Hill Heat

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Chair Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.)

Witness

• Tom Vilsack, Secretary, U.S. Department of Agriculture

The 2023 request for discretionary budget authority to fund programs and operating expenses is $31.1 billion, slightly more than 12 percent increase, or $3.8 billion, above the 2021 enacted level. The 2023 request for mandatory programs is $164.8 billion, a decrease of around $10.2 billion from the 2021 level.

Steps are being taken across USDA to improve adaptation and increase resilience to the impacts of climate change, including identifying agency vulnerabilities. Within the Office of the Secretary, $4.5 million is requested to coordinate such activities across the Department. In addition, the Office of the Chief Economist is requesting $6 million for research and analysis necessary to assist stakeholders in implementing climate smart agriculture and forestry practices and oversee the production of the Department’s resilience and climate change adaptation plan. The Budget includes an increase of $39 million above the 2021 enacted for the Forest Service to invest more in research related to climate mitigation, adaptation, and resilience, including expanding the scope and scale of research and program delivery related to reforestation, carbon sequestration, carbon accounting, and fire and fuels research. The Budget includes $6 million for Forest Service and $8 million for the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) for climate hubs.

The Budget requests $300 million in new funding for rural electric utilities to support the transition to carbon pollution-free electricity by 2035. Additional funding of $15 million is also requested to increase coordination between USDA, Department of Energy, and Department of Interior to support the creation of the Rural Clean Energy Initiative to achieve the President’s clean energy goals. A $261 million funding request for construction, preservation and rehabilitation under Rural Housing Service will target projects that promote clean energy or address climate resilience by improving energy or water efficiency, and energy saving features. The Budget includes more than $134.8 million for the USDA Agriculture Buildings and Facilities account, of which $25 million will provide for the hire and purchase of motor vehicles and the transformation of vehicle fleet to provide hybrid, alternative, and/or electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure.

Additionally, the Budget requests $21 million to support key climate priorities within the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), including establishing a soil health monitoring network that will include a network of soil sampling sites, integrating soil carbon monitoring into the conservation planning process, and efforts to increase the internal capacity of NRCS staff regarding key soil carbon and climate smart activities.

The Budget includes $2.7 billion to mitigate wildfire risk, an increase of $751 million from 2021 enacted. This includes $321 million for hazardous fuels reduction, an increase of $141 million from the 2022 annualized CR level. This builds on the over $300 million in hazardous fuels funding the Forest Service will receive through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act in 2023, a significant investment to prioritize and target landscape treatments across multiple jurisdictions.

The Budget includes $2.4 billion for the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) to protect up to 27 million acres of environmentally sensitive cropland and grassland. In addition, $2 billion is included for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, $1 billion for the Conservation Stewardship Program, $450 million for the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program, and $300 million for the Regional Conservation Partnership Program. The budget proposes $20 million for the Healthy Forests Reserve Program to enroll private lands and acreage owned by Indian Tribes for the purpose of restoring, enhancing, and protecting forestland to enhance carbon sequestration, improve plant and animal biodiversity, and promote recovery of endangered and threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. Of note, an increase of $41 million for NRCS will expand staffing capacity to keep pace with increased mandatory programs.

The Budget includes $4 billion to support research to advance the competitiveness of U.S. agriculture, promote food security and increase climate change research. Included in the ARS budget is an increase of $99 million for clean energy, $92 million for climate science, $11 million for Greenhouse Gas Monitoring and Measurement, $11 million for Adaptation and Resilience Activities, $55 million for additional investments and $5 million for climate hubs.

For the Economic Research Service, the Budget proposes a total of $100 million to focus on core data analysis related to agricultural production, as well as $2 million for climate science research. For the National Agricultural Statistics Service, the Budget includes $217 million, including $66 million for the Census of Agriculture and $8 million to help measure and inform climate science research.

The Budget includes $6.5 billion in loan authority for rural electric loans, an increase of $1 billion over the 2021 enacted level, to support additional clean energy, energy storage, and transmission projects that help get people back to work in good-paying jobs. The budget also includes $300 million in new funding to provide rural electric cooperatives financial flexibility as they continue investments in renewable energy systems, fossil fuel generating plants with carbon sequestration systems, and investments in environmental improvements to reduce emissions of pollutants and accelerate progress to zero carbon electricity by 2035 and create good paying jobs that provide the free and fair change to join a union and collective bargain.

The Budget includes an increase of $334 million to support necessary staff levels to enhance response to year-round fire activity and allow the agency to continue important investments that support the health, well-being, and resilience of the agency’s wildland firefighting force.

Food systems account for 31 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. These emissions arise along the whole food supply chain, from production, processing, and packaging to transport, consumption and disposal. Power and transport systems receive the lion share of attention in the global dialogue and response to climate change, while the nexus between food and climate has been largely absent from the climate conversations. To date, very few countries take a comprehensive view of the food system in their climate action plans.

