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Senate Committees Hear Familiar Pro/Con Comments On Economic, Environmental Impacts Of EQB’s Final Carbon Pollution Reduction Program Covering Power Plants - RGGI

On March 29, the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy and Community, Economic and Recreation Development Committees heard very familiar and often repeated pro/con comments on the economic and environmental impacts of the final Environmental Quality Board regulation establishing a Carbon Pollution Reduction Program covering power plants consistent with the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

Republicans said the final regulations will increase the cost of electricity for individuals and businesses, have a negative impact on jobs and will not significantly reduce carbon pollution.

Democrats said the General Assembly has been holding hearings on the RGGI regulations since the concept was first proposed in October of 2019 and Senate Republicans have yet to offer a plan for reducing carbon pollution or a proposal for helping workers and communities caught in the market-driven transition to clean energy.

They said, depending on how the proceeds of the final regulations are invested, it will not have a negative impact on jobs, but will be a job creator and energy efficiency and renewable energy initiatives will reduce energy costs.

In addition, last July, Sen. Carolyn Comitta (D-Chester), Minority Chair of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, introduced Senate Bill 15 to invest the proceeds from the final Carbon Pollution Reduction Program in efforts to help communities and workers during the transition to clean energy, environmental justice areas and other initiatives. Read more here.

Statements By Committee Chairs

Three of the four chairs of the Committees offered introductory remarks that summarized the same basic positions they’ve had since 2019.

Sen. Gene Yaw (R-Lycoming), Majority Chair of the Senate Environmental Resources & Energy Committee, offered remarks at the end of the hearing.

Here are the opening remarks--

Sen. Carolyn Comitta (D-Chester)

Sen. Carolyn Comitta (D-Chester), Minority Chair Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, said--

Thank you, Senator Yaw. Good morning, everyone. I also would like to recognize and say good morning to the members of the ERE Committee and our colleagues in the Community Economic and Recreational Development Committee for joining us today.

We appreciate the chairs of that committee, Senator Yudichak and Senator Cappelletti, for being here.

Throughout the debate over Pennsylvania's participation in RGGI, it's important that all viewpoints be heard and respected. I appreciate the chair's willingness, at my request, to include some additional testifiers in today's hearing.

I also believe that it's important to approach this discussion, and any hearing before this or any other body, with openness in looking at all sides and examining relevant studies, data and other information.

While we have had an opportunity to review the Independent Fiscal Office finding, I would like to make a few points.

First, RGGI has been extensively analyzed for more than a decade. In Pennsylvania, it's been a years long process, with more review, comment and study than any other initiative in memory.

RGGI has more than a long history of economic success.

Since 2008, RGGI states successfully cut power sector emissions in half, reduced electricity prices, and outpaced the nation in economic growth, all while creating $4 billion in net economic gains, and nearly 50,000 job years of employment.

RGGI allowance prices have had a very minimal impact on electricity bills because they account for such a small portion, a sliver really, of what makes up an electricity bill.

While electricity rates are already rising across the country, during the first 10 years that RGGI was in place, rates dropped nearly 6% in RGGI states.

And in those states RGGI energy efficiency investments of $2.8 billion have produced nearly $13.5 billion in consumer energy savings, a return of nearly $4.80 for every dollar invested.

So, is it fair to blame a program that is not in place in Pennsylvania for rising energy costs here?

Is it accurate to say that RGGI will hinder economic growth and skyrocket energy costs when there is extensive evidence to the contrary?

Do my colleagues who oppose RGGI have a plan, a new plan to address climate change, rising energy costs, the decline of coal fired power plants, and impact to their workers and communities?

I am not aware of one.

In closing, the past two years, and even the past two months, have shown us that the world is full of unknowns.

As elected officials, part of our job is to attempt to chart a course for the success, health, safety and economic prosperity of all Pennsylvanians.

So, we can debate projections, models and studies, however, we should hear all sides.

In fact, I want to mention a letter that I received last year from several business leaders, including Nestle, Mars, BP, Exelon and Westinghouse in support of RGGI.

It reads, and I quote, "This structure provides both certainty and flexibility for business to plan ahead and develop innovative, low carbon energy solutions."

