Wealth for the Working Class: The Clean Energy Economy
The clean energy economy has seen robust growth in recent decades and now presents the opportunity for widespread wealth creation that benefits American small businesses, their workers, and consumers. It has the potential to create millions of good-paying jobs spread across tens of thousands of businesses while simultaneously lowering energy prices for consumers.
This hearing will focus on workforce development initiatives in the clean energy economy, discuss Congressional proposals regarding clean energy, and explore the potential for the growth this industry could unleash.
Witnesses- Leticia Colon De Mejias, Chief Executive Officer of Energy Efficiencies Solutions and Co-chair for the Building Performance Association, Energy Efficiencies Solutions
- James Hasselbeck , Director of Operations , ReVision Energy, Inc., South Portland, ME
- Samuel Gilchrist, Western Campaigns Director, Natural Resources Defense Council, Denver, CO
- Tom Greer, Proprietor and Owner, Hub City Brewing Co., Belen, NM, Testifying on behalf of the Consumer Energy Alliance
Examining the President’s Fiscal Year 2022 Budget Proposal for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
On Wednesday, July 21, 2021 at 10:00 A.M. EDT, in room 1324 Longworth Hearing Room and online via Cisco Webex, the Subcommittee on Water, Oceans, and Wildlife will hold a hybrid oversight hearing titled, “Examining the President’s Fiscal Year 2022 Budget Proposal for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.” This hearing will also be streamed on the Committee’s YouTube.
Witnesses- David Palumbo, Deputy Commissioner of Operations, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
- Dr. Don Cline, Associate Director, Water Resources, U.S. Geological Survey
- Dr. Richard W. Spinrad, Administrator, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
- Stephen D. Guertin, Deputy Director, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
SBA’s Role in Climate Solutions
The Committee on Small Business Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Regulations will hold a hybrid hearing titled: “SBA’s Role in Climate Solutions.” The hearing is scheduled to begin at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, July 21, 2021 in Room 2360 of the Rayburn House Office Building. Participating members can also join remotely via Zoom.
Climate change is increasingly becoming a threat to local economies, but small businesses can take steps to become more resilient and boost their competitiveness. The SBA can support efforts to facilitate access to capital for climate change mitigation investments and resilience efforts. This hearing will allow members to learn more about the role that small businesses can play in addressing climate change, and how federal programs and services support small businesses adapt, innovate, and thrive.
Witnesses- Laurel Walk, Chief Lending Officer, Colorado Lending Source, Ltd., Testifying on behalf of the National Association of Development Companies (NADCO)
- Rick Chapman, General Manager and Certified Marina Manager, Port of Sunnyside Club, Inc., Stillwater, MN, Testifying on behalf of the Midwest Marina Association in his role as President
- Dr. Lynn Abramson, President, Clean Energy Business Network
- Mark Glenn, Owner and Chief Executive Officer, FASTSIGNS, Carrollton, TX, Testifying on behalf of the International Franchise Association (IFA)
Examining the Potential for a Civilian Climate Corps
- Tonya Gayle, Executive Director, Green City Force
- Chas Robles, Corps Director, Ancestral Lands Conservation Corps
- Scott Segerstrom, Executive Director, Colorado Youth Corps Association
- LaJuan D. Tucker, Environmental Program Coordinator, Wildlife Austin and the Austin Nature Preservation System
- Tate Watkins, Research Fellow, Property and Environment Research Center
21st Century Communities: Climate Change, Resilience, and Reinsurance
- Dr. Abdollah Shafieezadeh, Lichtenstein Endowed Professor Of Civil, Environmental And Geodetic Engineering And Director Of The Risk Assessment And Management Of Structural And Infrastructure Systems Lab, The Ohio State University
- Dr. Rachel Cleetus, Policy Director, Union of Concerned Scientists
- Frank Nutter, President, Reinsurance Association of America
- Roger Pielke Jr., Professor Of Environmental Studies, University of Colorado
- Jerry Theodorou, Director Of Finance, Insurance, And Trade, R Street Institute
Treatment of Environmental Justice in NRC Activities
The purpose of these meetings is to describe NRC staff efforts in assessing Environmental Justice in NRC’s programs, policies, and activities as directed by the Commission in Staff Requirements Memorandum (ADAMS Accession No. ML21113A070). The staff will provide an overview of current and planned activities and receive comments from members of the public.
