Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. BEYER. Mr. Chairman, I rise to offer an amendment to provide $11.5 billion to fund emergency infrastructure repairs related to the National Park Service deferred maintenance backlog.

Mr. Chair, earlier this month, the National Park Service, at the recommendation of the Department of Transportation, took the precautionary measure of closing two lanes on the iconic Arlington Memorial Bridge, one of the most important entrances to the Nation's Capital and a major artery for many of my constituents commuting to work every day.

The crisis of the Memorial Bridge, whose replacement will cost a startling $250 million, demonstrates the degradation of park infrastructure throughout the country. It also shows the extent of the backlog and the need to provide funds to ensure reliability for the economy as well as the safety of the public.

The backlog has also grown because of a steady decline in the construction account. Over the last decade, there has been a 62 percent decline, $227 million in today's dollars. The Park Service receives only 58 cents out of every dollar needed just to keep the backlog from growing.

Mr. Chair, the United States is the richest country in the history of mankind. We are the democratic leader, the military leader, the human rights leader, the financial leader of all the world. Can we not also be the investment leader?

This country needs to be the country that invests in our infrastructure today for our children and our grandchildren tomorrow.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. BEYER. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of Representative Tsongas' amendment to support the National Park Service's Centennial Challenge.

As a former National Park Service Ranger, I am proud to serve as a Congressional Friend of the National Park Service Centennial, and I eagerly await the centennial in 2016: Find Your Park.

As the NPS approaches its centennial year, it is important to ensure they have the resources they need to enter into the second century of service to the American people. The Interior Subcommittee has tried its very best to invest in parks, given its insufficient allocation; but with the centennial approaching and the buildup of park needs, this level is not remotely enough for parks.

Recognizing the serious impact of both the Budget Control Act and emergency wildfire suppression on the Interior allocation, Congress still must find a way to meet the needs of parks by securing another budget deal to get rid of the threat of sequester. There is no better time than the centennial for a robust investment in our national parks by Congress and the American people. It is time to make our national parks a national priority.

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Mr. BEYER. Mr. Chair, my amendment would correct the assertion in this bill that all forest biomass is carbon neutral. The assertion is simply scientifically inaccurate.

In 2012, EPA's Scientific Advisory Board directly challenged the claim that all forest biomass is carbon neutral, explaining that while some types of carbon biomass may indeed be, it is inappropriate to assume that all types of forest biomass are carbon neutral. This misperception could have serious consequences for wildlife habitat and for our ability to combat climate change in the coming years. In fact, numerous studies have underscored that using some types of forest biomass, particularly slow-growing trees, can actually increase atmospheric carbon for many decades.

The New York Times this Tuesday mentioned a study commissioned by the State of Massachusetts that indicated that the climate impacts of burning wood were worse than those for coal for 45 years and worse than that for natural gas for 90 years.

To know what types of biomass are truly low-carbon, scientists need to actually assess them, and treating all forest biomass as carbon neutral is risky. The Energy Information Administration has found that this will lead to a boom in the use of forest and other biomass for energy.

While this sounds like a good idea on the surface, the resulting logging would have dire consequences for climate mitigation and wildlife habitat. It would also drive up the price of pulpwood and other lower grades of wood for wood-product industries.

In my State of Virginia, local environmental organizations are concerned that if biomass is treated as carbon neutral, it would encourage Dominion Virginia Power to burn wood from forests to meet its emission reduction obligations. Dominion has already converted three of its existing coal plants to run on biomass fuel and has a hybrid energy center that can burn up to 20 percent biomass for fuel.

I share the concern of these local groups that Virginia will become known as a State that harvests forests to reduce its dependence on coal, rather than developing renewable technologies that clearly reduce emissions, such as solar and wind. More broadly, I worry about the precedent that this will set for forest management policy in the U.S. and around the world.

We have already seen that under the European Emissions Trading System, where biomass has a zero emissions rating, European companies have invested billions to convert coal plants to plants that can burn wood pellets, leading to an incredible demand for wood. Earlier this month, The Washington Post reported that Europe's climate policies have led to more U.S. trees being cut down as wood pellets are being exported to meet the demand for wood fuel.

More than two dozen pellet factories have been constructed in the southeastern U.S. over the past decade, along with special port facilities in Virginia and Georgia to ship the wood to Europe. Demand for wood in Europe is so robust that wood pellet exports from the U.S. nearly doubled from 2012 to 2013 and are expected to nearly double again this year.

We should not create artificial demand to meet scientifically unsubstantiated goals. It is critical that we make sure that the accounting used to estimate net biogenic emissions is scientifically accurate before we implement policies that might add carbon pollution rather than reduce it.

Mr. Chair, I will withdraw this amendment, but I do so urging my colleagues to support policies that are scientifically accurate, and to realize that not all forest biomass is carbon neutral, and that the EPA should take that into consideration.

I look forward to working with the chairman and the ranking member to more appropriately consider biomass.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment.

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