Transparency in Regulatory Analysis of Impacts on the Nation Act of 2011

Floor Speech

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Ms. DeGETTE. Mr. Chairman, for too long too many people in this body have proposed that we must make what amounts to a devil's bargain: choosing between environmental protections and jobs. Today, the ideology behind that false choice brings us to the brink of gutting one of our Nation's fundamental laws, the Clean Air Act.

Mr. Chairman, the Clean Air Act has safeguarded our economy and our families' health for decades. And despite heated rhetoric from the other side, it does not stand in the way of creating jobs. In 2010 alone, the Clean Air Act prevented 160,000 premature deaths, 3 million lost school days, and 13 million lost workdays.

By 2020, the Clean Air Act's total benefit to the economy will reach $2 trillion, outweighing the costs by 30-1. But despite the actual numbers, today we find ourselves debating a full attack on clean air--through the TRAIN Act--which would represent an unprecedented upheaval of our long-held pollution standards.

Now, Mr. Chairman, we had a 3-hour hearing in my committee, the Oversight Subcommittee, today talking about the alleged job loss that the majority claims would happen. I heard no--repeat no--evidence that these rules would cause a job loss. In fact, the evidence put into the record at the hearing showed that these regulations will create jobs at the same time they are preserving our citizens' health.

A key amendment to this act, which will be introduced later by Mr. Whitfield and which was accepted during the committee markup, is a dangerous measure that would indefinitely block two major Clean Air Act regulations. First, the Utility MACT rule, reducing mercury and other toxic emissions from power plants, and also the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, reducing sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants. Both of these rules are being developed after extensive cost benefit analyses.

Together, the two rules would prevent more than 50,000 premature deaths per year across the country. Now why would we delay implementation of the rules based solely on letters from constituents and anecdotal evidence? In fact, these two critical federal regulations correspond to successful pollution regulations in my home State of Colorado that are already bringing positive results for our State.

Now everybody in this Chamber knows the natural beauty of Colorado is a treasure for everyone to enjoy. People move there because of the clean air and safe water. It is also a primary driver in our economy through natural resources development and tourism. But because of mercury emissions from power plants, cement kilns, refineries, and commercial boilers, about 20 percent of our pristine lakes and reservoirs contain mercury-tainted fish, including in our alpine areas.

To combat that, Colorado has adopted some of the most stringent mercury rules in the country, with regulations on the books to cut mercury emissions by 80 percent by 2012 and 90 percent by 2018. These State regulations have been implemented successfully and to our collective economic benefit--a federal overlay to such regulations would bring the benefits that we have in States like Colorado to the entire Nation.

Colorado also has been a leader in cutting sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions to our economic and environmental benefit. While some States had a tough time designing haze-reduction plans in response to the Bush administration's now-defunct Clean Air Interstate Rule, Colorado didn't wait. We knew that we could clean up our power plants and also the power the economy.

So in 2010, Colorado enacted the Clean Energy Clean Jobs Act. The law calls for utilities to reduce haze-causing emissions of sulfur dioxide by about 80 percent and nitrogen oxide by about 85 percent. As a result, Colorado's largest utility, Xcel Energy, is on track to shutter four coal-powered plants, three in Denver, and replace that generation with natural gas-powered units. It will also install emissions controls for another 951 megawatts of coal-fired electrical generation. And, Mr. Chairman, Xcel expects that these improvements will only increase rates by 2 percent annually over the next 10 years.

Colorado's successful experience with these types of regulations stands as even further proof that effective and efficient regulations to protect our air and water bring ever growing benefits to our Nation. And blocking these regulations is a dangerous game where America's families will pay the price.

Mr. Chairman, the provisions of these amendments will fundamentally rewrite our approaches to the Clean Air Act regulations that have been the gold standard of our environmental laws since 1990.

I urge rejection of the amendments, and I urge rejection of this bill.

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