Certainty, flexibility and planning ahead.

We can discuss RGGI. We have discussed RGGI and we are still discussing RGGI, but what we can't do is continue to delay.

Time is of the essence, because we know that the climate change crisis is not getting better, it is getting significantly worse, and we know that RGGI is the only plan on the table to address climate change in Pennsylvania, and we know it will be far cheaper and far more effective to begin to address climate change now than to continue to wait and wait and wait.

I would just like to share briefly testimony that has been submitted, a couple of comments from each for your consideration from people whowill not be here to testify today, but were invited to send comments.

The first is from Seth Blumsack of Penn State University. He's a professor of energy policy and economics and the director of energy law and policy.

And in summary, his testimony says, one, joining RGGI will reduce emissions of carbon dioxide from Pennsylvania's power generation sector and will also contribute to improved air quality.

This will benefit the health of many Pennsylvanians.

Two, because of Pennsylvania's competitive retail electricity market, it is simply not the case that RGGI permit costs will necessarily be passed along to Pennsylvania ratepayers, the same way that they might in states without competitive retail electricity markets.

Three, Pennsylvania would earn revenue through the RGGI permit auction and mechanisms exist or could be created to reinvest that auction revenue to mitigate potential impacts of RGGI on electric bills in Pennsylvania.

And three, summary of the testimony from the Ohio River Valley Institute three items.

One, greenhouse gas emissions will be significantly reduced, as will other forms of pollution that harm Pennsylvanians' health and drive up healthcare costs and absenteeism.

Two, utility bills will be reduced, as less expensive renewable energy resources become more prevalent and gains in energy efficiency more than offset the small upward pressure that would be placed on rates.

And three, jobs and commerce will increase, particularly in rural counties and non-metropolitan areas, whose economies have struggled the most in recent years.

Again, thank you so much Chairman Yaw, Chairman Yudichak, and everyone for being here today, and our testifiers.

I look forward to listening and learning.

Sen. John Yudichak (I-Luzerne)

Sen. John Yudichak (I-Luzerne), Majority Chair of the Senate Community, Economic and Recreational Development Committee, said--

Good morning and thank you Senator Yaw. As noted by the chair, my name is Senator John Yudichak, and I have the privilege of serving as the majority chair of the CERD Committee in the Senate.

I want to thank Chairman Yaw, the minority chairs, Comitta and Cappelletti, and thank the members of the Environmental Resource and Energy Committee and the Community and Economic Recreational Development Committee for participating in this important and timely joint hearing on the economic impact of the administration's unilateral decision to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative through an executive order, rather than through the constitutionally required legislative process.

On the point of constitutionality, it is clear the administration has stepped well beyond their legal authority to join a multi-state compact and impose an energy tax on Pennsylvania businesses.

With the Senate's bipartisan passage of Senator Pittman's Senate Bill 119, legislation that would require legislative approval of RGGI, a veto proof majority of Republicans, Independents and Democrats in the Senate sent a clear message to the administration, you cannot circumvent the constitution or the legislature to serve an ideological agenda.

On the point of RGGI's economic impact on Pennsylvania businesses and taxpayers, growing evidence from independent economists suggest that RGGI will devastate Pennsylvania's energy industry, threaten Pennsylvania's position as the number one exporter of electricity in the United States, dramatically increase energy costs, and further fan the flames of inflation and supply chain disruptions that are overwhelming household budgets of families across Pennsylvania.

I'm eager to hear today's testimony on the economic impact RGGI will have on Pennsylvania from a broad range of informed voices.

Let us remember, we're not here to debate the issue of climate change. There is broad consensus in this legislature on the subject of aggressively pursuing reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

In fact, the legislature has acted in concert with the private sector over the last decade to dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while at the same time producing more energy.

At issue here today is whether the flawed scientific modeling used by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection to advance RGGI regulations will produce any meaningful or material reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and whether the Pennsylvania economy can sustain the economic pressure from the combination of high energy costs from RGGI during a period of record high inflation.

One thing is certain, the world is a very uncertain place.

With the horrific war being waged in Europe, that was shaped and fueled by flawed energy policies, it is important that Pennsylvania, as the number one exporter of electricity in the United States, gets out energy policy right.

