Speaker 1: Summer is officially over. How can you tell? Well, Congress
Speaker 1: is back in Washington, d C. This episode of Parts
Speaker 1: per Billion, we talk about the next few weeks and
Speaker 1: months on Capitol Hill and about whether any environmental bills
Speaker 1: might make it to the President's desk. Hello, and welcome
Speaker 1: back to Parts per Billion, the podcast from Bloomberg environment
Speaker 1: I'm your host, David Schultz, and we're coming to you
Speaker 1: from Capitol Hill today because the August recess is over
Speaker 1: and now it's a big legislative sprint from now until Christmas.
Speaker 1: And I'm joined by Bloomberg Environments Capitol Hill reporter Dean Scott. Dean,
Speaker 1: how are you great to be here, David? So yeah,
Speaker 1: let's talk about that legislative sprint. And first off, let's
Speaker 1: start off with just this month. The fiscal year, of
Speaker 1: course ends at the end of this year, and there
Speaker 1: are several things that must pass before the end of
Speaker 1: the fiscal year. Let's talk about those and will there
Speaker 1: be any environmental provisions attached to those bills? Sure? Well,
Speaker 1: we have a couple different tracks, but it's all money, money, money,
Speaker 1: Because we're almost at the end of the fiscal year,
Speaker 1: which is September thirtieth, so we have about three weeks
Speaker 1: to go, and in that time we have a couple
Speaker 1: things that are well that we''ll be watching very closely
Speaker 1: in the next couple weeks. The first is on spending.
Speaker 1: We have two things that we cover very closely, the
Speaker 1: EPA and Department of Interior Appropriation spending Bill and the
Speaker 1: Energy and Water Bill. And this is the bill. These
Speaker 1: are the bills that basically say, hey, federal agency, here's
Speaker 1: how much you can spend for the coming year. And
Speaker 1: if Congress doesn't pass these bills, the agencies shut down.
Speaker 1: That's right, and then they also have some policy in
Speaker 1: those bills, usually around the margins. The big issue this
Speaker 1: year is that the House has passed its versions of
Speaker 1: those bills and the Senate has been a bit tardy.
Speaker 1: And in the end, where that's left us is we're
Speaker 1: in September and we're less than thirty days away from
Speaker 1: the end of the fiscal year, and we have no
Speaker 1: Senate spending bills approved on the floor. So given that,
Speaker 1: I get the sense from everything I've been hearing and
Speaker 1: from what you've been reporting, that we're going to have
Speaker 1: a continuing resolution, which is essentially Congress's version of saying,
Speaker 1: let's just move the deadline back a couple weeks or
Speaker 1: a couple months, Is that right, that's right, So any
Speaker 1: bills that don't make it. So let's take our EPA
Speaker 1: interior and then energy and water bills as examples. If
Speaker 1: neither of those bills were packaged with other things on
Speaker 1: the floor in past, then we would need continuing resolutions,
Speaker 1: some short term extension for spending for one or both
Speaker 1: of those. And the reason why these are important is
Speaker 1: at least important to us and important to the people
Speaker 1: who care about the environment, is there are all kinds
Speaker 1: of things that can be added on to these bills
Speaker 1: that affect the environment. You know, you never know what's
Speaker 1: going to be added on, But can you talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about, you know, what are some potential ideas
Speaker 1: that you've heard in the past, or potential pieces of
Speaker 1: likelegislation that might you know, hitch a ride on these
Speaker 1: sort of bigger bills. Sure well, on the EPA Interior bill.
Speaker 1: The key thing that we're watching is take EPA spending.
Speaker 1: For example, in the House, they have near record EPA
Speaker 1: figures in terms of an annual budget, so you really
Speaker 1: get a big boost in EPA spending. If the Senate
Speaker 1: went along with that number, we expect that to be
Speaker 1: a somewhat more modest number, and we'll know a bit
Speaker 1: more about that on Thursday when they release essentially the
Speaker 1: allocations from the Appropriations Committee. Here in the Senate, you'll
Speaker 1: always see things in the in the EPA and Interior
Speaker 1: Bill that would restrict some EPA policy. The thing that
Speaker 1: we're watching closely this year, it's the first year that
Speaker 1: the House was controlled by Democrats. Let's take a step
Speaker 1: back and talk about must pass bills in general. You know,
Speaker 1: in how Congress works now, it seems like the the
Speaker 1: you know, not a lot of bills get passed out
Speaker 1: of Congress and make their way to the President's desk.
Speaker 1: The only ones that typically do were these must pass bills,
Speaker 1: like you mentioned, the spending bills, because if they don't pass,
Speaker 1: we have a government shutdown. Is this how Congress operates now?
