Hill Heat

Full committee hearing for testimony from members of Congress on legislation under the committee’s jurisdiction.

The purpose of this hearing is to continue the Subcommittee’s focus on consolidating Federal agencies and selling public buildings. The hearing builds on the March 2025 hearing about implementing the public buildings reforms passed last Congress.

Witnesses:

• Michael Capuano, Member, Public Buildings Reform Board
• David Marroni, Director, Physical Infrastructure, Government Accountability Office
• Andrew Heller, Public Buildings Service Commissioner (Acting), General Services Administration

This year, we’ve seen the Trump Administration weaken federal agencies and programs that protect workers’ rights, mass fire federal employees, and launch unprecedented attacks on our civil liberties. But there has also been inspiring resistance. Unions and labor leaders have been at the forefront of resistance: defending the right to unionize, protecting immigrant workers, and advocating for the students, patients, and communities they serve.

Special guest:

• Rep. Emily Randall (D-Wash.)

Speakers:

• Randi Weingarten, American Federation of Teachers
• Jon Schleuss, NewsGuild-CWA
• Curtis Hierro, CWA
• Sara Steffens, We Build Progress

RSVP

On Wednesday, December 10, 2025, at 10:15 a.m., in room 1324 Longworth House Office Building, the Committee on Natural Resources, Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations will hold an oversight hearing titled “Abuse of the Equal Access to Justice Act by Environmental NGOs.”

Witnesses:

• Dan Rohlf, Professor of Law, Director, Earthrise Law Center, Lewis and Clark Law School (Democratic witness)
• Regina Lennox, Senior Litigation Counsel, Safari Club International
• Travis Joseph, President and CEO, American Forest Resource Council
• Todd Wilkinson, South Dakota Rancher

The Endangered Species Act of 1973 allows litigants who win cases to protect endangered species to collect litigation costs (Section 11(g)(4)).

The Equal Access to Justice Act of 1980 authorizes attorney fees to individuals and businesses that win cases against the U.S. Government, but eligibility requirements apply to individuals ($2 million net worth) and businesses ($7 million net worth). On the other hand, there are no requirements applied to 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations. Right-wing anti-environmental organizations like the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation advocate for limiting the practical application of the Endangered Species Act by limiting these awards to environmental organizations.

Legislation has been introduced, such as the Endangered Species Transparency and Reasonableness Act of 2025 (H.R. 180), to impose such limits.

Subcommittee markup.

Markup memo

Items to be considered:

• H.R. 6409, Foreign Emissions and Nonattainment Clarification for Economic Stability (FENCES) (Rep. Pfluger)
• H.R. 4218, Clean Air and Economic Advancement Reform (CLEAR) Act (Rep. Carter)
• H.R. 6387, Fire Improvement and Reforming Exceptional Events (FIRE) Act (Rep. Evans)
• H.R. 4214, Clean Air and Building Infrastructure Improvement Act (Rep. Allen)
• H.R. 161, New Source Review Permitting Improvement Act (Rep. Griffith)
• H.R. 6373, Air Permitting Improvements to Protect National Security Act (Rep. Palmer)
• H.R. 6398, Reducing and Eliminating Duplicative Environmental Regulations (RED Tape) Act (Rep. Joyce)

The legislative hearing on most of these bills was on September 16th.

The proposed FENCES Act would let states escape having EPA designate an area as “nonattainment” for a national ambient air quality standard by blaming ambient air quality exceedances on sources outside their borders or outside the country — even though residents are indisputably breathing unhealthy air.

The Clean Air and Economic Advancement Reform (CLEAR) Act would make several changes to the Clean Air Act, including amending section 109(d) to extend the current NAAQS review cycle from five years to 10 years; section 109(b)(1) to allow consideration of attainability when choosing among a range of air quality standards that are protective of human health and the environment; section 110(c)(1) to provide states the opportunity to address concerns in a State Implementation Plan (SIP) submission before a Federal Implementation Plan is issued; and section 1825 to eliminate certain demonstration requirements in a SIP to promote increased technological innovations in control technologies. The legislation also includes provisions similar to H.R. 6387 concerning how certain events including fires, drought, and heat, are considered as part of the NAAQS process and H.R. 6409 concerning how non-attainment areas are classified as severe or extreme for ozone or as serious for particulate matter, and sanctions are imposed for implementation plan deficiencies under section 179.

The Clean Air Act section 319 allows states to petition EPA to exclude air pollution caused by “exceptional events” from EPA’s consideration in determining whether an area is violating a national ambient air quality standard. The proposed FIRE Act (H.R. 6387) would revise the definition of “exceptional event” to explicitly include prescribed fires undertaken to reduce the risk and severity of wildfires. The bill also would make other changes designed to make it easier for states to demonstrate that an ambient air quality standard violation resulted from an exceptional event. The proposed bill is unnecessary because EPA’s regulations already establish criteria for prescribed fires to be treated as “exceptional events.” More importantly, the proposed bill would put public health at risk by relaxing the required demonstration a state must make for an ambient air quality standard exceedance to be disregarded due to it being caused by an exceptional event. Such lax criteria for exceptional events would contravene the statutory principle in Clean Air Act section 319 “that each State must take necessary measures to safeguard public health regardless of the source of the air pollution.”

