Senate Appropriations Releases FY 24 Interior and Environment Bill
The Senate Appropriations Committee marked up the fiscal year (FY) 2024 Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations bill, which funds most Department of Interior and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) activities. The bill would provide $42.695 billion in total funding, which includes $2.76 billion for aging water infrastructure. The bill mainly preserves federal clean water spending at current funding levels, including preserving current funding levels for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds (SRFs). The House Interior bill proposed cutting the Clean Water SRF by 67 percent and the Drinking Water SRF by 59 percent.
The bill provides $373 million to the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI), which is $5 million above the FY 2023 allotment and the President’s FY 2024 budget request. The bill also includes $31.5 million for the U.S. FWS’s invasive carp program; $11 million for the USGS’s invasive carp program; at least $15 million for the USGS’s Great Lakes Science Center; and $3 million for the Great Lakes Fish and Wildlife Restoration Act.
Senate Confirms New IJC U.S. Section Chair
The U.S. Senate last week confirmed Gerald (Jerry) Acker, President Joseph Biden’s nomination to serve as a commissioner and chair of the International Joint Commission (IJC). The IJC serves as a binational group that regulates the uses of the Great Lakes and other waters shared by the U.S. and Canada.
Mr. Acker is the founder of Goodman Acker P.C. and served as a managing partner from 1993 – 2022. Having received his undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan in 1977, he went on to earn a Juris Doctorate in 1981 from Wayne State University Law School. Mr. Acker was elected as President of the Michigan Association for Justice in 2012 and remains a member of the Bar in the state of Michigan and the District of Columbia. He succeeds Ms. Jane Corwin, who served from 2019 – 2022.
The IJC prevents and resolves disputes between the United States of America and Canada under the 1909 Boundary Waters Treaty and pursues the common good of both countries as an independent and objective advisor to the two governments. U.S. and Canadian Commissioners work together to play a binational oversight role, in matters involving water quality and quantity issues on the topics and in the basins where the governments have requested the IJC’s assistance.
Senate Budget Committee Hearing Examines Impact of Climate Change on Infrastructure
The Senate Committee on the Budget held a hearing on Wednesday July 26, entitled “Beyond the Breaking Point: The Fiscal Consequences of Climate Change on Infrastructure” to examine the cost of action and inaction that will be imposed on governments and communities as critical infrastructure is imperiled in the face of climate change.
In opening remarks, Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse (D - RI) acknowledged the natural disasters sweeping the nation, from floods and wildfires to droughts and extreme heat. He stated that these events impact not only human lives and ecosystems, but the critical infrastructure that the nation and local communities rely on day-to-day. From roadways to bridges to individual homes, infrastructure in the U.S. is bearing the brunt of the impacts of climate change, as erosion, flooding, and full-on breakdowns decrease asset lifespans. Senator Whitehouse asserted that this in turn imposes costs on governments in multiple forms, including rebuilding initiatives, overall diminished economic activity when systems are down, and more. The Senator also spotlighted transmission lines and the need to maintain their functionality in the face of extreme weather events, which cause 78% of power outages and cost the nation $44 billion on average every year.
Ranking member Senator Chuck Grassley (R - IA) used his opening statement to highlight the size of the national debt, a remarkable $32 trillion. In light of this, he argued that permitting reform is a critical area of focus for combating the adverse effects of natural disasters on grid reliability, rather than irresponsibly investing in “unrealistic” climate goals around electric vehicles and achieving net zero emissions.
The five distinguished panelists invited to testify before the committee included Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards, Dr. Susan Tierney of the Analysis Group, Professor Jessie Keenan of Tulane University, President of ITC Holdings Corp. Linda Apsey, and President of the Permitting Institute Alex Hurgot.
Governor Edwards attested to the success that Louisiana has had in recent years with taking a proactive approach to climate adaptation by projecting current and future climate risks and adopting plans centered on coastal resiliency to protect their infrastructure and communities. He emphasized that although the up-front costs of these mitigation efforts amount to large sums, they pale in comparison to the cost of rebuilding and end up leading to huge savings.
Dr. Tierney emphasized the enormous human suffering associated with infrastructure failures that often result from natural disasters, which are on the rise. Americans experience natural disasters and ensuing breakdowns in the form of power outages, higher energy prices, and even loss of human life. She emphasized that the root cause for the increase in the number of these climate events is the release of greenhouse emissions.
Dr. Keenan in his testimony focused on the numerous ways in which developers and consumers are facing increased costs as a result of climate risks impacting infrastructure. These include higher upfront and operational costs, the price of adaptation and maintenance efforts, and lower output when there are interruptions. In the end, all of this amounts to higher prices for utility ratepayers. He highlighted the role of the municipal bond market in this interplay, which is beginning to price climate risk. In closing, he called on policymakers to pay more attention to long-term load and demand grid planning, choosing where to invest more versus disinvest, and accounting for increased costs in budget planning.
Mrs. Apsey provided further information about the necessity for long-term, interregional transmission planning and emphasized the insufficiency of current efforts in that domain. She called on policymakers to ensure that planning standards are put into place, as well as to streamline the permitting process for new transmission lines, which currently take an average of 7-10 years to be completed.
Finally, Mr. Hurgot underscored the need for bipartisan, scientifically informed efforts to reform permitting requirements for constructing transmission lines. In this reform, he stressed the importance of ensuring transparency, sharing data publicly, and acknowledging that tradeoffs are inherent to the process. Specifically, he called on policymakers and stakeholders to acknowledge that transmission projects unavoidably interact with nature, but this fact alone cannot curtail essential efforts to bolster grid capacity and reliability.
Click here for the full livestream of the Senate Budget Committee hearing.
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