Speaker 1: You know, we just have must pass bills and then
Speaker 1: try to add on as many things as you can
Speaker 1: to those bills. Yeah, and the list of must pass
Speaker 1: bills seems to grow each year, partly because they miss
Speaker 1: a lot of their deadlines. More and more this year,
Speaker 1: for example, I'm looking at three big let's call them
Speaker 1: big categories of bills that must pass. One is we've
Speaker 1: already spoken about, is the continuing resolution or an EPA
Speaker 1: and Interior spending bill. The twelve appropriation spending bills that
Speaker 1: need to be passed. We'll know as we get closer
Speaker 1: to September thirtieth which ones will require continuing resolution, and
Speaker 1: that's supposed to last, give them let's say thirty sixty
Speaker 1: ninety days of breathing room, and then they'll have to
Speaker 1: actually pass full year appropriations bills, which would then run
Speaker 1: through September of next year. We have the Defense Authorization Bill,
Speaker 1: which is a must pass built and we're gonna get
Speaker 1: to that a little bit more in a bit. But
Speaker 1: that's interesting in that it's a must pass bill, but
Speaker 1: there's not really a hard deadline for that, right. You know,
Speaker 1: if they go past the fiscal year, there's now a
Speaker 1: lot of nothing catastrophic happens. That's right. And we're watching
Speaker 1: the Defense Authorization build closely though in the environmental arena,
Speaker 1: because there's mainly there's two to three subject areas that
Speaker 1: we're watching closely. One is there's a lot of climate
Speaker 1: change language in the Defense Authorization Bill, there's always been
Speaker 1: some language that says, hey, Pentagon, you should be looking
Speaker 1: at the impacts that climate change has on your defense installations,
Speaker 1: your operations overseas. This could be anything from impacts of
Speaker 1: clout we call them climate refugees, but the movements of
Speaker 1: people across border, across borders. We also have a stronger,
Speaker 1: stronger language in the House build this year on what
Speaker 1: actions the Pentagon should take around the climate change. And
Speaker 1: then we have two other areas which deal with the
Speaker 1: pfoss chemical issue, the exposures to that chemical and that
Speaker 1: group of chemicals. And we should say that this is
Speaker 1: this is a really big area that both you and
Speaker 1: I have been covering a lot. These are these chemicals
Speaker 1: that are sort of used a lot in firefighting foam
Speaker 1: and have been used a lot on military basis. They
Speaker 1: are linked to some pretty bad health effects, and there
Speaker 1: are a lot of really interesting policy measures in this
Speaker 1: defense bill that would direct the Pentagon what to do
Speaker 1: about these chemicals. And it'll be really interesting to see
Speaker 1: what winds up in the in the final version of that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then there's one that we've also followed closely to
Speaker 1: has some climate relationship to climate change, which is the
Speaker 1: Used Act, which is a carbon capture bill that has
Speaker 1: passed the Senate, not the House Carbon captured. We'd explain
Speaker 1: that a little bit. If you're drilling for oil and
Speaker 1: gas and you use carbon dioxide, which is sort of
Speaker 1: the most ubiquitous climate pollutant that we have, if you
Speaker 1: use that material and you pump it in underground, you
Speaker 1: can recover deeper deposits of natural gas and oil, and
Speaker 1: if you do it right, you can seal that carbon
Speaker 1: dioxide underground. We've had some increase in those incentives in
Speaker 1: terms of tax incentives. For example, this latest bill also
Speaker 1: includes additional money for research and also for technologies that
Speaker 1: do direct air capture, which is this sort of next
Speaker 1: generation technology that would actually pull carbon dioxide right out
Speaker 1: of the air. And this is something that from my understanding,
Speaker 1: has some Republican support. It does, and Senate Basso, who's
Speaker 1: the chairman of the Environment Committee here in the Senate,
Speaker 1: is a big advocate. But it also has Senator white
Speaker 1: House from Rhode Island who's a big sort of climate
Speaker 1: hawk we call them over here in the Senate. So
Speaker 1: that's going to be important to watch. Also to see
Speaker 1: whether that stays in Before we move on to the
Speaker 1: rest of the year, we should talk you mentioned there's,
Speaker 1: you know, the must pass spending bills to avert a
Speaker 1: government shutdown. There's the must pass Defense bill to avert
Speaker 1: a defense not working properly, to phrase it, very in artfully.
Speaker 1: And then there's programs that are set to expire, that
Speaker 1: have their legal authorization expire that probably everyone wants to
Speaker 1: see renewed, but you know, not sure how it can be.
