales on public lands even if they are not needed. If these sales don't get enough bids, they are replaced with more sales, at lower prices. So we are not just giving away our public lands, we are doing it at laughably low prices, locking in these lands for oil and gas development for decades to come. This is not just extreme. It is obscene.

The Inflation Reduction Act included multiple oil and gas leasing reforms, modest reforms, to ensure that the public finally gets a fair share for onshore and offshore fossil fuel development. If we are going to begin to address the impacts of the climate crisis, then ending massive fossil fuel subsidies is a pretty good place to start. Under this legislation, not only are we going in the opposite direction, we are removing even these modest provisions to allow taxpayers to finally get their fair share from the incredible profits that these polluting industries would receive.

This legislation lowers royalty rates, repeals interest fees, reinstates noncompetitive leasing, and it does all of this while fossil fuel companies are rolling in record profits of $451 billion for the oil and gas industry last year.

H.R. 1 is the biggest rollback of the Clean Water Act that we have seen in 50 years. It will remove important clean water protections for States and Tribal Governments specifically. Under current law, section 401 of the Clean Water Act gives States and Tribes authority to review water quality as well as requirements of State law on any project or activity that requires a Clean Water Act permit. This bill would slash that authority and shorten the time frame for which they can review such projects.

Make no mistake, this will make it harder to protect the waterways and the communities that depend on clean water in this country. Whether you are in East Palestine or Philadelphia or anywhere else in this country, we should know better than to take something as critical as clean water for granted.

I had an amendment that would retain these section 401 protections for Tribal Governments. This was a simple test because often some of my Republican colleagues say that they believe in Tribal sovereignty and they want to empower Tribal voices. So we came up with an amendment to let them do that, to just at least take away this terrible provision when it came to Tribal Governments. They declined to move that amendment forward. It was blocked.

Why do our Republican colleagues want to block Tribal voices?

One of the last details that we should note, if you listen to the debt ceiling debate, this cyclical, situational concern for fiscal conservatism which is coming around again, my colleagues on the other side shout from the rooftops now about the deficit.

Well, guess what? This legislation is not just bad for people, not just bad for the planet, it is fiscally irresponsible. The CBO projects that it will add to the deficit.

Just a reminder, the Inflation Reduction Act, which all of my friends voted against, paid for itself and reduced the deficit.

Look, we do need to be talking about permit streamlining for clean energy infrastructure. This is very important. We need more efficient procedures to bring more renewable energy online, to modernize and upgrade electricity transmission facilities, but this bill doesn't even begin to touch any of that. That is our greatest need, and it is nowhere in this bill.

If my Republican friends want to be taken seriously regarding permitting reform and not just giveaways to polluters, they need to offer real solutions. This package is not it.

For the sake of the planet and future generations, I urge my colleagues to vote against this bill. There are real, workable solutions to addressing our energy needs, extreme weather, food insecurity, and all of the downstream consequences of climate change, but this bill doesn't do it.

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