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The US House of Representatives on Thursday passed the Lower Energy Costs Act — a Republican energy reform bill intended to bolster US oil and gas production while scaling back climate initiatives, the first major legislation of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s majority.
The House passed the Lower Energy Costs Act by a mostly partisan 225-204 vote. The vote was a symbolic victory for McCarthy that demonstrated his ability to hold his narrow 222-213 Republican majority together.
“We promised the American people that we would work to reduce energy costs and make it easier and more affordable to build in the US,” McCarthy said. The Lower Costs and Energy Act will deliver on that promise by increasing energy production and instituting comprehensive permitting reform to speed the construction of critical infrastructure in our country.”
“The need for permitting reform is something that Republicans and Democrats alike can get behind, and I encourage my colleagues in the Senate to do right by the American people and swiftly take up this bill.” McCarthy said.
The bill would deliver on a top 2022 Republican campaign pledge to lower Americans’ energy costs but faces little chance of making it through the Democratic-led Senate, where Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has declared it “dead on arrival.”
Democrats want a permitting bill that will pave the way for a swifter adoption of clean energy technologies like solar and wind power that have received lucrative new subsidies under the Inflation Reduction Act, while Republicans are pushing for a renewed focus on fossil fuels.
On his first day in office, President Biden revoked the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline, imposed a moratorium on oil production on federal lands, directed agencies across the Federal government to impose punitive and burdensome regulations, which House Committee on Energy and Commerce Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers said makes the US more reliant on China.
“Predictably, gas prices skyrocketed to the highest levels in American history,” Rodgers said. People are counting on us to improve their quality of life…passing of this package will boost energy production, lift regulatory burdens for the construction of more energy infrastructure, cut China out of our critical materials supply chains, and lower costs across the board.”
The White House has said President Joe Biden would veto the measure if it were to make it to his desk. Democrats decried the legislation as a giveaway for the oil industry.
With the bill’s future in doubt, Republicans said they hoped to include provisions from the legislation in any agreement with Democrats to lift the federal government’s borrowing limit.
(With files from Reuters)