Speaker 1: Let's touch briefly on one of those, the National Flood
Speaker 1: Insurance Program. That's right, So the National Flood Insurance Program
Speaker 1: of courses is getting even more attention of late because
Speaker 1: we have yet another round of hurricane damage in the US,
Speaker 1: and that, as you know that the flood insurance program
Speaker 1: is always struggling, needs to be reauthorized and then whenever
Speaker 1: we need to reauthorize it, there is a debate, particularly
Speaker 1: among more conservative members of Congress, as to just how
Speaker 1: much money we're shoveling into national flood insurance and whether
Speaker 1: we should be more let's say, strict about whether property
Speaker 1: owners can rebuild in areas that are more prone for
Speaker 1: future hurricane damage. But again, they're up against an also
Speaker 1: a September thirtieth deadline, and I think, you know, I
Speaker 1: would if you were to be a betting person around
Speaker 1: that you would not necessarily see that being reauthorized in time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I don't think anyone in Congress from any party,
Speaker 1: any you know, ideological stripe, wants to see the National
Speaker 1: Flood Insurance Program expire right in the middle of a
Speaker 1: hurricane season. Finally, though, let's talk about, you know, the
Speaker 1: state of play for the rest of this year and
Speaker 1: into next year. You know what I've seen so far
Speaker 1: this year, and you know a lot better than me,
Speaker 1: But it seems like the Democrats in the House and
Speaker 1: the Republicans in the Senate don't have a lot of
Speaker 1: eagerness to cut a deal and to negotiate and to
Speaker 1: sort of compromise and send really big environmental packages to
Speaker 1: the White House. Do you see that changing next year,
Speaker 1: when a lot of members are going to be up
Speaker 1: for reelection and start to think like, oh, I need
Speaker 1: to have something I can bring back home and wave
Speaker 1: to my constituents when I'm campaigning. I think through the
Speaker 1: end of this year, I would look to see at least,
Speaker 1: you know, some incremental progress on a number of energy bills.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of there's the feeling in the Senate
Speaker 1: Energy Committee from the chairman Lisa Mrikowski from Alaska and
Speaker 1: the top Democrat, Joe Mentioned from West Virginia, that they
Speaker 1: really do want to produce something from their work on
Speaker 1: climate and energy. These would be very moderate bills and
Speaker 1: probably be incremental. They might include things like energy efficiency.
Speaker 1: I would expect to see some more movement on those bills.
Speaker 1: So we're going to see activity and we're going to
Speaker 1: see some progress. I doubt we'll see much pasted on
Speaker 1: the Senate floor because they're going to need something to
Speaker 1: hitch that onto. We'll be watching closely for another big
Speaker 1: conservation bill, the Land, Water and Conservation fun There'll be
Speaker 1: another effort. We're going to an election year. There are
Speaker 1: many Republicans and Democrats who like who like conservation. It's
Speaker 1: sort of a safe area and the environmental space to
Speaker 1: promote that you have green credentials. The problem is next year.
Speaker 1: The closer we get to the November twenty twenty election,
Speaker 1: the less we'll see things get done. Yes, there'll be
Speaker 1: some effort, probably by Senator McConnell, who runs the Senate here.
Speaker 1: We'll see some effort to perhaps give some floor time
Speaker 1: to members or to legislation that's favored by some vulnerable
Speaker 1: members such as Corey Gardner and Colorado, or even Senator
Speaker 1: McSally from Arizona. We could see some things that come
Speaker 1: to the floor to give them a chance to sort
Speaker 1: of promote whatever it is that will help them with voters,
Speaker 1: including some green issues like conservation. But that said, the
Speaker 1: closer we get every election cycle to the actual election,
Speaker 1: the less that seems to actually get done in the
Speaker 1: US Congress. Yeah, that's a really good point. So I
Speaker 1: guess it's the opposite of what I kind of was
Speaker 1: expecting for next year, although it sounds like what you're
Speaker 1: saying is, you know, if you're looking for environmental action
Speaker 1: in the Senate next year, expected to have something to
Speaker 1: do with Colorado and or Arizona. All Right, Well, that
Speaker 1: was it. Thank you so much, Dean for that rundown.
Speaker 1: That was Dean Scott Bloomberg Environments Capitol Hill reporter. You
Speaker 1: can follow him at newstt Bloomberg environment dot com. That's
Speaker 1: where his and all of our stories get posted. Today's
Speaker 1: podcast was produced by myself along with Marissa Horn and
Speaker 1: Jessica Coombs. Nicholas Anzeloda is our audio engineer. The music
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