There will be two meetings; one from 1:30 pm to 3 pm and one from 8 pm to 9:30 pm.
Comments will be accepted from members of the public and other stakeholders from 8:30 until meeting closing at 9:30 pm. NRC staff will also answer process-related questions after everyone has had a chance to provide comments during the meeting, time permitting. A transcript of the meeting will be available approximately 10 days after the meeting and a link to the transcript will be referenced in the meeting summary.
1:30 pm-3 pm: Webinar Link (Microsoft Teams)NRC staff contacts are Allen Fetter, Office of the Executive Director for Operations, at Allen.Fetter@nrc.gov or (301) 415-8556, and Ed Miller at (301) 415-2481.
Additionally, NRC is requesting comments as part of its systematic review for how NRC programs, policies, and activities address environmental justice. Specifically, the NRC would like input on how the agency is addressing environmental justice, considering the agency’s mission and statutory authority. The information will be used to inform the agency’s assessment of how it addresses environmental justice.
Submit comments by August 23, 2021. Comments received after this date will be considered if it is practical to do so, but the NRC is able to ensure consideration only for comments received on or before this date.
You may submit comments by any of the following methods:- Telephone: 301–415–3875.
- Email: NRC-EJReview@nrc.gov
- Mail comments to: Office of Administration, Mail Stop: TWFN–7–A60M, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555–0001, ATTN: Program Management, Announcements and Editing Staff.
Please reference Docket ID NRC–2021–0137 in your comment submission.
Policy + Pints: The Urgent Need for a Civilian Climate Corps with Sen. Ed Markey
Markey your calendars: Evergreen’s next Policy + Pints happy hour is coming up—and, as you might have guessed, Senator Ed Markey is joining us! We’re going to be talking about the urgent need to launch a Civilian Climate Corps. (Think of it as a justice-driven, climate-centered version of FDR’s Civilian Conservation Corps.)
In this virtual BYOB special hosted by Evergreen Action campaigns director Lena Moffitt, we’ll chat with:- Senator Markey
- Tonya Gayle, executive director, Green City Force
- Lauren Maunus, advocacy director, Sunrise Movement
about:
- Why the CCC is such a powerful opportunity for taking on our overlapping climate and economic crises
- How overwhelmingly popular it is
- What corpsmembers would actually do in communities across the country
- And more!
Bring beer, tea, wine, kombucha—whatever!—and join us on Wednesday, July 14 at 4 pm ET / 1 pm PT.
Heat, Fires, and the Climate Connection
The wildfires forecast this summer in the American West could be the biggest climate story of 2021 (until November’s Glasgow summit). And the unprecedented heat waves now scorching much of the American West are another painful sign that the climate emergency is here. Conditions are likely to worsen as much of the region is suffering severe drought and the hottest months of the year are still to come. Good journalism will not only inform people how to stay safe, but also make the climate connection to communicate what’s driving the dangers at hand.
To talk about how to cover the story, please join Covering Climate Now for our next Talking Shop webinar. We’ll discuss the science behind the heat wave, drought, and wildfires; the extreme weather that is also afflicting countries throughout the world; and how journalists can cover these stories in ways that connect with their audiences.
All bona fide journalists are invited to attend, even if their newsrooms are not formal partners of CCNow.
Panelists:- Adriene Hill, Managing Editor at NPR’s California Newsroom
- Sarah Kaplan, Climate Reporter at The Washington Post
- Sammy Roth, Energy Reporter at Los Angeles Times
Mark Hertsgaard, CCNow’s executive director, and the environment correspondent for The Nation, will moderate.
Date/Time:
Thursday, July 8th at 1pm US Eastern Time/10am US Pacific Time.
