OVERNIGHT ENERGY: Senate GOP takes aim at EPA water rule

STATES WANT A SAY IN REGULATING WATERWAYS: Senate Republicans and state regulators at a hearing Tuesday argued that states, not the Environmental Protection Agency, should be charged with protecting waterways.

The EPA and Army Corps of Engineers are finalizing their “waters of the United States” rule, which would redefine the waterways under the EPA’s jurisdiction.

Republicans have long opposed the rule, and those on the Senate Environment and Public Works committee have coalesced around a bill that would have the EPA rewrite it based around a more narrowed set of standards. 

{mosads}Their goal is to remove waterways they believe would be covered by the water rule from the federal government’s purview, something state regulators said they could handle on their own.

Lawmakers heard testimony Tuesday as they weighed the bill from Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.).

“Allowing for states’ administrative discretion without ubiquitous, counter-productive federal oversight ensures the critical waters of the state, as well as the nation, will be protected,” Susan Metzger, the assistant secretary of the Kansas Department of Agriculture, said. 

The EPA and Democrats defended the rule and the idea of federal control over waterway regulation. 

“The idea that, as a downstream, sovereign state, I have to depend on what another state does to protect the waters that flow through me, is inconsistent with the entire history of clean water regulation,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said.

Read more here. 

ON TAP WEDNESDAY I: Officials from Virginia, West Virginia and Alabama will testify on their reaction to a federal mountaintop mining removal rule at the House Natural Resources oversight and investigations subcommittee. 

ON TAP WEDNESDAY II: The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee’s superfund, waste management, and regulatory oversight panel will hold a hearing on the Environmental Protection Agency’s use of scientific advisory panels and a Republican bill to reform the process. 

Rest of Wednesday’s agenda … 

Steve Ellis, the deputy director of operations at the Bureau of Land Management, and Leslie Weldon, the deputy chief of the National Forest System, will testify at a House Natural Resources subcommittee hearing on recreational hunting, fishing and shooting.

The House Natural Resources Committee’s energy and mineral resources subcommittee will hold a hearing on a bill that would allow natural gas pipelines on federal land.

The House Natural Resources Committee’s water, power and oceans subcommittee will hold a hearing on an electricity reliability bill.

The House Science, Space and Technology’s environment subcommittee will hold a hearing on improving weather forecasting.

Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) is scheduled to keynote an American Council for Capitol Formation event on U.S. crude oil exports. 

AROUND THE WEB: 

Xcel Energy has won federal approval to use drones to inspect its transmission lines, according to the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal.

Duke Energy will build a $750 million natural gas plant to replace a coal-fired plant in North Carolina. The move will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 60 percent, the Associated Press reports.

Vox talks climate change and science with the Science Guy himself, Bill Nye.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: 

Check out Tuesday’s stories … 

-Yucca Mountain left out of Senate funding bill
-Petroleum company to pay $2.9M fine
-Texas governor signs law banning local fracking restrictions
-Republicans: States, not EPA, can regulate water
-White House unveils new plan to save the bees
-EPA accused of improper lobbying for water rule

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