Hill Heat

Today, President Barack Obama discussed the initial findings of an investigation by Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, Mine Safety and Health Administration chief Joe Main, and MSHA Administrator for Coal Mine Safety and Health Kevin Stricklin:

THE PRESIDENT: Good morning, everybody. On April 5th, the United States suffered the worst mine disaster in more than a generation. Twenty-nine lives were lost. Families have been devastated. Communities have been upended. And during this painful time, all of us are mourning with the people of Montcoal and Whitesville and Naoma and the Coal River Valley. The people of West Virginia are in our prayers.

But we owe them more than prayers. We owe them action. We owe them accountability. We owe them an assurance that when they go to work every day, when they enter that dark mine, they are not alone. They ought to know that behind them there is a company that’s doing what it takes to protect them, and a government that is looking out for their safety.

In the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, I asked the officials standing with me – Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, and Joe Main and Kevin Stricklin with the Mine Safety and Health Administration – to lead an investigation into what caused the explosion at Massey Energy Company’s Upper Big Branch mine. I asked them to report back with preliminary findings this week.

We just concluded a meeting, where they briefed me on their investigation. I want to emphasize that this investigation is ongoing, and there’s still a lot that we don’t know. But we do know that this tragedy was triggered by a failure at the Upper Big Branch mine—a failure first and foremost of management, but also a failure of oversight and a failure of laws so riddled with loopholes that they allow unsafe conditions to continue.

So today I’ve directed Secretary Solis, Assistant Secretary Main, and Administrator Stricklin to work closely with state mining officials to press ahead with this investigation—so we can help make sure a disaster like this never happens again. Owners responsible for conditions in the Upper Big Branch mine should be held accountable for decisions they made and preventive measures they failed to take. And I’ve asked Secretary Solis to work with the Justice Department to ensure that every tool in the federal government is available in this investigation.

But this isn’t just about a single mine. It’s about all of our mines. The safety record at the Massey Upper Big Branch mine was troubling. And it’s clear that while there are many responsible companies, far too many mines aren’t doing enough to protect their workers’ safety.

Below is the text of the remarks from Dr. Lawrence Summers, the Director of the White House’s National Economic Council, to the U.S. Energy Information Administration Conference.

A few months before I came into government, my twin daughters completed their course in AP U.S. history at their local high school and I reviewed for their test with them. There were two aspects of that experience that stuck with me as I thought about my objectives in advising President Obama.

The first is that while I, as a macroeconomist, thought of the 1982 recession as a big deal, thought of the inflation of the 1970s as a big deal, thought about the 1987 stock market crash as a big deal, none of them got mentioned in my daughters’ history course.

On the other hand, they spent six weeks on the events of the 1930s.

And the lesson I took away, coming into office a year ago, was that our first priority had to be making sure that a depression was avoided. Making sure that the vicious cycle of deleveraging and contraction that then plagued the economy was first contained and then ultimately reversed. And so this was remembered as a very disturbing economic fluctuation, but not as the kind of depression that defined an era.

And the evidence, I think, suggests that the President has made very substantial progress with that objective.

• Fifteen months ago, a depression did not look unlikely as three-quarters of a million Americans were losing their jobs each month.
• The stock market was, after correcting for inflation, at 1966 levels.
• And the output was declining at 6 percent a quarter.

Today, we have a long way to go, but a 6 percent GDP loss in first quarter gave way to a 6 percent gain in GDP, according to the most recent statistics.

Markets have risen by 75 percent since last March as conditions have substantially normalized.

And while there are special factors and there will be fluctuations, the economy has begun to produce jobs again: 162,000 last month, the largest increase in the number of jobs in three years.

While we have a long way to go in an economy with 9.7 percent unemployment and $1 trillion short of potential, we are at last moving in the right direction.

As we move in the right direction, as this recovery unfolds, as what economists call the left tail of the distribution recedes in likelihood, it becomes essential that

• We think about the renewal of the American economy;
• We think about creating an economy with a stronger foundation for prosperity than the one that we inherited;
• We invest more and consume less;
• We technologically engineer more and we financially engineer less;
• We look to the long view and to the short view less;
• We compete in the global economy and we win.

To do so, in many areas, will require a change in our gestalt. Not the continuation of existing battles and of existing conflicts, but the reformulation of problems in new ways that permit us to cut across old debates and to as a nation move forward.

It is the accomplishment of those tasks of national economic renewal that are what came through again and again as what history remembered in that history course my daughters took.

