Approving the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline, handcuffing regulations to curb greenhouse gas emissions, removing restrictions for building pipelines and speeding up permissions to drill and export fossil fuels will top a GOP agenda with Republicans in control of the Senate.
The GOP caucus in the upper chamber will seek to be more reserved than its House counterpart, but Republicans in both houses will pursue the same agenda.
The idea is that being too overzealous leading into 2016, with many Tea Party senators on the ballot and the White House up for grabs, might turn off potential voters. Republicans in the Senate want to show a contrast to the Harry Reid-led chamber. They say the Nevada Democrat blocked energy bills, many of which were bipartisan, to protect the Obama administration and some of the Democratic Party’s more liberal members.
“I think you’re going to see the Senate show how they want to govern, and that they can be responsible,” said Karen Harbert, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute for 21st Century Energy.
Sen. Mitch McConnell — the incoming majority leader — will seek to restore a committee-driven legislative process that sees the chairmen wield considerable power. That bring more debate to the floor, and the Senate will have plenty of House-passed energy bills to take up through the committee process.
Whether that happens, of course, remains to be seen.
But if McConnell does follow through on delivering a more congenial atmosphere, much will be accomplished through spending bills. Republicans could, for example, vote to defund Environmental Protection Agency programs that police greenhouse gas emissions — a proposal to regulate carbon spewing from power plants will be a prominent target.
“I think there is support on the greenhouse gas emissions to defund them,” Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., told the Washington Examiner. “The Congress did not pass [those] the regulations.”
But many of the GOP energy and environmental aims, even in a spending bill, might fail to net the 60 votes needed to proceed to a vote. And, in any event, snagging a veto-proof 67 looks to be nearly impossible on some of the caucus’ bread-and-butter policies.
On some matters, such as climate policies, the GOP could turn to a Senate maneuver known as “reconciliation” so long as the policies they’re singling out have a budgetary impact.
The tool is a budget resolution that sets the parameters for spending bills before committees begin crafting them, and they only require 51 votes for approval. The president, of course, could reject those spending bills, but it would set up a showdown over two warring agendas.
Putting President Obama on the defensive is likely the best-case scenario on Keystone XL, which Republican senators have said will be an immediate priority. While backers of the Canada-to-Texas project might have 60 supporters to proceed to a vote, they likely don’t have enough to override a veto.
Hoeven said Keystone XL is emblematic of the type of projects the U.S. needs to ship its expanding amount of domestically produced energy around the country. He said that it might work well in a package of bills to boost construction of infrastructure that reduces “flaring” of excess natural gas, along with building other pipelines.
But some GOP-aligned strategists and interest groups say focusing on Keystone XL is wasted energy. That’s because TransCanada Corp., the company behind the pipeline, has shifted to other proposals, and Canada is finding out other ways to move the carbon-dense oil sands that it views as key to economic growth.
“Yeah, unfortunately it is [going to be a priority],” said Michael McKenna, a GOP strategist who lobbies on energy issues. “The world has kind of moved on.”
But Keystone XL is just one of many energy and environment agenda items Republicans would seek to address in the Senate, which hasn’t held a vote on a substantive energy bill since 2007.
Incoming Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairwoman Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, will have the opportunity to advance priorities such as opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to more drilling, deliberating nuclear waste storage legislation she sponsors and holding hearings on whether to end nearly four decades of restrictions on exporting crude oil.
Imposing a timeline for issuing permits to build export liquefied natural gas to nations lacking a free trade-agreement with the United States also could be in the offing. The House has passed such a measure, and a near-identical bill sponsored by Democrats that enjoys bipartisan support is also on the table.
“That’s absolutely still important and a lot of the industry still realizes that, and I think you’re going to see a real push to do that in the next Congress,” said an energy industry source who works on export issues. “Regardless of what the control is in the Senate, I think there’s a real will to do that.”
Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., will become chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee. A prominent opponent of policies to address climate change, which he calls a hoax, he likely will focus oversight capabilities on how the EPA functions as an agency. That would include climate policies, a revised ozone standard the agency sent to the White House for review last month, and the so-called “Waters of the U.S.” rule that has agricultural interests and rural lawmakers from both parties up in arms.
But Inhofe also could focus considerable attention to more near-term, and more agreeable, legislative priorities given he only has two years to serve as chairman due to GOP caucus rules. That means a deeper dive into how the Interior Department administers the Endangered Species Act — the Oklahoma senator has complained the Obama administration’s use of the law has choked off oil and gas drilling opportunities — and changes to the Highway Trust Fund, which is facing insolvency without reform.
Spending bills also will play a prominent role. Republicans will want to send more money toward the Interior Department to better fund agencies that permit oil and gas drilling on federal land, both onshore and offshore. They also could send more money to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to finish a review of whether the Yucca Mountain site in Nevada can safely and indefinitely store nuclear waste — the NRC says it doesn’t have enough funding to complete the review and Reid, an opponent of the project, has prevented more money from flowing to that review.
GOP lawmakers also will push for drilling off the Atlantic coast for the next five-year drilling plan that runs between 2017 and 2022. The White House has offered signals that it would open such areas to drilling.
Enhancing federal energy efficiency is a fairly small bore item that could clear both chambers. It ran into snags in the spring over a disagreement on amendments and the collapse of a standalone vote to approve the Keystone XL pipeline.