RGGI was a bad idea in 2019, and in 2022, it is potentially a tragic idea.

On one hand, President Biden tries to lead the world against naked Russian aggression by pledging 15 billion cubic tons of LNG to Europe, and on the other hand radical environmentalists in Pennsylvania shut down an $800 million LNG project in Bradford County* and the $1.2 billion PennEast Pipeline** in Luzerne and Carbon Counties, two natural gas projects that would have boosted the Pennsylvania economy with the creation of over 12,000 new jobs and significantly furthered U.S. efforts to wean Europe off their dependency on Russian oil and gas.

Pennsylvania must get this decision on RGGI right. It needs to be an informed decision with equal input from climate scientists and economists.

Furthermore, we cannot forget that the strength of America's foreign policy and our very own national security is intrinsically tied to the strength of Pennsylvania's energy industry.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to today's discussion.

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*The Bradford County LNG plant got a permit from DEP in July 2019 and they did nothing with it. DEP had to twice extend the permit at the request of the company because they failed to start the project. On March 18 the company said they would not do anything with the permit through at least July 2022 and entered into a voluntary agreement to apply for a new permit if or when they actually start the project. Read more here.

**The New Jersey part of PennEast Pipeline was canceled in September, 2021. Read more here. In December 2021, the company requested DEP to withdraw/revoke their permits for PA portion. Read more here.

Sen. Amanda Cappelletti (D-Delaware)

Sen. Amanda Cappelletti (D-Delaware), Minority Chair of the Senate Community, Economic and Recreational Development Committee, said--

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Before we begin with my prepared remarks, I'd like to address a term used by one of my colleagues in their opening statements, radical environmentalists.

It's a rude and dimeaning term because there's absolutely nothing radical about addressing the omnipresent threat of climate change.

Report after report, scientist after scientist, they continue to demonstrate that our lack of movement on climate change is leading to stronger and more frequent and dangerous weather patterns and rising ocean waters.

So no, there is nothing radical about addressing that, and I would suggest that if we'd like to have a real dialogue, we'd stop with that kind of language.

In 2019, Governor Wolf jump started the process for Pennsylvania to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, RGGI as we're all talking about, a commonsense carbon cap and investment program that requires companies who have greatly contributed to our climate crisis to take responsibility for their role by limiting their emissions and investing in the inevitable transition to clean energy.

Currently, 11 states participate in RGGI, and have generated millions of dollars that are being invested in a transition to clean energy, to environmental justice communities, and the weatherization projects that can protect homes and communities from the devastation of a natural disaster.

The DEP estimates that by joining RGGI in 2022, Pennsylvania would have been able to cut carbon emissions by at least 25.5% by 2030. And considering Pennsylvania accounts for nearly 1% of greenhouse gas emissions worldwide, that reduction could have global significance.

According to Penn State Center for Energy Law and Policy, Pennsylvanians' health would also be greatly improved by joining RGGI.

In fact, the increased health benefit to Pennsylvanians is estimated to be in the order of $a billion to $4 billion per year in the initial decade of our participation.

So, introducing Pennsylvania into RGGI will impact everyone differently.

And for that, I'm glad to see that we have so many perspectives included in today's testifiers, and I'm grateful that Chairman Yaw allowed us to have two additional speakers added, and I look forward to hearing all of that information, because as we look at different ways to respond to climate change, RGGI is one of many tools that we can and should be using, and I hope that in conjunction with holding conversations like these, we also prioritize those around putting Pennsylvania on a longterm path to respond to climate change and protect the public health, wellness and finance of the people of Pennsylvania.

I look forward to hearing from all our testifiers and thank everyone for being here today.

Sen. Gene Yaw (R-Lycoming)

Sen. Gene Yaw (R-Lycoming), Majority Chair Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, concluded the hearing by saying--

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all the panelists. We now are approaching using up four and a half hours on this hearing. I kind of gauge things by the interest in it and how long they take.

And as I said, my kind of my personal philosophy is to allow people to inquire and also the the panelists to respond and answer questions. I think that's the way we learn from this.