Whether it was the land grant colleges and intercontinental railroad of President Lincoln, whether it was the Sherman Act and national parks and much more of President Theodore Roosevelt, whether it was the expansion of the concept of protection so as to save the market economy from itself with Social Security and unemployment insurance and deposit insurance of President Franklin Roosevelt, ultimately the most historically memorable accomplishments are those which renew our market system, which approach problems in different ways, and extend our efforts to create a more stable and more durable and more secure prosperity.

And it is that across a range of areas that will, I believe, define President Obama’s presidency when its history is written.

That was the motivation for the President’s historic battle for comprehensive health reform.

That was the motivation and is the continuing motivation for our efforts to insist that we rebuild our financial system and particularly the way in which it is regulated on a much more secure foundation after all the crises of the last generation.

And it is this approach of a new gestalt, a new view, a new paradigm, and a commitment to renewal that I believe needs to shape our approach to energy policy going forward.

To be sure, energy policy is about much more than economics.

There are only two ways in which mankind can affect the basic terms of life on earth on a planetary scale. One is what happens with respect to nuclear weapons. That’s outside my sphere, but in Prague later this week and in Washington next week we are making substantial progress with respect to the challenge of nuclear weapons.

The other, of course, is with respect to global climate change, where it is an imperative for this planet that we act so as to reduce the risks that current science points up.

From the Wonk Room.

“Strong currents on Monday battered a stranded coal carrier that slammed into a stretch of the Great Barrier Reef over the weekend,” as “Maritime Safety Queensland officials warned that if the ship broke in two, some 65,000 tons of coal and 300,000 gallons of heavy fuel oil used to run the ship’s engines would spill into the marine reserve.”

Gov. Brian Schweitzer (D-MT) made a “local officials express support, in writing, for a proposed coal mine in order to receive stimulus money for local projects,” in a letter telling them to voice support for “coal money.”

The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that “about 150,000 deaths occur annually in low-income countries due to the adverse effects of climate change”, as scientists report that emissions of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide have surged by 2000 percent from melting permafrost.

From the Wonk Room.

The Obama administration “effectively called time today on one of the most destructive industries in America, proposing new environmental guidelines for mountaintop mining removal,” and also finalized new “fuel efficiency and emissions rules for America’s passenger vehicles,” its “first formal step to regulate global warming pollution.”

President Obama visited the Massachusetts’s flood-fighting headquarters yesterday, thanking workers for their round-the-clock efforts.

California remains in a drought despite extreme storms that ” has caused the worst damage and most significant beach erosion in at least a decade,” and China’s drought is “beginning to erode power production capacity.”

From the Wonk Room.

President Barack Obama will announce today his plan to open “vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling” for the first time, but New Gingrich’s American Solutions for Winning the Future says it is just an “attempt by Obama to seduce the public” with window dressing.

President Obama yesterday declared a state of emergency as record levels of rainfall cause “100-year floods” in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Long Island.

U.S. Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) said Tuesday that he does not believe a climate change bill will see the light of day in 2010. “You can’t do things too quickly, particularly something that is as big as climate change.”

Today, President Barack Obama announced a sweeping new offshore drilling policy, opening “vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling” for the first time. This plan would also restore the ban on drilling in Alaska’s Bristol Bay. White House officials “pitched the changes as ways to reduce U.S. reliance on foreign oil and create jobs,” the Associated Press reports. For years, Obama has explained that new offshore drilling would not “reduce U.S. reliance on foreign oil” :

“The days of running a 21st century economy on a 20th century fossil fuel are numbered – and we need to realize that before it’s too late.”

“The truth is, an oil future is not a secure future for America.”

“We could open up every square inch of America to drilling and we still wouldn’t even make a dent in our oil dependency.” 9/15/05

“It would be nice if we could produce our way out of this problem, but it’s just not possible.” 2/28/06

“Instead of making tough political decisions about how to reduce our insatiable demand for oil, this bill continues to lull the American people into thinking that we can drill our way out of our energy problems. ” 8/1/06

“Now is the time to end this addiction, and to understand that drilling is a stop-gap measure, not a long-term solution. Not even close.” 8/28/08

In the beginning of August 2008, as Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions for Winning the Future (ASWF) “Drill Here, Drill Now” campaign overlapped the presidential campaign, and oil and gas prices were skyrocketing to record levels, Obama abandoned his “blanket opposition to expanded offshore drilling,” saying that he would be willing “to compromise in terms of a careful, well thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage” in order to get Republican votes for comprehensive climate and energy reform.

