CBO: GOP coal bill would cost $97M

A Republican-backed bill aimed at protecting the coal industry by restricting the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) permitting ability for water pollution would cost the government $97 million, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said.

The cost over the next five years would come because the bill would also require the EPA to write new analyses and hold additional public hearings, the budget agency predicted.

{mosads}“The provision in H.R. 5077 requiring additional analyses related to employment and economic activity prior to issuing guidance and regulations would increase EPA’s costs,” the office wrote in a Thursday report.

The bill would add about $2 million to cost of each of the 10 relevant pollution reviews the EPA completes per year.

Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) introduced the bill in July in an attempt to increase states’ power in overseeing permits for development that may pollute waterways. Coal mining produces a large volume of waste that often needs a permit.

The EPA, Army Corps of Engineers and states are supposed to cooperate on permits, but Capito said the states should have more power.

“This act addresses many of the obstacles that the EPA has placed in the way of our coal production in Appalachia,” she said at a July meeting when the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee passed the bill.

“The EPA has a clear-cut role, and has for years, in making sure that these permits go forward,” she said. “This bill does not in any way take that right or that ability from EPA away.”

Capito is running for the Senate this year against Democrat Natalie Tennant, and both women have emphasized their commitment to coal and opposition to President Obama’s environmental rules throughout the campaign.

Most of the bill’s provisions are meant to restrict the EPA’s power. The CBO said those measures would not increase or decrease costs, because the agency does not intervene in the state permitting process, so “the bill mostly addresses actions that EPA rarely undertakes,” it wrote.

The EPA does get involved with some permits, and the CBO said those would not change under the bill.