WRAP UP

Tamar Hallerman
GHG Monitor
06/15/12

IN CONGRESS

Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee continued to prod the Environmental Protection Agency for not yet providing information on the total cost of its recently-finalized Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS). In a letter sent to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson late last week, Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and more than a dozen other Republicans on the panel said they were not satisfied with previous responses from EPA officials on the issue. “While we have received the May 8, 2012 response from Assistant Administrator Gina McCarthy providing an estimate of $35 billion for the capital component of the total cost, we continue to be extremely concerned that EPA has not yet provided to Congress or the American public an estimate of the total estimated compliance costs that includes the present value of both capital and non-capital costs,” the letter states. The letter is the most recent in a series sent to EPA officials this spring after McCarthy said EPA did not have figures on MATS’ total impact on the economy at an earlier hearing. The agency had instead released cost estimates for several benchmark years. In their letter, Congressional opponents said that the response was not satisfactory and asked for EPA to provide answers by the end of June.

AT DOE

Former Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy Director and nominee for Under Secretary of Energy Arun Majumdar completed his last day as a Department of Energy employee this week, ending his three-year tenure at the department. Majumdar completed his last official act as a DOE employee on June 13 in Denver, introducing Energy Secretary Steven Chu at a conference on the SunShot Initiative, media outlets reported. Majumdar previously said that he plans to move back to California to be with his family. DOE Assistant Secretary for Policy and International Affairs David Sandalow stepped in as acting under secretary of Energy last month, while Deputy Director of Technology Eric Toone began leading ARPA-E earlier this week.

ON THE INTERNATIONAL FRONT

The Canadian government said it is “working towards” an equivalency agreement with Saskatchewan for its proposed greenhouse gas performance standards, potentially giving the province more control over how it reduces emissions from its coal-fired power plants. Federal Environment Minister Peter Kent said late last week that Environment Canada is in the final stages of granting Saskatchewan more authority to regulate its GHG emissions, as long as its standards achieve the same environmental outcomes as the federal regulations, which are expected to be finalized this summer. Kent said that the equivalency will provide more flexibility and eliminate the piling of regulations in the province. “Both governments wish to avoid duplication of effort to control greenhouse gas emissions, and are working together to ensure that industry does not face two sets of regulations,” an Environment Canada release said. However, opponents said the agreement will allow the province to get away with more lax standards. Saskatchewan emits a large proportion of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions due to its heavy reliance on coal for power generation. Equivalency agreements are similar to ‘primacy’ status granted to U.S. states by the Environmental Protection Agency to help carry out its clean air and water regulations. In those cases, state standards must also be equivalent to national rulemakings in terms of stringency.