In 2005 and 2006, Obama talked about the “tough decisions” of “how to reduce our insatiable demand for oil” and “investing in more hybrids and renewable energy sources, raising CAFE standards and helping our auto industry transition to a fuel-efficient future,” instead of drilling. In his State of the Union speech in 2010, in contrast, Obama said that “clean energy jobs” means “making tough decisions about opening new offshore areas for oil and gas development.”

Conservatives are treating the announcement with disdain— ASWF said the president’s plan “is likely to be an attempt by Obama to seduce the public (into) believing that he will do something in the future on offshore drilling,” but amounts to little more than window-dressing. Americans for Prosperity vice president Phil Kerpen commented that “the idea that this is a big concession in exchange for which Congress should jumpstart climate legislation is ridiculous.”

From the Wonk Room.

“A convoy of 60 kayaks, rafts and boats” from Rising Tide Australia formed a blockade at Newcastle Harbour and blocked Newcastle’s new coal loader to protest the expansion of the world’s largest coal export port.

The Kerry-Graham-Lieberman climate legislation will be introduced the week of Earth Day , but Sierra Club executive director Michael Brune warns, “There are things that would cause the Club to oppose the bill,” including offshore oil drilling and pre-emption of Clean Air Act authority.

Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) explored flood damage in Massachusetts, Gov. Jodi Rell (R-CT) prepared for a flooding emergency in Connecticut, and up to “100,000 people reportedly have fled or lost their homes in the flood stricken regency of Karawang, West Java.”

From the Wonk Room.

Senators are beginning to seriously tackle climate and clean energy reform, responding to the leadership of Sen. John Kerry (D-MA), Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) with letters staking out positions and making specific demands. Here’s an overview of these letters:

The Udall Group: Twenty-two Senators Say Senate Should ‘Consider’ Climate Legislation ‘This Year’.

Led by Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM), a moderate bloc of twenty-two Democratic senators “believe the United States should consider bipartisan and comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation this year with a renewed focus on jobs and reduced dependence on foreign oil.” Critically, eleven of the signatories last year signed on to a Republican filibuster threat of green economy legislation, and seven are members of Sen. Evan Bayh’s (D-IN) Moderate Democrats Working Group . Bayh himself did not sign Udall’s letter.

Download the Udall Group letter. Signatories: Begich (D-AK), Bennet (D-CO), Brown (D-OH), Burris (D-IL), Cantwell (D-WA), Carper (D-DE), Casey (D-PA), Franken (D-MN), Hagan (D-NC), Harkin (D-IA), Kaufman (D-DE), Klobuchar (D-MN), Merkley (D-OR), Murray (D-WA), Shaheen (D-NH), Specter (D-PA), Stabenow (D-MI), Tester (D-MT), Udall (D-NM), Udall (D-CO), Warner (D-VA), and Wyden (D-OR).

The Nuke Group: A Bipartisan Group Of Eleven Senators Demand A Nuclear Energy Summit.

Five Democrats and six Republicans, from Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) to Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK), propose the White House hold a “nuclear energy summit” on the “development of a 50-year strategy” within “the next 3-4 months,” because “safe nuclear power must play an increasingly important role in meeting our rising energy demand and ensuring cleaner air.” They want Energy Secretary Steven Chu, EPA Adminstrator Lisa Jackson, NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko, and Bill Gates to attend.

Download the Nuke Group letter. Signatories: Carper (D-DE), Landrieu (D-LA), Klobuchar (D-MN), Webb (D-VA), Warner (D-VA), Voinovich (R-OH), Crapo (R-ID), Vitter (R-LA), Sessions (R-AL), Alexander (R-TN) and Inhofe (R-OK).

Coastal State Senators: Don’t Drill On Me.

In a letter to Kerry, Graham, and Lieberman, ten Democratic senators from coastal states – Florida, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Maryland, Oregon, and Ted Kaufman of Delaware – write that “our states are literally the front lines when it comes to the severe impacts we’ll see from sea level rise and stronger storms,” and express their concerns that “some interests are aggressively pursuing an effort to open the nation’s coasts and oceans for unfettered access to oil and gas drilling.” They reject “the concept of sharing revenue with states,” as “funds that belong to the American people should be shared equally and prioritized to reduce the federal deficit and to protect our oceans and coasts that provide this resource.” They call for use-it-or-lose-it language on oil leases. Increased offshore drilling won’t reduce the cost of gas, they recognize, saying “the only way for us to lower oil prices is to pursue and aggressive policy of energy efficiency and conservation.”

