Streetsblog Capitol Hill

As the threat of a Republican filibuster continues to prevent the Senate from passing climate legislation, leading Democrats have tried to scale back their proposal in an attempt to peel off a few votes. In the process, serious attempts to put a price on carbon have fallen by the wayside, taking with them the best hope of reducing transportation emissions. A new bill introduced yesterday by Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley, however, aims to reintroduce transportation into the energy debate, if in a more limited form.

The Oil Independence Bill for a Stronger America, co-sponsored by Colorado's Michael Bennet, Delaware's Tom Carper, and New Mexico's Tom Udall, sets an ambitious goal: completely halting imports of oil by 2030. Since transportation accounts for a full 70 percent of our oil use, that requires changing how the nation moves around.

Based on principles laid out last month, Merkley's bill has four main components. First, it looks to improve the fuel efficiency of the transportation system we currently have. That means providing incentives for buying electric vehicles and charging infrastructure and setting ambitious new fuel efficiency standards for all vehicles.

Second, the Oil Independence Act would try to rebalance our transportation system away from reliance on the automobile. The bill includes Carper's proposed CLEAN TEA program, which would require state Departments of Transportation and metropolitan planning organizations to set goals for how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and establishes a competitive grant program to fund exemplary projects.

Because Republicans are expected to filibuster a cap-and-trade system that includes transportation, however, the revenues that system would generate aren't available to fund CLEAN TEA. Merkley's bill only authorizes the spending for the grant program; it doesn't actually allocate the funding, potentially leaving the program greatly weakened. 

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Editor's note: Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) sent us this commentary on the the BP oil spill, climate change and the need for transportation reform.

Last week, President Obama delivered his first speech from the Oval Office on the single greatest challenge our nation faces: how we supply and consume energy.

The searing images we’re seeing from the Gulf Coast -- of the families who lost loved ones, of people out of work and of oil-coated birds and dolphins -- are daily reminders of what’s at stake when we drill, baby, drill.

The truth is that we are drilling 150 miles offshore and one mile below the earth’s surface because we have run out of accessible oil. Most shocking is how small a difference this oil makes to our energy needs. The 35-60,000 barrels spewing daily from the Gulf floor would be enough to power our nation’s cars for just four minutes.

Whether from the Gulf of Mexico or Persian Gulf, we cannot meet our nation’s energy needs by drilling. We are at a precipice, and I stand firmly with President Obama when it comes to Congress passing legislation that arms the nation with clean energy.

But frankly, we need to do more on these issues, especially by addressing transportation and how we build in our communities.

The transportation sector accounts for almost three-quarters of U.S. oil consumption and one-third of our carbon emissions. If we really want to break our dependence on oil and improve our global competitiveness, we must focus on the way people commute and move goods.

Being truly aggressive about where and how we build can save even more money and energy -- with the potential to cut carbon pollution 12-16 percent by 2030 and save more than a million barrels of oil a day.

This is not the first thing that comes to mind for most people, but to ensure our energy security, we need a comprehensive approach. I hope this becomes part of the future message and, more importantly, a key focus of Congressional action.

The transit industry's leading D.C. lobbying outlet today joined the umbrella group for state DOTs and two major construction groups to protest the Senate climate bill's failure to set aside all of the revenue from its proposed new fuel fees for infrastructure projects -- specifically, to the cash-strapped highway trust fund that is generally split, 80-20, between roads and transit.

American Public Transportation Association (APTA) chief William Millar told reporters that while the local transit agencies he represents are "very supportive of legislation to address climate change and energy issues," the Senate bill's diversion of all but about $6 billion of its fuel revenues for purposes unrelated to transportation is a matter of serious concern.

"This is one of those cases where we really can't even talk about the merits of any portion of the bill because the fundamental position is flawed," Millar said.

Referring to the legislation's promise of funding for the clean transport and land-use grants known as "CLEAN TEA" and TIGER, he added, "Many of those are very good ideas … but you can't make those ideas work if there's no significant funding to make them work, and this bill would aggravate the funding situation for public transit."

John Horsley, executive director of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), was more direct in outlining where state DOTs want to see the Senate climate bill's fuel revenues directed. "Channel[ing] every dollar through the highway trust fund," he said, would help the industry break through a congressional stalemate and win passage of a new six-year federal transport bill.

Stephen Sandherr, CEO of the Associated General Contractors, and Pete Ruane, president of the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, echoed Horsley's interpretation of the new fuel fees in the climate bill -- which are imposed on oil companies and refiners but are likely to be passed along through higher gas prices -- as a de facto "user fee" on drivers.

The climate proposal, Ruane said, does "nothing more than finance a lot of goals, which are enviable in part, on the backs of transportation users."

It remains to be seen whether the transportation industry's combative stance against the partial diversion of the bill's transportation revenue, billed as a "call for a rewrite" of the climate legislation, will help force senators into restructuring the measure. Ruane said he "like[s] the odds" facing the four groups.