I'm not sure though that four and a half hours is what I expected when I started this morning, but I'm glad to know that people were that interested in it.

And I think it obviously shows that this is a really important issue for the Pennsylvania Legislature and for Pennsylvania in general.

RGGI, as a whole, it started off as a reduction of CO2 emissions and, you know, as they affect the climate change.

I'll tell you that my feeling is that climate change has been going on for thousands of years or hundreds of thousands of years, or maybe even longer than that. And climate change is going to continue to occur.

We are not going to stop climate change.

I spent some time in the Finger Lakes area in New York, and the last evidence of ice in that area was 11,000 years ago.

Now, my question is if the ice was disappearing, there had to be some indication of warming trend.

And I'm not sure whether Native Americans and there campfires were the cause of global warming, but something happened. It is climate change, and I'm not sure that there's something that we can really ever explain it.

I did a little bit of background checking, and [in] 1969 there was an article in the New York Times by a renowned Stanford University professor, a population biologist, whatever that is.

He said we need to head off what will be a catastrophic explosion fueled by runaway population growth, limited world food supply, and contamination of the planet by man.

We must realize that unless we are extremely lucky, everybody will disappear in a cloud of blue steam in 20 years. That was in 1969.

In 1970 in the Boston Globe newspaper, there was a scientist from the atmospheric research in Boulder, Colorado predicted that an ice age would be upon us by the 21st century.

He also predicted that in the electric generation demands for cooling water will boil dry the entire flow of rivers and streams in the continental United States.

We heard today about, you know, what happens when hysteria sets in.

In 1971, the Washington Post published an article from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration by, once again, a renowned professor.

And his opinion was in the next 50 years, fine dust put in the atmosphere by fossil fuel burning could screen out so much of sunlight that the average temperature could drop six degrees and trigger an ice age.

So that was in 1971. We were looking at that point, at an ice age.

The Guardianf said that space, in 1974 said, space satellite showed that the new ice age is coming fast. And there was comment that the 1935 to 1955 was a warming period, but in 1974 the snow and ice covering the earth increased by 12% during the '67 to '72 time period indicating that the average temperatures were now falling.

In 1989, according to an Associated Press article, a UN official [said] entire nations could be wiped off the face of the earth by rising sea levels if global warming is not reversed by the year 2000.

In 2006, of course, we know that Al Gore said humanity has 10 years left before the point of no return.

Well, you know, some of these things are, I don't know how to explain it other than to say as I said, at the beginning, climate change is going to happen.

I think there are many things that we can and should be doing as stewards, we have an obligation to be good stewards of the earth and what we have, but there are some things that we can't change.

So I'll tell you, some of the things that we should be doing, that was mentioned here today about orphaned [oil and gas] wells. In the methane that is being emitted from there, which is one of the worst greenhouse gases that we could have. We're not doing enough.

We perhaps will do more in the future, but we have not paid attention to that in the past.

We could be supporting farm digesters to controlled methane.

There's new technology out there, fluidized bed coal-fired power plants. Seems to me that that would be a win-win for everybody, with 100% CO2 emissions capture would solve electric generation, would solve emissions problems, and it would support the coal industry.

Why don't we start looking at things like that.

And one of the other things that, and this is not necessarily directly environmental, although it is environmental, it's not air environmental.

Why don't we just stop dumping raw sewage in the Susquehanna River?

Recently, as many of you know, I'm on the Chesapeake Bay Commission. Recently, we had a email, or there was an exchange, letter to the editor about Baltimore being downstream from Harrisburg, when Harrisburg is noted for dumping considerable amounts, millions of gallons of raw sewage into the river, and then it goes to Baltimore.

That's a good question. Why aren't we paying attention to things like that?

Instead, we spent four and a half hours focusing on RGGI, and, you know, it was mentioned that RGGI for Pennsylvania means that we're putting our economic and our environmental wellbeing in the hands of, we're putting it up for popular vote, with 11 or 12 other, other states.

I'm not sure, I'm not prepared to do that.

And as we already talked about the electric prices in those states, in the RGGI states, they have eight out of 10 of the highest electric prices in the country.

I'm not so sure why we want to join with somebody that has the highest electric prices.