The United States and China, the two largest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions, both face similar climate change threats to agriculture—from extreme weather patterns, stronger floods, extended droughts to greater pests and diseases. Climate impacts threaten economic and food security. As food market superpowers, the United States and China are well positioned to lead efforts in green agriculture to address climate change. Notably, green and climate resilient agriculture were priorities highlighted in the U.S.-China Climate Crisis Statement and the U.S.-China Glasgow Declaration in 2021.

At this May 10th CEF meeting, panelists will give an overview of the global food-climate challenge and delve into opportunities for China and the United States to target the food system to help reach their carbon neutral and short-lived climate pollutant reduction goals.

David Sandalow, (Center for Global Energy at Columbia University and co-founder of the Food Climate Partnership) will set the stage, discussing the food system and climate change. Next, Sally Qiu and Hörn Halldórudóttir Heiðarsdóttir will share insights on China’s food-related greenhouse gas emissions.

The next two speakers will turn the conversation to the farms with Zhenzhong Si (Waterloo University) offering some insights into the government’s policies and bottom-up agroecological initiatives in China that respond to the social and environmental challenges facing the food system while creating new problems for sustainability. And Karen Mancl (Ohio State University) will examine success in sustainable agriculture in the United States and China and explore policies needed to incentivize farmers.

Patty Fong (Global Alliance for the Future of Food), whose CEF Green Tea Chat laid out the urgency for global food system transformation to address climate change, will be the commentator at this session.

RSVP

Senator Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), Chair of the Environment and Public Works (EPW) Subcommittee on Clean Air, Climate and Nuclear Safety, will host a subcommittee field hearing on policies regarding the decommissioning process for nuclear plants such as the Pilgrim Nuclear Station, including nuclear safety and security issues and state, local, and community stakeholder engagement.

The Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth was decommissioned in 2019.

Location: 1820 Court House Plymouth Town Hall 26 Court Street Plymouth, MA 02360

The purpose of the hearing is to examine the President’s budget request for the Department of Energy for Fiscal Year 2023.

Witness

• Jennifer Granholm, Secretary of Energy, U.S. Department of Energy

Hearing page

I. Nominee

• S. Lane Tucker to be United States Attorney for the District of Alaska

II. Bill

• S. 977, No Oil Producing and Exporting Cartels Act of 2021 (Grassley, Klobuchar, Lee, Leahy)

Related bill: H.R. 2393

The bill would seek to prohibit foreign states from working collectively to limit the production, set the price, or otherwise restrain the trading of petroleum and natural gas when such actions affect U.S. markets. The bill would authorize the Department of Justice (DOJ) to enforce the prohibition by filing antitrust actions in federal courts. Under the bill, foreign states that restrain trade in petroleum and natural gas would not be immune from the judgment of U.S. courts under the doctrine of sovereign immunity.

Hearing page

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Nominations:

• Dr. John N. Nkengasong, of Georgia, to be Ambassador at Large, Coordinator of United States Government Activities to Combat HIV/AIDS globally
• Mr. Marc B. Nathanson, of California, to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Kingdom of Norway
• Ms. MaryKay Loss Carlson, of Arkansas, a Career Member of the Senior Foreign Service, Class of Minister-Counselor, to be Ambassador Extraordinatory and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Republic of the Philippines
• The Honorable Philip S. Goldberg, of the District of Columbia, a Career Member of the Senior Foreign Service, Class of Career Ambassador, to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Republic of Korea
• The Honorable Caroline Kennedy, of New York, to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Commonwealth of Australia

Treaties:

• Amendments to the Treaty on Fisheries between the Governments of Certain Pacific Island States and the Government of the United States of America (Treaty Doc. 115-3)
• Agreement between the Governmemnt of the United States of America and the Government of the Republic of Croatia comprising the instrument as contemplated by Article 3(2) of the Agreement on Extradition between the United States of America and the European Union, signed June 25, 3003, as to the Application of the Treaty on Extradition signed on October 25, 1901 (the “U.S.Croatia Extradition Agreement”) and the Agreement between the Government of the United States and the Government of the Republlic of Croatia comprising the Instrument as contemplated by Article 3(3) of the Agreement on Mutual Legal Assistance between the United States of America and the EUropean Union signed at Washington on June 25, 2003 (the “U.S.Croatia Mutual Legal Assistance Agreement”), both signed at Washington on December 10, 2019 (Treaty Doc. 116-2)
• Amendment to the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer (the “Montreal Protocol”), adopted at Kigali on October 15, 2016, by the Twenty-Eighth Meeting of the Parties to the Monteral Protocol (the “Kigali Amendment”) (Treaty Doc 117-1)

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Witness:

• Jennifer Granholm, Secretary of Energy

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Witness:

• Randy Moore, Chief, U.S. Forest Service

The Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works will hold a Business Meeting to consider the following items:

• Benny R. Wagner, of Tennessee, to be Inspector General of the Tennessee Valley Authority
• Six (6) GSA Resolutions
• Water Resources Development Act of 2022