But a spokesman for Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) said that APTA, AASHTO, and 25 other industry groups mis-estimated the amount of revenue set aside for transportation in a letter outlining their concerns that was sent today to Kerry and his chief climate bill co-sponsor, Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT).

“Let’s get the facts straight," Kerry spokesman Whitney Smith said via email. "This bill invests more than $6 billion annually in transportation infrastructure, which is more than any other comprehensive energy and climate bill and more than twice what's claimed in this letter. In effect, the letter advocates a policy that would accelerate emissions from the transportation sector and increase our dependence on foreign oil. That's not good for anyone, especially consumers."

One congressional source was befuddled by APTA's move to "bit[e] the hand that feeds them" by criticizing a climate bill that stands to give broad, lasting benefits to rail and bus systems.

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The American Public Transportation Association (APTA) is set to join the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) and two construction interests tomorrow in protesting the Senate climate bill's proposed diversion of new fuel fees away from infrastructure -- an argument that puts the transit industry's leading D.C. lobbying group squarely in the transportation mainstream.

In a release previewing its joint press conference with AASHTO, scheduled for tomorrow morning, APTA said the Senate bill's use of new fuel fees for purposes beyond infrastructure, such as paying down the federal deficit, "would harm efforts to pass a new surface transportation bill and would also greatly impair the ability of states, counties, cities and transit systems to reduce our dependence on foreign oil and reduce transportation-related emissions."

While transport reform advocates hailed last week's long-awaited Senate climate bill for directing an estimated $6 billion-plus towards local land use planning and green infrastructure, state DOTs and construction interests criticized the legislation -- suggesting that the measure's sponsors could face stiff resistance from the transportation industry's mainstream despite making concessions to win over all sides.

The central complaint raised by mainstream transport players boils down to, as American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) executive director John Horsley put it in a statement, the Senate bill's "preemption" of user-fee revenue that historically has gone into the nation's dwindling highway trust fund.

"Congress can ill-afford to consider any legislation that" siphons off money from the trust fund, which has required more than $30 billion in replenishment from the general Treasury over the past 18 months, Horsley said.

Stephen Sandherr, chief of the Associated General Contractors -- a backer of the Senate effort to bar the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from regulating greenhouse gas emissions in the absence of congressional action -- echoed that sentiment in his own statement on the upper-chamber climate proposal.

"[B]y taking funds raised through the proposal’s new transportation fees and committing all but a small percentage to unrelated spending, the legislation leaves our aging and inefficient roads, airways and transit systems vastly underfunded," Sandherr said.

But does the Senate climate bill impose a user fee on transportation fuel consumers? The text of the measure specifically requires "each refined [fuel] product provider" to purchase emissions permits from the EPA on a quarterly basis at a fixed price, with no permit trading allowed. Horsley's depiction of those charges as a "user fee" relies on the considerable likelihood that oil companies and refiners would pass on the cost of those emissions permits to consumers in the form of higher gas prices.

In the meantime, how much of the revenue raised by the bill's new fuel permits would infrastructure receive?

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Transportation would receive more than $6 billion of the revenue generated by selling carbon emissions permits to fuel providers under a new Senate climate bill introduced today by Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Joseph Lieberman (I-CT).

That money for infrastructure would be divided into three equal parts, according to the legislation. One-third would go into the nation's cash-strapped highway trust fund – with a mandate to set aside the funding for projects that decrease greenhouse gas emissions – while another third would go towards competitive federal grants in the style of the stimulus law's Transportation Investments Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) program. 

A final third would go towards local land-use planning, as envisioned in the so-called “CLEAN TEA” bill championed by Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE).

“We want to make this the Senate where we finish the job and cast the decisive vote for the future,” Kerry told reporters at a packed Capitol Hill press conference where veterans' groups and industry representatives lent their support to the legislation.

The climate bill also takes a step towards requiring a set of national transport objectives – a longtime goal of reform groups – by giving the U.S. DOT and Environmental Protection Agency one year to propose “national transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions goals” as well as unified strategies for states and metro areas to measure their compliance with those goals.

State and local transportation planners would then have two more years to draft plans for emissions reduction, using a variety of strategies named in the bill, including transit-oriented development, high-speed rail, zoning changes, and promotion of biking and walking. Any areas that do not propose plans for reducing transport emissions would be declared ineligible for the proposed “CLEAN TEA” grants.

The bill states that emissions allowances set aside for the highway trust fund “shall be used to promote the safety, effectiveness, and efficiency of transportation,” specifying that the money should be used in accordance with the principles of the “CLEAN TEA” package. But the legislation did not specify how such a firewall surrounding highway trust fund money would be enforced within the U.S. DOT.

Nonetheless, transportation reformers hailed the bill as a step forward. Read more...

Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) are set to roll out their long-awaited, somewhat delayed climate change bill tomorrow without onetime co-sponsor Lindsey Graham (R-SC).

The legislation no longer includes its originally conceived "linked fee" on motor fuels -- which was quickly branded as a gas tax increase, alarming Graham and the White House while catching many members of the transport industry off-guard. But how does the Senate climate bill address the 30 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions that come from transportation?

The Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin has an early look, reporting that the transportation section makes room for a "cap" on emissions but eliminates the "trade" aspect of the House-passed climate bill:

The transportation sector will not have any allowance trading, sources said. Instead, companies will have to buy quarterly carbon allowances that would be based on the average price in the previous quarter; the fee would be tacked on at a stage known in the industry as "the rack," which is after the fuel has left the refinery but before it reaches gas stations.

The bill would put electric utilities first in line for a sector-specific emissions cap, with other fossil fuel-using industries to follow, according to a report in National Journal that also includes a link to a leaked four-page summary of the measure. That summary suggests that the transportation industry may be pleased with the measure, referencing annual funding of "over $7 billion" for infrastructure.

For more details on how the legislation would affect U.S. infrastructure, check this space tomorrow ...

(ed. note. This post was updated to add a link to the bill summary.)

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief Lisa Jackson today told House members that she would soon begin work on new auto fuel-efficiency rules for the year 2017 and beyond, responding to calls from carmakers searching for certainty -- and warily eyeing the new fuel standards being crafted in California.

The political and legal jockeying that ultimately led the White House to a deal on higher U.S. auto fuel standards began in California, where stronger efficiency rules were adopted, shut down by the Bush administration, and later embraced by 13 other states. 

Now, as the Golden State sets to work on its fuel standards for the year 2017, the endpoint of the current White House efficiency rules, clean energy advocates are vowing to push California officials for the strongest possible auto emissions limits. If California can set the stage for nationwide progress on fuel-efficiency once, the theory goes, it can easily happen again.

But not every California lawmaker is convinced that the state should be a pioneer. At today's House Energy & Commerce Committee hearing, Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-CA) openly wondered whether California should continue prodding the rest of the nation towards greater energy efficiency -- a question equally applicable to the state's law limiting broader carbon emissions.

After noting that she spoke as "a proud Californian," Bono Mack asked Jackson, "If California changes their standards, are you saying we all have to agree with their standards?"

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While state DOTs marked Earth Day by depicting roads as unsung heroes of livability, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and the transit industry celebrated in their own ways by releasing reports on local rail and bus systems' roles in reducing U.S. transport emissions.

The FTA's updated report [PDF] on transit's value in combating climate change includes average emissions for various modes of transportation (see above chart), calculated using the government's National Transit Database. The emissions totals, which reflect average ridership estimates, show that transit averages about half the CO2 poundage per passenger mile of a single-occupancy vehicle.

But the FTA also breaks down individual transit systems' average emissions, illustrating how much of a difference high ridership -- and cleaner-burning sources of electricity -- can make when it comes to the energy efficiency of local rail.

Take the San Francisco metro area's heavy rail system, known as BART, which achieves average emissions of just 0.085 pounds of CO2 per passenger mile. That rock-bottom total is made possible by electricity generated largely through hydropower. Washington D.C.'s Metrorail, meanwhile, comes in at an average of 0.347 pounds of CO2, making it four times less efficient than BART.

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The several dozen transportation industry groups that raised questions about where the upcoming Senate climate change bill would send proceeds from its new "linked fee" on carbon fuels can stop worrying -- because it looks like the legislation won't contain any new tax on motor fuels.

As Sen. John Kerry (MA), the climate bill's chief Democratic author, told Reuters late yesterday:

"There is not even a linked fee. There's not a tax, there's nothing similar."

Pressed for clarification about the fee, Kerry then said, "certainly not the way it was described previously, nothing like that." The Massachusetts Democrat refused to elaborate.

Kerry was more direct in a response to the Houston Chronicle, stating: “The gas tax is 18.4 cents today, and it'll be that when this bill is passed.”  

His comments do not rule out the possibility of some charge on carbon-based fuels remaining in the bill, but they cast significant doubt on the scenario that Washington transportation watchers had feared most: extra fees that oil companies would pass on through higher costs at the pump, amounting to a de facto gas tax hike without guaranteed revenue for road and transit projects.

The oil and gas industry had responded favorably to the prospect of a predictable fee they could market as a response to climate change, effectively shifting any negative consumer response onto Congress rather than fuel producers. American Petroleum Institute President Jack Gerard predicted last month that a carbon charge would "soften the reaction" among his member firms to a national cap on greenhouse gases.

The challenge of addressing transportation emissions, which account for about one-third of the nation's total output, could end up pushing the release of the Senate climate bill beyond its original Monday deadline. Sen. Lindsey Graham (SC), the measure's sole GOP backer so far, told CongressDaily that Monday remains "the hope" but is not set in stone.