Cochran & Wicker Cosponsor Bill to Force EPA to Consider Economic Impact of Clean Air Rules

Press Release

U.S. Senators Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) and Roger Wicker (R-Miss) today said they are cosponsoring legislation that would prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency from finalizing any major Clean Air Act regulation without considering its economic impact.

The EPA Employment Impact Analysis Act (S.2161) was introduced Wednesday by Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.). It would force the EPA to adhere to Section 321(a) of the Clean Air Act, which requires EPA to conduct continuing evaluations of potential loss of jobs that result from enforcement of the Clean Air Act.

"Federal regulations have real consequences including the jobs lost and costly compliance burdens on businesses," Cochran said. "Unfortunately, it is needed because of the Obama administration's belief that it has free rein to implement the Clean Air Act in ways that are extraordinarily costly. We have experienced this first-hand in Mississippi when the administration failed to give adequate consideration to the economic impact of the nonattainment ozone designation in DeSoto County."

"EPA's rapid expansion should not move forward without full knowledge of how its existing rules are impacting American jobs," said Wicker, who serves on the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (EPW). "EPA is legally obligated to analyze its policies' cost to the economy and ought to comply with the law."

Inhofe, a senior member on the EPW Committee, included in the legislation examples of instances where the EPA did not follow Clean Air Act requirements for ongoing reviews of regulations it initially indicated would create increase employment but ended up eliminating jobs. Some of these examples include the agency's rules on cross state air pollution and Maximum Achievable Control Technology (MACT) regulations for boilers and utilities.

In recent years, Cochran and Wicker have been critical of EPA regulatory efforts regarding ozone rulings affecting DeSoto County, as well as Boiler MACT regulations for fossil fuel and biomass-fueled boilers.

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