GOV’T SHUTDOWN BRINGS VARYING IMPACTS ON DOE, EPA SO FAR

Tamar Hallerman
GHG Monitor
10/4/13

The current federal government shutdown appears to have had varying impacts, so far, on the federal agencies that oversee carbon capture and storage and air pollution rules; while the Environmental Protection Agency has furloughed the bulk of its workforce, much of the Department of Energy appears to have largely stayed open for much of the week. However, much still remains unclear about the impact of the shutdown on the Department’s Office of Fossil Energy (FE), as well as how much in prior year balances the program has leftover that can be used in the coming days to keep operations running if the budget impasse continues in Washington.

The shutdown was implemented on Oct. 1, after lawmakers failed to finalize legislation to continue to fund the federal government at the start of Fiscal Year 2014. Once the shutdown went into effect, it was immediately clear that the EPA was going to be one of the government agencies hit hardest. The agency announced that it would be furloughing roughly 94 percent of its more than 16,000 employees and only continuing activities that “ensure continued public health and safety” such Superfund site work and food inspections. Meanwhile, the agency furloughed the vast majority of its Office of Air and Radiation, the department charged with overseing carbon emissions standards for new power plants that were unveiled last month. The shutdown, if prolonged, could at least temporarily stop the clock on the agency’s work promulgating the rulemaking, since EPA has not yet published the draft rulemaking in the Federal Register.

Current Impact on DOE Unclear

The impact of the shutdown on DOE, meanwhile, appears to be more unclear, as some offices appeared to be operating somewhat normally for much of the week. In a plan posted on its website Sept. 27, the Department indicated that each of its offices would continue to operate until they exhaust prior year balances. As of press time, though, it was unclear how much money FE had leftover from FY 2013. DOE did not respond to a request for comment.

According to the Department’s shutdown plan, once offices exhaust their leftover funding, roughly 70 percent of DOE’s more than 13,800 staffers would be furloughed. Those excepted will be those needed to “to protect life and property,” presidential appointees and contractors whose jobs are financed by means other than annual appropriations bills, according to the shutdown blueprint. “However, depending upon the length of the lapse of the appropriations, whether government oversight is needed, and the availability of prior-year funding, the Department may need to review the activities of its contractors and only those activities where the suspension of the function of the contract would imminently threaten the safety of human life or the protection of property will be permitted to continue,” DOE cautioned.

Once money runs out at FE, the vast majority of the office’s 1,000 employees will likely be sent home, according to the Department’s plan. DOE indicated that a “small staff would be in place related to the protection of property” at FE headquarters in Washington, but that only one employee, acting Assistant Secretary for Fossil Energy Chris Smith, would be considered “excepted.” The blueprint said that four employees have been exempted at the National Energy Technology Laboratory, 11 at the Strategic Petroleum Reserve based in New Orleans and two at the Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Center in Casper, Wyo.

During a C-SPAN interview that aired this weekend, Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said the shutdown would have “significant impacts” on the Department. “We view this as really an unnecessary activity that impacts our delivery of services to the public, but we will cope as best we can,” Moniz said. “We have essential security functions that we will have to maintain through this period, while other activities will get trimmed back.”