Ed Markey

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Amendment No. 7. I rise as the designee to offer amendment No. 7. Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. MARKEY. Yes, I am offering the amendment as the designee of Mr. Quigley, which I think under the rules is permitted.

Mr. MARKEY. Today the Republicans continue their war on the environment. This time we have episode 58 of the Clean Air Act Repealathon. That's right, ladies and gentlemen who are listening. This is the 58th time the Republicans have voted to weaken the Clean Air Act this year. Today's episode guest stars excessive and unwanted appearances by neurotoxic mercury, carcinogenic dioxin, and deadly arsenic. This bill blocks and indefinitely delays implementation of the rules that would reduce emissions of these lethal air pollutants from industrial boilers and does so in total disregard for the devastating impacts these pollutants have on public health, particularly the health of infants and children. We already know a lot about these substances. For instance, exposure to dioxin causes delays in motor skills and neurodevelopment in children, impacts hormones that regulate growth, metabolism and reproduction, and has been classified as a carcinogen by the World Health Organization and the National Toxicology Program. Chromium 6 was made famous by the movie ``Erin Brockovich,'' starring Julia Roberts. That chemical has been linked to stomach and other forms of cancer. And let's not forget mercury, a substance that is particularly harmful to children because it impairs brain development, impacting memory, attention and language, potentially leading to life-long disabilities. The mercury is released directly into the air we all breathe and finds its way into the food that we eat. In 2010, all 50 States issued fish consumption advisories warning citizens to limit how often they eat fish caught in State waters because of mercury contamination. This bill seeks to permanently eliminate EPA's ability to reduce these toxic emissions from industrial boilers and does so despite the fact that the American Boiler Manufacturers Association, the association that represents the very companies that design, manufacture, and supply the industrial boilers in question, oppose the Republican bill. That's right, the companies that have stated that they stand ready and able to harness American ingenuity and technological might to design products that comply with EPA requirements in a timely and cost- effective manner oppose the Republican bill here today. And why? Because they believe this bill will only kill what they expect to be a new high-tech engineering and domestic manufacturing job explosion. So the Republican bill will not only kill people, 6,600 additional deaths per year in the United States according to the EPA; it will also kill jobs. My amendment is very simple. It just says that the Republican prohibitions on EPA reducing toxic air pollution in this bill are waived if these emissions are found to increase the risk of cancer. This amendment makes the choice very clear. If we adopt this amendment, EPA can continue with its plans to require the dirtiest industrial boilers and incinerators to clean up their cancer-causing emissions and do so while creating American jobs. So we saved 6,600 Americans from dying each year from their exposure to these neurotoxins; and at the same time, we create jobs in our economy. That's what this is all about. The EPA just has to certify that the Republican approach will not lead to an increase in cancers. That's all that we ask the Members on the floor to vote on today. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. MARKEY. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MARKEY. Again, the EPA has estimated that delaying the boiler air pollution rules could cause upwards of 6,600 deaths per year. That's the estimate, but that might be lowballing the number. We all know that parents out there are very concerned about what their kids are breathing in, especially if they live near these kinds of facilities that are spewing this stuff up into the atmosphere. They know how kids can be very vulnerable to this going into their systems as they're growing up. So to say that there is no health effect and that it can't be specifically quantified--that it's 6,602 as opposed to 6,605--doesn't mean that they haven't come up with a number, 6,600, that approximates what could happen in terms of the number of deaths that are caused by having this bill go on the books.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. The ``Occupy Wall Street'' protests have spread from New York to cities across America. As the protests expand, people are asking, Why? Why are thousands of Americans in the streets? Because Americans are fed up. Ninety-nine percent of the people are 100 percent fed up. They are fed up with a system that puts profit over people, that rewards the rich at the expense of everyone else. Let me give you an example: The government plans to spend $700 billion on new nuclear weapons systems over the next 10 years, even as it's proposing to cut research for Alzheimer's, for cancer research, for a diabetes cure, to take care of Medicare and Medicaid patients across our country. The American people are not afraid that their family is going to get killed by a new nuclear weapon. They're afraid that the killing that comes into their life comes from the terrorist that is the phone call from a doctor in the middle of the night that another member of their family has cancer, has diabetes, has Alzheimer's, has Parkinson's. That's the priority that we have to establish for our country. That's why 65 of my colleagues are going to introduce this effort to cut $200 billion out of the nuclear weapons program over the next 10 years.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. I thank our leader from California. I just want to say that these bills represent a toxic assault that compromises public health for polluter wealth. Republicans are continuing their war on the environment with episode 37 of the Clean Air Act repeal-a-thon. It is a tried-and-true, three-part Republican strategy: First, pass legislation that repeals regulations that have already been set. Second, indefinitely delay new regulations from ever being set. And third, just for good measure, include a provision that eviscerates the very underpinnings of effective Federal law and deters any effort to protect the health and well-being of millions of Americans. Make no mistake, that is what we are doing here this week. These bills block and indefinitely delay implementation of the rules that would reduce hazardous air pollution, such as mercury, lead, and cancer-causing substances released from cement kilns and industrial boilers, and do so in callous disregard for adverse impacts those pollutants have on public health, particularly on the health of infants and children. Republicans have decided to stage their own public event today on the floor: Occupy Stall Street. But lest you think that Republicans always want to delay regulations, it turns out that sometimes they want to speed up the wheels. Republicans voted to tell EPA to hurry up and make decisions to issue air permits for drilling rigs off the pristine coast of Alaska. Republicans have voted to give the Department of the Interior a mere 30 days to approve permit applications for drilling in the gulf at the same time they block legislation to implement any drilling reform in the wake of the BP disaster. And they've also voted to reduce the time allowed for environmental review so that the State Department would approve the Keystone pipeline as soon as possible. But when it comes to regulations that would decrease the amount of toxic pollutants in our air or water, apparently the same Federal agencies that evaluate hazardous pollutants in the first place just need more time to review the science, more time to understand the technologies, more time before doing anything to make our water safer to drink, make our air safer to breathe, and protect the health of children around the country. And it also turns out that Republicans don't always turn a blind eye towards the health effects of toxic chemicals. Three months ago, as our country stood on the edge of default due to Tea Party brinksmanship, House Republicans chose to vigorously debate a bill to ban compact fluorescent light bulbs. During that debate, Republicans repeatedly told us that the mercury vapor from those light bulbs is dangerous and that exposing our citizens to the harmful effects of the mercury contained in CFL light bulbs is likely to pose a hazard for years to come. Yet the bills considered today would result in nearly 16,600 pounds of extra mercury vapors being released directly into the air, and that's just in 1 year. That is the equivalent of 2.5 billion compact fluorescent light bulbs. And the mercury released as a result of these bills is not the kind you can sweep off the living room floor or throw into a trash can. This is the mercury released directly into the air that we all breathe and finds its way into the food that we eat. If the regulation to remove mercury from cement plants--which is already 13 years overdue--is delayed for even 1 year, up to 2,500 people will die prematurely, there will be 17,000 cases of aggravated asthma, and 1,500 people will suffer heart attacks.