The Clean Air and Building Infrastructure Improvement Act (H.R. 4214) amends section 1097 require EPA to concurrently publish regulations and guidance for implementing a revised NAAQS and prevent the new or revised standards from applying to preconstruction permit applications until the Administrator has published such final regulations and guidance. It also clarifies that nothing in the subsection eliminates the obligation of a preconstruction permit applicant to install the best available control technology and lowest achievable emission rate technology, and clarifies that nothing in the subsection limits the authority of a state, local, or Tribal permitting authority to impose more stringent emissions requirements pursuant to a state, local, or tribal law than NAAQS. The legislation also provides that the 2024 PM2.5 standard shall not apply to the review and disposition of a preconstruction permit application if a permit application is completed on or before the date of promulgation of the final designation of an area; or a public notice of a preliminary determination on a draft permit is provided within 60 days after the date of final designation of an area.

The so-called “New Source Review Permitting Improvement” Act (H.R. 161) would essentially eliminate NSR for emissions-increasing changes made to our nation’s largest industrial sources.

The proposed “Air Permitting Improvements to Protect National Security” Act (H.R. 6373) would authorize the President to exempt proposed large new or modified semiconductor manufacturing facilities and facilities that extract, process, refine, or mill a “critical mineral” from the requirement to “offset” the new air pollution they will cause with air pollution reductions within the same airshed.

Clean Air Act section 309 grants EPA authority to review and comment on the environmental impact of (1) legislation proposed by any Federal department or agency, (2) newly authorized Federal projects for construction and certain other major Federal agency actions, and (3) proposed regulations published by any Federal department or agency. The proposed “RED Tape” Act would eliminate all of EPA’s section 309 authority except for its authority to comment on proposed legislation.

EPW business meeting to consider:

• Douglas Weaver to be a Member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
• Lee Beaman to be a Member of the Board of Directors of the Tennessee Valley Authority

Their nomination hearing was held on December 3rd.

The purpose of this hearing, entitled “The Genesis Mission: Prioritizing American Science and Technology Leadership,” is to examine President Trump’s executive order, “Launching the Genesis Mission.” This hearing will also review the Department of Energy (DOE)’s recent reorganization and evaluate how these changes impact the goals and priorities of its civilian research, development, demonstration, and commercial programs.

Hearing charter

Witness:

• Darío Gil, Under Secretary for Science, U.S. Department of Energy

The executive order “Launching the Genesis Mission” was published on November 24th and the Department of Energy website published on November 25th. The list of corporate collaborators on the site includes AWS, AMD, Microsoft, IBM, OpenAI, Google, NVIDIA, and Anthropic. The website was built by DOGE operatives Ed “Big Balls” Coristine and Joe Gebbia.

Unlike the broader Department of Energy reorganization, this project was authorized by Congress in section 50404 of the One Big Brutal Bill Act, “Transformational Artificial Intelligence Models,” which appropriated $150 million for national lab-private sector AI partnerships.

Department of Energy Genesis Mission Town Hall:

Berkeley National Lab has announced three AI-research initiatives under the Genesis umbrella, two of which are ongoing:

• Multi-Office particle Accelerator Team (MOAT): MOAT currently includes partners from Argonne, Brookhaven, Fermi, Jefferson, Oak Ridge, and SLAC national laboratories, as well as industrial partners at Advanced Micro Devices, Kitware, Nusano, NVIDIA, Radiasoft, and Xlight. This continues ongoing AI-assisted particle accelerator research. Jean-Luc Vay is MOAT’s lead and the head of the Advanced Modeling Program in the Accelerator Technology & Applied Physics Division.
• SYNAPS-I (Synergistic Neutron and Photon Autonomous Science – Imaging). The effort will integrate foundation models across all participating light and neutron sources, enabling unified analysis of imaging data from cutting-edge X-ray and neutron instruments at seven DOE Basic Energy Sciences user facilities, including the ALS, a synchrotron light source that produces X-ray, ultraviolet, and infrared light. Alex Hexemer, ALS senior scientist is the SYNAPS-I lead point of contact.
• Orchestrated Platform for Autonomous Laboratories to Accelerate AI-Driven BioDesign (OPAL) project is using robotic systems, AI agents and models, and standardized data-sharing platforms to accelerate the biotechnology pipeline. Paul Adams is the Associate Laboratory Director for Biosciences and OPAL lead point of contact. OPAL is an ongoing initiative supported by DOE’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research (BER) and Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) programs.

Full committee hearing to receive testimony on legislation under the committee’s jurisdiction.

Subcommittee hearing.

Witness:

• Jamieson Greer

The Committee on Rules will meet Tuesday, December 9, 2025 at 4:00 PM ET in H-313, The Capitol on the following measures:

• H.R. 3638 – Electric Supply Chain Act (Report, Committee vote)
• H.R. 3628 – State Planning for Reliability & Affordability Act (Report)
• H.R. 3383 – Increasing Investor Opportunities Act [INVEST Act]
• H.R. 3668 – Improving Interagency Coordination for Pipeline Reviews Act
• H.R. 3898 – PERMIT Act [Rule Markup Only]