And as we said, Pennsylvania's different. We are far different from those.

We are an, we are an energy generator. We're an electric exporter that has cut emissions by 40%. I mean, that's pretty significant.

What RGGI does is it targets a small sector, and it's mainly, as Sean Stuffy testified it's coal fire power plants, and the less efficient gas fire power plants.

What RGGI has not considered, and we have had, even though there were overtures supposedly to be made by DEP to discuss the impact of RGGI job losses in areas that would be affected, to my knowledge it's never been done.

And what we're doing is we're looking, the flavor of the month as I refer to it around here, happens to be solar.

And I have absolutely nothing against solar, but we need to look at the big picture.

What is it? And it's the same with wind, both of those renewables, and I'm not sure that renewable is the correct term to use for those, are intermittent power sources, and they depend on the weather, and you need a backup system.

So we have to duplicate it and you need a backup system that can be brought online fairly quickly as the weather changes.

Many of you have heard me say this before, and I've been saying it for several years now. You cannot have cleaner green energy projects without fossil fuel. You can't.

And I think the Sean Stuffy said about the windmills have, I think it's 90 tons of steel, 45 tons of non-recyclable plastics, and about 2,500 tons of concrete. That's a significant carbon footprint made from fossil fuel for every windmill that's out there.

And, just as an aside, every windmill has 500 gallons of oil in it, too.

But those are the types of things that we need to consider. And many of you also know, I've also said, you can't have a cleaner green energy project without mining. Mining is absolutely, that's where you get all these materials to, how do, how do you produce it?

Even if you're talking about steel, you have to mine iron, iron ore, and then you have to mine coal to make Coke, to make steel. I mean these things, we just can't pick things that fall out of the sky that are already made.

One of the areas that I, I talk about a lot and many of you know, that I have been an advocate of a person by the name of Dr. Scott Tinker, who's a professor at the University of Texas in Austin.

And he lays out in probably the most simple terms that we could ever explain anything about how societies exist and what you need to survive. You need energy. The core, the base is energy.

And with energy, you can build an economy, and with an economy, you can deal with the environment. And if you don't do it and don't do it in that order, it's not gonna work.

If you don't have an economy and you're worried about your job, you're worried about, "Am I going to eat tonight or today at all." Then, do you really care about the environment?

I don't think so.

And one of the things that's really interesting in his whole concept of things that he has talked about is that there are three area of the world that are gonna grow in the next 30 to 50 years.

One of 'em is Africa, the other one's India, and the other is China. And what's their primary source of energy? Coal.

We know that Russia and China, Russia has a contract with China or has agreed to furnish a hundred million tons of coal to China for powering their power plants.

And if you recall the Paris Accord, the most recent one, the United States kind of got their fingers slapped big time, 'cause we went there with the idea that we were gonna get everybody to join in. We're gonna be carbon free.

And basically India and China said, "No, we're not going there. We're not doing that. We are not going to agree to anything like that."

So in fact, what happened is China has the ability to continue emissions through at least 2030 before they even have to start reduction.

And India was the same way as like we need power with a billion people or however many billion people that they have. We need it, we're going to do it.

So, I look at this kind of thing, what happened here today, I have a couple of different thoughts about it.

One of the things that happened considering what happened in Europe right now, there's three things that came out of the war that Russia has declared on the Ukraine.

One of them is the effect on gas and oil. That's one of the global more markets that's been drastically affected.

The second is fertilizer, and the third is grain production.

I'll talk about fertilizer. Fertilizer, what do you need to produce fertilizer? You need natural gas to produce the nitrogen fertilizer, to raise grains and corn.

And Russia at various times has threatened to reduce gas to the manufacturers of fertilizer plants. Why? If you control food, what do you control? Everybody.

Grain production, 25% of the grain, mainly wheat, which hits the global market comes from Russia and 13% of the corn.

Now I talk about those things for this reason, the whole issue in Europe has been over energy and we heard some reference today to the natural gas, the pipeline and the issue of carbon reduction and Germany chose to say, "We're gonna use Russia's natural gas and it's producing a real problem."

So Western Europe is a market where we could be helping, Pennsylvania could be helping.