Download the Coastal Senators letter. Signatories: Nelson (D-FL), Menendez (D-NJ), Lautenberg (D-NJ), Reed (D-RI), Whitehouse (D-RI), Cardin (D-MD), Mikulski (D-MD), Merkley (D-OR), Wyden (D-OR), and Kaufman (D-DE).

Feinstein Drills Into Policy Details.

In a letter to Kerry, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) touches on several specific policy details for his “bipartisan legislation to address the pressing problem of climate change.” She wants heavy industry to be exempted from the initial cap, opposes pre-emption of California’s tailpipe emissions standards, supports the Waxman-Markey formula for electric utility permit giveaways, wants new offshore drilling to require state-level legislation, thanks Kerry for including the Snowe-Feinstein market oversight language, and wants the oil carbon fee to be indexed to an emissions target rather than a carbon market. Significantly, Feinstein recommends that “the legislation’s spending authorizations expire no later than ten years after enactment”—a major change from the forty-year permit allocation formulas in previous legislation.

Download Feinstein’s letter.

Begich: ‘Alaska Is Ground Zero For Climate Change,’ So Let’s Drill It.

Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK) penned a letter saying “Alaska is ground zero for climate change. We are feeling its near-term effects far more than the residents of any other state, including retreating sea ice, rapidly eroding shorelines, thawing permafrost, ocean acidification, and changing fish and wildlife migration patterns.” Despite this, Begich calls for “greater emphasis and expanded incentives for natural gas” and “sharing in revenue from oil and gas development” from federal waters off the Arctic coast. Citing the “billions of dollars” of “damage to Alaska public infrastructure alone due to climate change,” Begich also requests “a higher priority for domestic rather than international adaptation funding” and an increased investment in Arctic research.

However, Begich does not call for stronger emissions reduction targets, stronger renewable or efficiency standards, stronger investments in green technologies, or anything that would allow the United States to lead an international agreement to halt greenhouse gas pollution.

Download Begich’s letter.

Kerry, Graham, and Lieberman have been holding a marathon of meetings. On Thursday they met with representatives of oil majors Shell, BP America, and ConocoPhillips, yet again with the pollution lobbyists of the Alliance for Energy and Economic Growth, and also with Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) and later with members of the electric utility trade group Edison Electric Institute.

None of these senators’ letters call for stronger pollution reductions, stronger renewable or efficiency standards, stronger scientific review, stronger regulation of hydraulic fracturing, stronger action on coal ash waste, stronger mercury rules, an end to mountaintop removal, or greater auctions of pollution permits.

From the Wonk Room.

“I think the bill we came up with is the right approach,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) said about the climate legislation she introduced with Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA). Cantwell agreed that she prefers a limited carbon market.

A “lack of significant precipitation, above average temperatures and the disappearance of snow in what normally is the second snowiest month” is causing an early start to wildfire season in Minnesota, and because of drought a “thousand forest fires burnt through Cuba in the first quarter of 2010 alone.”

“Deforestation slowed in the last decade, in the first sign that global conservation efforts are bearing fruit, but an area the size of Costa Rica is still being destroyed each year,” the United Nations said on Thursday.

Max Baucus (D-Mont.), Senate Finance Chairman

The Hill If it’s a viable bill, we’ll have a markup.

National Journal I just want to see the bill when it’s written. I’d be foolhardy to get more specific.

Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Senate Environment & Public Works Chairman

E&E News In general terms, they give a lot of power to the states on that [offshore drilling]. It seems to me what they’re doing is they’re taking the best ideas that have appeared over the years.

Kent Conrad (D-N.D.)

E&E News I’m kind of waiting to see what happens. But if it looks like we’re not going to advance on the broader bill, I think it’s critically important that we at least have legislation to reduce dependence on foreign energy. I just think it’s critically important to the economy, critically important to our energy and economic future, and that can be done in a way that it’s harmonized with reducing our carbon footprint as well.

Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)

E&E News On such a substantial decision about the future of a state [offshore drilling], a decision should be made by both the legislature and the governor. The state should also have the power to review its decision on a regular basis.

Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)

E&E News I’m still committed to trying to roll out a vision of how you can price carbon and make it business-friendly. We’re still going to do that. ... But the truth of the matter is, I think you’re going to find most of our colleagues around here risk adverse.