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentleman. If the regulation to remove mercury, lead, and cancer-causing toxins from incinerators and industrial boilers--which is already 11 years overdue--is delayed for even 1 year, there will be 6,600 people who will die prematurely and people will miss 320,000 days of work and school. The Republicans are presenting yet another false choice to the American people. We do not have to choose between manufacturing and mercury. We do not have to choose between concrete and cancer. We can have both clean air and a healthy manufacturing sector. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this terrible Republican cancer-causing bill out here on the floor today.

Mr. MARKEY. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, can you inform us as to how much time is remaining on both sides?

Mr. MARKEY. I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

Mr. MARKEY. I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ellison).

Mr. MARKEY. I yield myself 1 minute. What we have here today is just one more episode in what is a 1-year Republican control of the Congress, which has seen a litany of industries that no longer want to make the air cleaner, that no longer want to make the water safer to drink. We come out here on the House floor with Republican leadership in order to repeal the laws, to water down the laws to protect children from mercury, to protect children from contracting asthma. That's what this is all about. The EPA used to stand for the Environmental Protection Agency. Now it stands for ``every polluter's ally'' out here. They all come out here, and they want to ensure that the laws are watered down. That's what we're fighting. That's what Democrats are fighting here. We're fighting to ensure that the water stays clean, that the air stays safe to breathe. The boiler industry is saying, no, there's not enough mercury that gets sent up into the air; there's not enough mercury that goes into the lives of children in our country. We're going to fight that. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. I would ask the Chair if we could review again how much time is remaining.

