Weekly Political Roundup — Time Goes By, Things Become Less Clear
Posted April 24, 2009 at 11:28 am 
Filed in: At the end of this week, the prospects for various energy and climate proposals on Capitol Hill seem, if anything, less clear than they were seven days ago.
First comes what may be indications that cap and trade may not be a done deal in 2009. The week started with White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel appearing to say on ABC’s This Week that, while “there will be an energy bill on the president’s desk” by the end of the year, legislation dealing with climate change was not quite such a lock. “We will see,” he said. “You’re asking me before the legislative process starts to make that prediction.” To be fair, only three days later—on Earth Day—the president, while delivering a major speech on green jobs in Iowa, reiterated his strong support for cap and trade. However, on Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Reid put an additional set of brakes on cap and trade, announcing that the Senate would wait for the House before taking up the issue. “They’re going to finish theirs before August,” Reid said. “So we’ll have to do it in the fall.”
The House Energy and Commerce Committee is continuing full speed ahead with its combined energy and climate change bill. Chairman Waxman said again this week that he plans to pass the bill through committee by Memorial Day. The Senate, in the meantime, looked ready at the beginning of this week to continue forward with an energy-only bill. Even that, however, appears to be slowing down.
The Senate Energy and Resources Committee initially planned to hold a markup on the renewable electricity standard and transmission elements of its bill next week. The RES markup was dropped from the plan midweek when it became clear the votes were not there to pass it. Now, indications are that the transmission element of the markup will also be postponed. Instead, the Energy Committee will likely turn to cybersecurity next week.
So what does it all mean? It can be risky to read too much into the week-to-week machinations on Capitol Hill. Still, there are some patterns emerging. First, particularly on climate change but even on certain elements of energy—RES particularly—it appears that there is less of a consensus, even among Democrats, than many thought would be the case only a month or two ago. Cap and trade seemed a given for quick action with a Democrat in the White House and expanded majorities in both the House and Senate. Tying it to energy, another urgent issue, in the House (and as some wanted to do in the Senate as well) could have even given it a boost. Instead, however, climate change is slowing, now looking as if it may not be passed until late this year or sometime next. And if legislators are not careful, it may end up dragging energy down with it.
The questions the Obama administration and Democrat leaders need to ask themselves today are, ‘how urgent is energy security?’ and ‘how important is it politically that we have at least one major bipartisan accomplishment this year?’ The answers to those questions will help to determine the shape of the energy and climate debates over the next several weeks. If the answer to either or both is ‘this is important,’ then it is even more likely that climate change will be set aside temporarily in order to pass a bipartisan energy bill. On the Senate side, that process already appears to be happening.
Even that, however, does not automatically spell out bipartisan (or even intra-party) consensus, as the delays in the RES and transmission markups in the Senate show. That said, energy security still offers the best opportunity for a broad, bipartisan victory this year. Many of the concerns now being raised about various aspects of energy bills—transmission, RES, domestic production—are more regional than ideological. And there is a consensus emerging: we do need a stronger, more modern grid; we do need to be less dependent on oil, especially in our transportation sector; and we do need more renewables. Few policymakers would disagree with any of those propositions, and around them is the opportunity for a genuine, major bipartisan accomplishment this year.
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