RSVP:
Reserve your spot here — You can submit your questions ahead of time in the RSVP form or during the Q&A portion of the webinar.
Questions? Please email symone@coveringclimatenow.org
Plastic Waste Reduction and Recycling Research: Moving from Staggering Statistics to Sustainable Systems
The purpose of this hearing is to discuss federal research and development and standards development needs to help address the plastic waste crisis and barriers to the current recycling system. In addition, the Subcommittee will explore challenges and opportunities for adopting sustainable upstream plastic waste reduction solutions and efficacy of existing lifecycle analysis models for assessing the impact of plastic waste and metrics for sustainability. The Subcommittee will also consider the role that the Plastic Waste Reduction and Recycling Research Act can play in addressing these important issues.
Opening Statements- Chairwoman Haley Stevens (D-MI) of the Subcommittee on Research and Technology
- Chairwoman Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX)
- Keefe Harrison, Chief Executive Officer, The Recycling Partnership
- Dr. Marc Hillmyer, Director and Principle Investigator, University of Minnesota National Science Foundation Center for Sustainable Polymers
- Dr. Gregory Keoleian, Director, Center for Sustainable Systems, Peter M. Wege Professor of Sustainable Systems, School for Environment and Sustainability, Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, co-Coordinator, Engineering Sustainable Systems Program, University of Michigan
- Joshua Baca, Vice President, Plastics Division, American Chemistry Council
Infrastructure needs of the U.S. energy sector, western water and public lands
The purpose of this hearing is to examine the infrastructure needs of the U.S. energy sector, western water and public lands, and to consider the legislative proposal attached, the Energy Infrastructure Act.
Opening Remarks- Sen. Joe Manchin, Chairman, Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
- Dr. Kathleen Hogan, Acting Undersecretary for Science and Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
- Tanya Trujillo, Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Water and Science, U.S. Department of the Interior
- Chris French, Deputy Chief, National Forest System, U.S. Department of Agriculture
- Douglas Holtz-Eakin, President, American Action Forum
- Collin O’Mara, President and CEO, National Wildlife Federation
- Mark P. Mills, Senior Fellow, Manhattan Institute
While President Biden gave his blessing for a bipartisan infrastructure framework yesterday, Sen. Joe Manchin was already pushing the committee he chairs to get a jump-start on its portion of the spending.Manchin, chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, has long pressed for a bipartisan infrastructure package. Indeed, the West Virginia Democrat is widely seen as the key reason negotiations on a deal have persisted.
Now all Manchin needs to do is get everyone on board with his $95 billion draft proposal.
“This bill will go into our infrastructure package,” Manchin told E&E News yesterday in the midst of a hearing on his proposal, which emerged late last week as the negotiations on a bipartisan deal began ramping up.
The timing of yesterday’s hearing — just hours before Biden backed the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure framework agreed to by White House negotiators and a group of senators that included Manchin — was no accident.
Former Energy and Natural Resources Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who was one of the 10 senators who spent hours this week negotiating the agreement with top Biden administration officials, said yesterday that her successor atop the panel used the weeks of meetings to inform his draft bill.
“We have the contours of the energy infrastructure in our framework,” Murkowski said in an interview after returning from a meeting with Biden on the plan.
“What Manchin has done — and keep in mind, this has come together very, very quickly — is to try to write a bill utilizing the framework that has been under discussion now for these past few weeks.”
However, while the framework released by the White House contains a $73 billion line item for “power infrastructure including grid authority,” it leaves the details to Congress.
“We got to write the bill,” Murkowski noted.
Manchin conceded the point yesterday. “Everything that you are seeing in that framework the president put out, that has to be all worked in every committee of jurisdiction,” he said. “So we started ours because we knew where we were at and how much we had to work with.”
Yesterday’s hearing, which will be followed by a markup after the July 4 recess, “gives us a little bit of a jump on everybody,” he said. “That’s why we wanted to do the hearing now.”
Manchin’s draft legislation would infuse $95 billion into efforts like fortifying fragile electric grids, bolstering supply chains for critical minerals and ramping up energy efficiency efforts.