Mr. MARKEY. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

Mr. MARKEY. I yield myself such time as I may consume. The Republicans have yet to bring a job creation bill out here on the House floor in the 10 months they have controlled the Congress. Instead, what they're doing is responding to industries who do not want to make the air cleaner, who do not want to make the water safer for the children of our country to drink and to breathe. And, instead, they make the case that making the environment cleaner kills jobs when we know that all evidence says it creates more jobs, because it spurs innovation in new technologies that create jobs that make our economy stronger. Instead, they argue that what the country needs is more mercury, more arsenic, more cadmium, more asthmas, more mercury poisoning, more carcinogens that harm the health of our country. So not only do they not help the health of our economy by bringing out a jobs bill, instead they bring out bills that hurt the health of the American people where they live and their families. That's what their agenda has been all about since the day they took over in January, and that's the agenda that we are voting on here today. Vote ``no'' on this Republican health-killing bill. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I rise in opposition to the Republican TRAIN Act, the Total Regulatory Amnesty for Industry Negligence Act of 2011. The very silly premise of this bill is that it's simply impossible to keep our air clean and still keep our economic engine chugging along. This Republican-led House has initiated a full-throttle ``repeal-a- thon.'' It's a three-part strategy: one, deny the science; two, delay the regulations; three, deter efforts to protect the health and security of millions of Americans. We keep hearing from Republicans about how EPA's clean air standards to reduce mercury, lead, dioxins, and other pollutants need to be economically analyzed and reanalyzed. They insist that, even if a standard for one toxic chemical was met by an entire industrial sector, the removal of just one more poisonous chemical would cause a domino effect of problems for industry. And the solution to these supposed problems? It is a time-tested Republican tradition. First, pass legislation that repeals regulations that have already been set. Two, require endless study of the cumulative effects of all regulations of all industries. Finally, just for good measure, pass an amendment that guts the very underpinnings of the Clean Air Act. Make no mistake, that is what we are doing here today. Our planet is warming and extreme weather is increasing. We're having record 100-year floods every few years. Hurricanes have caused floods, massive power outages, and deaths. Texas was on fire this summer after having the warmest summer ever recorded by any State. The President has issued disaster declarations in 48 States so far this year. We have set an all-time high of 83 major disasters declared in 2011. We've already had 10 weather events causing $1 billion or more in damages--another record--and we still have 3 months of the year left to go. And what do Republicans propose? Rather than saving money by cutting the hundreds of billions we spent on unneeded Cold War-era nuclear weapons, the Tea Party chooses to cut funds that would reduce our dependency on foreign oil. Rather than cutting the tens of billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies we give to Big Oil and Big Coal, the Republicans gut programs that would manufacture energy-efficient cars in America and provide clean air. Republicans would have us pay for the costs of weather disasters caused by global warming by cutting funding for a program that actually reduces the very threat of global warming. For all the talk of this so-called ``TRAIN wreck of cumulative EPA regulations,'' there seems to be one cumulative effect that isn't getting mentioned by the Republicans: the cumulative effect of all of their goals on the health of Americans. That is because the Republicans, perhaps, are spending so much time doing the bidding of those corporations that they have lost their train of thought. If the regulation to remove mercury from cement plants--already 13 years overdue--is delayed for even one more year, up to 2,500 people will prematurely die. There will be 17,000 cases of aggravated asthma, and 1,500 people will suffer heart attacks. If the regulation to remove mercury, lead, and cancer-causing toxins from incinerators and industrial boilers--already 11 years overdue--is delayed for one more year, there will be 6,600 people who will prematurely die because of that. Additionally, if this bill passes, it would repeal mercury and Cross- State Air Pollution Rules for power plants, resulting in the loss of 25,000 more lives and more than 11,000 heart attacks. And that's just with 1 year of delay. So what's the cumulative impact of just 1 year of delay on each of these regulations? Thirty-four thousand people will die and many more will be injured. In discussing these Republican efforts, today, Lisa Jackson, EPA Administrator, testified before our committee that, ``If we could reduce particulate matter to healthy levels, it would have the same impact as finding the cure for cancer in our country.'' The difference is we already know how to reduce particulate matter. We don't know how to cure cancer. The Republicans are providing the American people with a false choice. We do not have to choose between air quality and air- conditioning. We do not have to choose between manufacturing and mercury poisoning. We do not have to choose between clean air and cancer. Ending protections for clean air and clean water should be a third rail issue, but the Republican Tea Party express has veered far off onto the right track.