And the reason I say that Pennsylvania could be helping, in the United States last year, we produced about 32.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that was in the United States.

Russia produced about 22.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Significantly less.

How does that relate to Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania produced 7.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. That means Pennsylvania alone. Yes.

The state of Pennsylvania produced one-third of the amount of natural gas that Russia produced. Does that make us a player? Absolutely. It makes us a player in the energy market.

Two counties in my district, and I just found this out-- Bradford and Susquehanna Counties-- produced more natural gas than all of the production that comes out of the Gulf of Mexico.

That's what Pennsylvania is. That's where Pennsylvania stands, and we don't act like it.

So I said, I had mixed feelings about it. Part of me wanted to say today.

Why aren't we helping? Why aren't we producing natural gas? Why aren't we doing LNG? Why aren't we helping Western Europe more than what we're doing?

And it's not gonna happen overnight. It's gonna take years, but why aren't we starting? Why aren't we supporting that?

That was the part of me that said, you know what we're doing with RGGI here today is kind of like, it's a little bit superficial considering what's going on in the world and where Pennsylvania stands, what Pennsylvania could be doing, and what Pennsylvania is not doing.

But then part of me also said after hearing the testimony and spending more [than] four and a half hours listening, this is the type of hearing that maybe we should have had, or the administration should have had two years ago or three years ago before embarking on the RGGI program.

There have been things that came out here today, which I appreciate, different thoughts, different ideas, working together. Maybe there is something that we could do, which would satisfy everybody and help reduce emissions-- not against reducing emissions.

However, I don't want to expose Pennsylvania to the point where we're doing something that's punishing ourselves, our workers and our jobs and our manufacturing for no gain.

And RGGI right now, everything that I've read and all this studies that have been done, it produces less than 1% savings of CO2 emissions in the first 10 years.

I am not sure that that's worth the effort.

So with that, those are my comments, and I think that today was very, very useful.

I still feel a little bit that there's more that we should be doing on the international front.

Pennsylvania is the leader, and I've said this for a couple of years now-- we don't act like it.

We have one of the largest gas deposits in the world, and as I said, we're producing one-third of the gas that the entire country of Russia produces.

That makes us a significant player in the world energy market, and we need to step up and I think accept that responsibility.

So with that, I'm gonna close this hearing and thank you all for participating today.

Thank you.

Written Comments

These presenters provided comments--

-- Matthew Knittel, Independent Fiscal Office

-- Kevin Sunday, PA Chamber of Business & Industry

-- Melissa Morgan, NFIB - Pennsylvania

-- Carl Marrara, PA Manufacturers' Association

-- Brett Vassey, Virginia Manufacturers Association

-- Kris Anderson, International Brotherhood Of Electrical Workers Third District

-- Martin Williams, International Brotherhood of Boilermakers

-- Shawn Steffee, Boilermakers Union Local 154

-- Dr. Seth Blumsack, Center for Energy Law & Policy, Penn State University

-- Dr. William Shobe, Center for Economic & Policy Studies, University of Virginia

The Department of Environmental Protection, Ohio River Valley Institute and Herr’s provided written comments.

Visit DEP’s Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative webpage for more information on the final regulations.

Click Here for a video of the hearing and for written comments.

Sen. Gene Yaw (R-Lycoming) serves as Majority Chair of the Senate Environmental Committee and can be contacted by calling 717-787-3280 or sending email to: gyaw@pasen.gov. Sen. Carolyn Comitta (D-Chester) serves as Minority Chair and can be contacted by calling 717-787-5709 or sending email to: senatorcomitta@pasenate.com.

Sen. John Yudichak (I-Luzerne) serves as Majority Chair of the Community and Economic Development Committee and can be contacted at 717-787-7105 or send email to: John@pasen.gov. Sen. Amanda Cappelletti (D-Delaware) serves as Minority Chair and can be contacted at 717-787-5544 or send email to: cappelletti@pasenate.com.

NewsClip:

-- Post-Gazette - Laura Legere: Republican Senators File For Injunction To Block Gov. Wolf’s Carbon Pollution Cutting Plan For Power Plants - RGGI

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