During a House Appropriations Committee hearing on Tuesday, Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) grilled EPA Administrator Michael Regan about his budget request for new employees.
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00:00 Thank you Mr. Chair. Thank you Mr. Reagan. I appreciate you being here. It's always good to see somebody from North Carolina.
00:09 It is good to see you. You mentioned in your earlier comments that or at least your budget request is asking for 2,000 additional federal employees. Was that right?
00:25 Yes it is. And I heard a couple times through I think your comments and some of the others that a portion of those would be dedicated towards addressing climate change.
00:39 Help me understand how many positions of those 2,000 would go towards climate change?
00:47 Well what I'll do is I'll circle back with you on that breakdown because it's sort of looking at how those positions would help us develop some of these technology based standards that we use to regulate some of these greenhouse gases.
01:03 And so as we think about the ones that we're currently regulating from natural gas, from cars, from trucks, we also have a remit that's focused on cement and other places.
01:16 And so as we look at how we build up that capacity to design these technology standards to be again completely competitive on a global standpoint but also reduce the levels of pollution that we want to see here domestically.
01:29 I can get you the specific breakdown of how many FTEs would go to which organizations in EPA that focus on various technology standards.
01:40 All right. Maybe it's me. I'm new to this committee. I don't understand what you just told me.
01:45 How many positions would be dedicated towards climate change, let's start with this, in any capacity?
01:56 I'm looking for a number.
01:59 I'll get you that specific number because some people work on technology standards that regulate a public health.
02:06 So you don't know?
02:07 Well, there are co-benefits there.
02:10 Someone may work on a standard that's controlling a certain aspect of a power plant and there are co-benefits there.
02:18 We might get NOx reductions but we also may get some CO2 reductions based on the technology that the power plant chooses or any other regulated community might choose.
02:27 And so I certainly don't want to be combative in asking my questions.
02:32 But it seems to me like you're passing rules for companies to adhere to certain standards and now we're hiring people to go back and see what the effects of those rules are.
02:48 No, no, not at all.
02:50 I think what we're doing is we're focused on designing technology standards in a way that the industry can make investments, long-term investments.
03:01 I'll give you a good example.
03:03 The power plant rules that we just announced, there were four rules that focused on carbon, mercury, water, and coal ash cleanup.
03:13 When I spent time with the utility industry two years ago, they said, hey, instead of dieting by a thousand paper cuts,
03:19 just present these regulations in some bundles so that we can make longer-term investments because there are co-benefits in some of those investments and the like.
03:27 And so what we're doing is trying to do more of that.
03:30 And we have a slew of rules.
03:32 We have hundreds of rules that by law and by Congress we're required to put out.
03:38 We've been asked by the industry, various industries, can you work on some of these rules in a simultaneous manner so that we know what we're getting and investing in.
03:48 So that's why we're asking for some of these additional FTEs.
03:51 >> How many unfilled positions are there currently in the EPA?
04:17 >> About 700 positions.
04:19 >> 700?
04:20 >> Yeah.
04:21 >> So wouldn't it make sense before you ask for 2,000 more employees to fill the 700 that you've already got appropriation for?
04:27 >> Well, listen, we are ramping up in some of this hiring.
04:30 Some of these skill sets are very hard to ascertain.
04:34 Obviously, there's some matriculation going on, so it's not necessarily a full 700 people on every given day.
04:40 >> That's the answer you just gave me.
04:43 >> Well, right, that's the number that we have today.
04:46 But we have people going out and coming in.
04:48 >> Let's shift gears just a little bit.
04:51 Less than a week ago on Thursday, April 26th, your agency issued a new regulation that expedites the requirement for coal-fired power plants to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 90% by the year 2039.
05:06 What's your instruction to them?
05:09 What's the plan?
05:11 What actions will they take, do you think, to reduce their emissions by 90%?
05:17 >> You know, it will vary.
05:19 I think what Duke Energy will do in North Carolina will be drastically different than what happens in West Virginia or Texas.
05:25 There's a process that we have in place.
05:27 They have a number of years to comply.
05:30 As a former regulator, I'll tell you, they will work -- each state secretary will work with their utility to design a state implementation plan.
05:39 >> So what are the possibilities?
05:41 >> There are a number of possibilities, ranging from the choice of running their plant differently from an efficiency standpoint,
05:47 because they may be shifting more of their demand from coal to natural gas or some other generation source that they've chosen.
05:55 There are technologies like CCS that they may choose.
05:58 So there are fuel, there are technology switches, there are new technologies that they may be adding.
06:05 As a matter of fact, some are looking at retiring some asset and bringing some new assets online.
06:11 I think, obviously, nuclear energy and other things will be in place.
06:14 >> So stop using coal is the plan?
06:16 >> No, I think that the plan offers control technologies that will reduce emissions if a plant decides to continue with coal.
06:25 >> Yeah, with all due respect, I just asked the question,
06:30 what would be your instructions to them to reduce emissions by 90%?
06:37 And in your explanation, you said switch to natural gas and nuclear and some of these other things.
06:43 That's stopping to use -- that effectively is an order to not use.
06:50 >> There's a coal plant in Texas right now using CCS technology.
06:54 What I don't want to do is what you're asking me to do, which is tell them what to do.
06:58 I think we've given them a suite of options.
07:01 We've talked to a lot of these utility CEOs.
07:04 There are a number of ways that they can meet the emission reductions that we've laid out.
07:09 So without being too prescriptive, I think the rule lays out a plethora of options and routes that they could choose.
07:16 >> One more question, Mr. Chair, if I may.
07:20 The EPA's new Endangered Species Act herbicide strategy adds significant cost and new regulatory burdens to the agriculture community.
07:32 I'm hearing that from farmers in North Carolina especially.
07:36 Many farmers say that they might go broke trying to comply with these new restrictions, while others wouldn't even have a choice.
07:44 Can you detail to me how the EPA plans to make these proposals workable for agriculture so that they don't put family farms out of business?
07:56 >> Yeah, I'll say that you and I are probably talking to the same folks in North Carolina.
08:01 I think we share those relationships.
08:03 No farmer should wake up in the middle of a growing season and have to choose or take a tool out of the toolbox.
08:09 I think who has taken those choices out have been the courts.
08:13 And EPA's administering of the Endangered Species Act for 30 plus years proves that.
08:20 And so what I will say is a number of farm groups have spoken positively about these new strategies and updated plans that we've laid out,
08:29 including groups like the American Soybean Association and Ag Retailers Association.
08:34 So what I would say is we are trying our best to put this pesticides program back on track.
08:40 And in one place I'll say that unfortunately Congress just cut our pesticides budget.
08:46 But when I talk to the Farm Bureau or my folks back at home, what they're asking us to do is increase the staff there so that we can put some of these newer products on the market,
08:57 because we're seeing the courts consistently both tie the farmers' hands and tie EPA's hands.
09:02 And I think we've seen that with dicamba and I think we've seen that with some other pesticides and herbicides that, quite frankly, many farmers rely on.