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentleman. Sadly, these are the kinds of anti-innovation, anti-science, anti- public health schemes the public has come to fear from this legislative wrecking crew. When the Republicans beckon you to come ``all aboard'' on the TRAIN Act, I urge you to run in the opposite direction, because the only train Republicans seem to care about is the Big Oil and big coal gravy train, and that's pulling out of the station here tonight as the Republicans push this bill through the Congress.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentlelady. Write today's date down, September 22, 2011. The Republicans are now in open warfare against clean energy. Yesterday was an opening salvo, but today is the declaration of war. They've already gutted clean energy research and development budgets by 40 percent for next year. Their budget for the next 3 years promises to cut those investments by 90 percent. They've zeroed out loan guarantee programs for all renewable energy in their budget while leaving intact $25 billion for the nuclear industry. They're prepared to shut down the government rather than rescind one penny of the oil and gas industry's $41 billion in tax subsidies. But clean energy sector gets the hammer. Yesterday, in a gratuitous assist to Big Oil, Republicans tried to kill the Clean Car Factory Fund in order to pay for natural disaster relief. This is the program that is helping American companies manufacture superefficient vehicles that reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign oil from OPEC. But, apparently, that bill wasn't radical enough for the Tea Party base. So tonight, they come back and they're launching their full-frontal assault on clean energy. Yesterday, it was just clean cars. Today, it's solar energy, wind energy and all renewables. Tonight, they take out the full assault attack. But a word of warning. Up to a dozen projects are prepared to receive the green light in the next week. Swooping in and destroying this program now will destroy these projects and destroy the thousands of jobs that will come with them. So before you vote for this bill, check and see if your State is one of the 38 that has received support under this program. Check and see if your State is one of the 12 that could have a new project announced next week. Make sure that the 66,000 people that have jobs today as a result of this program are not from your State. By the way, those 66,000 jobs created through this program are far more than any jobs created through legislation passed out in the first 9 months that the Republicans have controlled the United States House of Representatives. So our planet is warming and extreme weather is increasing; 100-year floods and droughts are now striking every few years. Hurricanes have caused floods, massive power outages, and deaths. Texas has been on fire after having the hottest summer ever recorded. The President has issued disaster relief declarations in 48 States so far this year. Eighty-three major disasters declared in 2011, the all-time record; 3 more months to go this year. Wake up. Wake up. You can't kill these programs. This is the solution you are killing. Republicans say, fine, we'll provide emergency relief for those who have been afflicted by nature's wrath in an ever-warming planet, but we won't do it unless we can cut the funds for the programs that promise to be the solution to the problem. That's what they're proposing here tonight. Does the majority ask if we can save money by cutting the hundreds of billions of dollars we are planning on spending, the Republicans are planning on spending on new nuclear weapons being constructed over the next 10 years when we don't need any more nuclear weapons? No. Can we cut the tens of billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies we pay to Big Oil and King Coal? Of course not. But wind, solar, clean cars, all- electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, oh, yeah, let's cut that program tonight to fund disaster relief for people in this country suffering from weather, from floods, from hurricanes, and from tornadoes caused by an ever-changing climate. This bill is an embarrassment. This is not worthy of this Congress. Vote ``no'' on this latest Republican assault plan to kill the clean energy industry in this country on behalf of the Big Oil and Big Coal industries.

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentleman. I'm glad you brought out the General Motors deal because the General Motors deal is only possible because of the grants and the loans that have been given for the batteries and for the new technologies under these programs that are now making it possible for General Motors to reinvent.

Mr. MARKEY. So they will not receive a nickel under this program. The oil and gas industry will receive that money as they tip the people of our country upside down and shake the money out of their pockets.

Mr. MARKEY. This is not a debate over compassion. This is not a debate over who cares more about the people in Joplin or the people in Vermont. This is a debate about what the Republicans, what the Tea Party has decided to use as an excuse, as a guise to finish off the revolution that the Democrats have put in place that changes our relationship with where we get our energy from. Big Oil and Big Coal have fought solar, wind, all-electric vehicles, biomass, geothermal, that entire revolution because they know that it will eat into their profits. So a disaster occurs that each of us wants to respond to. The Republicans, responding to the oil and coal industry, say this is our chance to kill the revolution that makes it possible to have vehicles go 50, 60, 80, 100 miles a gallon without oil, no oil, that makes it possible for us to have wind and solar generate the electricity that will fuel those vehicles without sending greenhouse gases up into the atmosphere, which is changing our climate and leading to these storms, leading to these floods, leading to these disasters that then needs FEMA, need the relief that we give to these families. So they take the chance, they take the opportunity to kill the very programs which are the solution to these disasters which are being created here in our country and around the world, the agenda of Big Oil and Big Coal. And the temerity of it all is that they know that the automotive program has already created 39,000 jobs in our country over the last 3 years and that this one cut that they are talking about tonight will kill 10,000 jobs over the next year. In the solar industry--and, by the way, they cut out $100 million in solar and wind guarantees as well. Right now, ladies and gentlemen, there are 85,000 jobs in the wind industry, almost all of them created in the last 4 years. There are 85,000 jobs in the coal industry. In other words, in the last 5 years, wind now equals the entire coal industry. There are 100,000 jobs in the solar industry, and last year we were a net exporter to China; 100,000 jobs in solar, 85,000 jobs in wind, and it is the future. The oil industry laid off 20,000 employees over the last 3 years. Let us talk here about future, about young people, about this planet, about backing out the oil from OPEC so we can tell them we don't need their oil any more than we need their sand. That's what this debate is about tonight. And under the guise, with these crocodile tears of how much they care about the victims, as though it's any greater on our side, they are using it as the guise to kill these programs. That's what it's all about tonight. That's why we're angry. That's what this is all about.