With a vote expected as early as Monday in the U.S. Senate on a sweeping licensing reform bill, opponents of the legislation are sounding the alarm over legislation that they say represents the worst form of bipartisanship: one in which corporate interests have twisted enough arms in each party to get what they want while the public and the common good get the short end of the stick.
The impending vote to pass S.5653, the so-called Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act (BAAJA for short), has been largely overshadowed by the midterm elections, but coming on the heels of the Democratic Party’s rout of the Republicans last Tuesday, it is being billed as a last chance for the current Congress to pass at least one piece of legislation before President Donald Trump becomes a veritable lame duck president in January.
Democratic co-sponsors in the Senate—Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico attempted to thread the bipartisan needle by arguing that the benefits of their proposal outweighed what Republicans demanded in return.
“We need a rapid and equitable transition to clean energy, but not one built on the backs of communities that live near mines and pipelines. These are the communities that drink the water and breathe the air and this bill gives them fewer protections.”
But the problem, critics say, is that it is a horrible, counterproductive bill that will allow utility conglomerates, mining companies, data center operators, and oil and gas giants to extract huge concessions on future construction of polluting projects while hiding behind the promise of a more efficient permitting process for clean energy infrastructure — a noble goal.
The crucial point, as The Verge summarizes, is that while the legislation, if passed, “could be a catalyst for lots of clean energy, it could also accelerate polluting projects and limit oversight of new data centers.”
In the days leading up to Monday, green groups intensified their opposition, even as lawmakers introduced changes to make the bill more palatable. On Saturday, the Senate Democratic caucus met in Washington, D.C. to discuss the bill and propose “manager’s amendments” in hopes of garnering enough votes for passage.
However, according to Elizabeth Bast, executive director of Oil Change International, “no amount of last-minute tinkering can hide the fact that this bill is a massive giveaway to fossil fuel companies and big tech, at the expense of communities, the climate, and people’s energy bills.” »
The bill, Bast added, “is exactly what the fossil fuel industry has been asking for for years” and called on all lawmakers to vote against it.
Earthworks, one of hundreds of advocacy groups aligned against BAAJA, warns that the legislation would give the public and tribes less say in major energy projects, creating conditions that would be a gift to the mining, data center and fossil fuel industries.
“The bill would expand the Mining Act of 1872 so that companies can claim nearly unlimited public lands for landfills, roads, pipelines and power lines,” Earthworks said in a statement. “The demand for minerals for the energy transition is real, but that’s no excuse for letting mining companies take over more public land with fewer safeguards, under a law that already prioritizes mining above all other land uses. »
The group’s policy director, Lauren Pagel, said: “We need a rapid and equitable transition to clean energy, but not one built on the backs of the communities that live next to mines and pipelines. These are the communities that drink the water and breathe the air, and this bill gives them fewer protections.”
Veteran climate organizer Bill McKibben, writing Saturday about the legislation, also highlighted the fundamental problem with the legislation that treats permitting reform for clean energy projects and dirty energy projects as an equal effort.
While recognizing that currently it remains “too difficult to build what we sorely need – housing, public transport, energy”, when it comes to building energy infrastructure, “there is a problem, and that problem (as is often the case) is climate change. Building more housing produces… more housing. But if you take climate change seriously, you need to build more clean energy and less dirty energy, or you’ll get nowhere.
It’s a similar argument made by groups like Public Citizen, which said Friday that while some of the bill’s provisions, like those related to transmission lines and taxpayer protections in data centers, are “strong and absolutely necessary,” the problem remains that “the downsides of the bill are greater, more immediate and more certain.”
Whatever benefits the legislation might bring, said David Arkush, director of Public Citizen’s Climate Program, the downsides will be far worse, undermining existing laws designed to protect public lands, endangered species and the nation’s natural resources, including clean air and water.
BAAJA, Arkush said, “seriously weakens the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act and destroys the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act. It speeds up the permitting of all kinds of projects, then makes it virtually impossible to regulate, or even arguably enforce, existing rules against them, without an act of Congress.”
“Among other effects,” he continued, “the bill will open the door to a dramatic increase in liquefied natural gas exports and facilitate the hasty and reckless construction of data centers powered by fossil gas. And the bill would make it much more difficult to subsequently moderate, regulate, or modify these actions, regardless of the demands of public health, climate destruction, or public opinion. »
As for McKibben, “I think if this deal had been made 30 years ago, it might have made sense: we would reap the benefits now.
With Democrats soon returning to power, opponents of the licensing reform bill said it makes no sense to pander to Republicans now to pass a bill that fails on such fundamental issues.
“In the November 3 election, voters across the country roundly rejected data centers,” Arkush said. “Now is not the time to pass a bill that allows Big Tech to continue using them, powered by fossil fuels, over the objection of local communities.”
In January, he said, “the makeup of Congress will change significantly,” making it likely that a “much better deal can then be reached — one that will implement the laudable and important provisions of this bill, and more, without much sacrifice.”
In October, veteran Democrat John Podesta warned that proposing legislation like BAAJA to the Trump administration would be tantamount to giving the president and his party a “loaded howitzer” with which to attack environmental protections.
With Trump’s nomination Friday of Stephen Miller as his new White House chief of staff, McKibben linked this choice of “the most despicable character I have ever seen on our national stage” to Podesta’s comments and offered this guidance: “Handing Stephen Miller a loaded howitzer is not something a senator should even consider.” Period.
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