The proposal also includes the creation of a $1.2 billion annual credit program that would give the executive branch the power to help financially struggling nuclear power plants stay online. It would also fully fund clean energy demonstration projects approved by the Energy Act of 2020.
“With the right strategy, reinvesting in our nation’s infrastructure can also strengthen the economy, create jobs, boost our competitiveness and help tackle climate change,” Manchin said yesterday during the hearing on energy infrastructure.
But he still faces a challenge in selling the plan to his Senate colleagues. Murkowski, who led the panel in the last Congress with Manchin at her side as ranking member, isn’t entirely sold on it, although she conceded that she’s been so busy this week on infrastructure talks that she’s still absorbing the substance of the bill.
“Let’s just say it’s not perfect, but we don’t even know how we’re going to work out some of the details here,” Murkowski said.
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), who has encouraged the bipartisan negotiations, said yesterday that he was encouraged that there was a deal on individual line-item spending, but noted, “We still need a lot more details on that.”
He had not seen Manchin’s plan, but said bipartisan support for the $73 billion for energy infrastructure bodes well for agreement on the finer details.
“Anything that this group of Democrats and a group of Republicans agree to is likely to be acceptable,” he said in an interview. “It’s likely to leave a lot of things undone, but it’s likely to be acceptable.”
Manchin kicks off energy debate Manchin made his case for the bill during yesterday’s hearing, which featured witnesses from the Biden administration across the Energy and Interior departments.
Those officials and some Democratic senators largely endorsed the draft language put forward by Manchin, although backers pressed the committee to go even further in its spending to better match the proposals pitched by the White House in the American Jobs Plan.
Kathleen Hogan, acting undersecretary for science and energy at DOE, largely heralded the Manchin proposal, backing the grid authority language, clean energy demonstration project funding and billions in energy efficiency spending.
“That said, additional capabilities, flexibilities and funding as outlined in the American Jobs Plan are needed,” Hogan cautioned, including the need for a clean energy standard along the lines pitched by the Biden administration to move the electric sector to 100% clean energy by 2035.
The call for a clean energy standard was echoed by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.).
“I think we need to look hard at a clean energy standard to meet the scale of time that is necessary in this transition,” Heinrich said.
Progressives have demanded that any infrastructure package include significant provisions dedicated to tackling the climate crisis.
While many Democratic lawmakers applauded Manchin’s proposal, they insisted that more money needs to be in the final package.
“We are going to need, in my view, increased funding above what is in this proposal, but I think we all know we have to work on these issues in the way this committee has always focused, which is to do it in a bipartisan way,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
Republican opposition While the proposal largely earned high marks from Biden administration officials, Republicans were more skeptical about the committee process so far for the crafting of the bill, as well as the high price tag associated with some of the programs in Manchin’s draft proposal.
Energy and Natural Resources ranking member John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) specifically griped that Republicans were not consulted in the drafting of the bill, although he did express support for programs that would help keep online the existing nuclear fleet and advance carbon capture technology.
“The lack of consultation means we are not including the priorities from all of our committee members, who represent states with different needs,” Barrasso said. “There is time to right the ship, to build this consensus, and to pass something we all can support.”
Barrasso also complained that the bill would extend past the authorization responsibilities of the committee to include direct appropriations, a prospect with “no precedent where this committee appropriated anything close to the $100 billion included in this draft bill.”
Those criticisms specifically targeted provisions in the bill that would promote energy efficiency, including money to bolster building code improvements, $500 million set aside for efficiency improvements at schools and $3.5 billion for DOE’s Weatherization Assistance Program.
In addition to price tag complaints, Republicans lamented the lack of language to induce permitting reforms for energy infrastructure like transmission lines or natural gas pipelines.
Such changes are needed, they argued, to have any chance of deploying infrastructure on the scale needed to meet the Biden administration’s carbon reduction targets.
“I’m not an opponent to any of this, but we have to figure out what are realistic timelines for how we are going to handle the permitting and how we are going to be able to solve that, or all of this is good theory and we will still be discussing it in 2060,” said Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.).