Bingaman, Kerry Panels Take Up Climate Change
Amy Harder and CongressDaily staff
Tuesday, October 13, 2009 12:12 PM
Climate change has gone to the shadows with health care occupying Congress' attention. This week, though, two key committees will delve into the issue.
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., will hold a hearing Wednesday featuring analyses of the House-passed climate bill by the Congressional Budget Office, Environmental Protection Agency, Energy Department and Congressional Research Service. The hearing had been postponed from Sept. 17 because of Bingaman's involvement in health care talks, but his staff released a Sept. 14 report from CRS detailing seven cost studies done on the House bill and warning against relying too much on any one that offers detailed projections of future costs of a cap-and-trade program.
Witnesses will include Douglas Elmendorf, CBO director; Richard Newell, administrator of the Energy Information Administration; Larry Parker, energy and environmental policy specialist at CRS; and Reid Harvey, chief of the climate economics branch in the EPA's climate change division.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- chaired by the Senate climate bill's lead supporter, John Kerry, D-Mass. -- is scheduled to hold a hearing Thursday on the effects of climate change on the world's "most vulnerable" countries. Witnesses include Jim Ball, senior director of the Evangelical Environmental Network's climate campaign, and retired Air Force Gen. Charles F. Wald.
The Energy Department continues to host its 2009 Solar Decathlon on the National Mall, where 20 university teams built solar-powered houses. The homes are open to the public today and Thursday through Sunday. On Wednesday, the Environmental and Energy Study Institute will hold a briefing on Capitol Hill, with some of the participants and Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., who chairs the Science and Technology Committee, scheduled to speak.
On Thursday, the National Press Club's newsmaker luncheon focuses on the December U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen. Jorma Ollila, incoming chairman of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, will speak about the need for global action ahead of the talks. Ollila is also chairman of Royal Dutch Shell and Nokia.
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