House Democrats unveil green transmission bill

Two of the House’s biggest clean energy enthusiasts Wednesday dropped their long-anticipated pitch on transmission in a bid to coalesce Democrats around a landmark permitting plan to accelerate renewable energy development.

The bill from Democratic Reps. Sean Casten of Illinois and Mike Levin of California would ease transmission build-out, expand renewable energy and fix the country’s jumbled electricity system.

And with 76 original cosponsors representing both the progressive and more moderate factions of the House Democratic Caucus, the authors of the “Clean Electricity and Transmission Acceleration Act” hope they can credibly claim their bill is their party’s “consensus” legislative package on energy policy.

Their legislation, which Casten said was a “tentpost on what is Democratic energy policy,” bundles new proposals with bills that have been previously introduced and vetted.

It would force the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to ensure that utilities account for greenhouse gas emissions when setting rates. It would also boost the commission’s authority to improve transmission lines that span multiple states.

And it would create a new Office of Electricity at FERC to enhance offshore wind deployment — an attempt to align with President Joe Biden’s goal of 30 gigawatts by 2030.

In addition, the measure tries to reduce pressure on the grid and deploy more clean energy projects on public lands. It also aims to improve community input for environmental reviews as well as require climate considerations in National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) analyses.

The politics are exceedingly tricky. Congressional Republicans say they support an all-of-the-above energy strategy but have shown little interest in standalone transmission bills. Instead, they see the issue as a bargaining chip to get what they really want: changes to environmental laws like NEPA or the Endangered Species Act to streamline pipelines, highways, bridges and other energy projects.

Some Democrats, in turn, have indicated no desire to compromise with Republicans on permitting changes that could lead to more oil and gas projects in exchange for meeting their own goal: powering the country with renewable energy.

Even Levin, in an interview, made clear he viewed Republicans with suspicion in the permitting debate.

“I see some of the Republicans, when they talk about permitting reform, it’s code for letting the fossil fuel industry gut environmental and community protections, and that’s not what we need,” he said.

While members of both parties and chambers insist conversations are ongoing around a bipartisan permitting deal, a more likely scenario is that Levin and Casten will use this bill to lay the groundwork for the next Congress, where Democrats hope to retake control of the House while keeping the Senate and the White House, too.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) is not an official co-sponsor at this time, but his spokesperson, Christie Stephenson, said Jeffries “is grateful for their efforts ... and looks forward to continuing to work with these Members to advance commonsense solutions.

Stephenson added that "this legislation represents the kind of thoughtful, substantive approach required to tackle the climate crisis with the fierce urgency of now,” Stephenson added in a statement to E&E News.

Ultimately, Levin said, in introducing the bill now, “this is really about being prepared when the time comes” to negotiate a larger permitting deal.

Casten agreed: “At some point we may have to have some conversations about: Is there a vehicle that can pass? And what is the makeup of the House and Senate at this point in time? And we’ll have the ‘is-the-perfect-gonna-be-the-enemy-of-the-good’ conversation, and where are the votes?

“But finally,” he said, “this is the thing we can point to that says, ‘if we are gonna do it right, here is what it looks like.’”

Diverse group of Dems on board

Casten and Levin, who developed their bill as co-chairs of the House Sustainable Energy and Environment Caucus’s Clean Energy Deployment Task Force, hope the “Clean Electricity and Transmission Acceleration Act” can stand out in a pack of competing measures sponsored by fellow Democrats who are all looking for ways to break through the thorny topic of transmission.

A bevy of grid bills already exist, including ones that would connect the country’s electricity patchwork, provide tax credits for transmission developers and give the federal government more authority to invoke eminent domain.

Casten is bullish about the substance of his bill with Levin: “Our general view is, if you do policy right, good politics tends to follow.”

But he is also proud of his list of co-sponsors. The process of getting more than 70 members on the record in support of the bill was largely what delayed formal introduction of the measure for almost a year.

“I don’t know if there have been any energy bills — I can’t think of one — that has hit right out of the gate with over 70 original co-sponsors before it already dropped,” Casten said in an interview Tuesday.

Longtime permitting reform skeptics like House Natural Resources Committee ranking member Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), the top Democrat of the Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water, Wildlife and Fisheries, have signed on as supporters.

Last year, the two progressives rallied against Sen. Joe Manchin's fossil-fuel-friendly permitting plan, charging that the West Virginia Democrat’s measure would overburden communities that the federal government had long neglected. In effect, they branded “permitting reform” as a boon for polluting industries.

Huffman and Grijalva also decried the changes to permitting laws secured in the larger deal to raise the debt ceiling this spring, which made revisions to NEPA while virtually ignoring transmission.

But in the months since, clean energy industries have become increasingly vocal about the need to ease permitting for their projects too — a sentiment progressives have also started adopting.

“CETA will help us build out the infrastructure we need to put clean energy in American families’ homes quickly, while also making sure impacted communities are brought into the process early and meaningfully,” Grijalva said of the Casten-Levin bill in a statement.

“I look forward to upholding the inclusive, community-led process we’ve fought for and continuing to engage with frontline communities in that spirit as this legislation moves forward.”

The progressives will be listed as original co-sponsors of the bill alongside Rep. Annie Kuster of New Hampshire, the chair of the New Democrat Coalition, a band of nearly 100 self-styled centrists who pride themselves on taking a pragmatic approach to legislating and looking for bipartisan common ground.

The New Democrat Coalition, of which Casten is a member, included the "Clean Electricity and Transmission Acceleration Act" among a slate of environmental bills it endorsed Wednesday morning.

“I’m really proud to have the support of someone like Raúl Grijalva, a leader on environmental justice; … Annie Kuster, chair of the New Dems; [Rep.] Pramila Jayapal [D-Wash.], chair of the Progressive Caucus,” he said. “Multiple committee chairs and subcommittee chairs spanning the whole ideological breadth, regional breadth, of the Democratic Caucus.

“We have [Rep.] Susan Wild [D-Pa.], from an area that depends on fossil fuel production, and people like AOC,” Casten added, referring to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), champion of the Green New Deal and a member of the Democratic Socialists of America.

Missing supporters

Not included in the list of co-sponsors, however, was Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.), who has established himself as a Democrat eager to make a deal with Republicans on permitting reform.

Peters has separated himself from others in his party by expressing an interest in amending NEPA — a law many Democrats deem sacrosanct. He regularly talks with Rep. Garret Graves (R-La.), a staunch permitting reform advocate, and he’s recently been in contact with Manchin, too.

“I think that we have to see if all this mutual interest develops into something, but having things ready is good,” Peters said last week.

Levin said of Peters’ absence from the sponsorship list: “I wouldn’t read anything into it. … I look forward to working with Scott. We’re geographic neighbors, and I consider him a good friend and a very thoughtful guy.”

Casten, noting that he and Peters were co-chairs of the New Democrat Coalition task force on climate and clean energy, called Peters a “friend” while noting he believed Peters “very much likes to prioritize bills that he thinks are bipartisan, and there’s a need for that.”

Peters is a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which would likely have main jurisdiction over the legislation.

The top Democrat on the panel, Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, is also not an original cosponsor, nor are Texas Democratic Reps. Lizzie Fletcher and Marc Veasey, who are defensive against attacks on oil and gas from their positions on the powerful committee.

And while Casten and Levin won the endorsement for their bill from House Democratic Caucus Vice Chair Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), they were ultimately unable to get support at this time from the other members of their party leadership, despite lobbying Jeffries.

“We’ve had very constructive conversations with Jeffries and their staff,” said Casten, saying that Jeffries' aides “helped to sort of steer this through and make sure any political minefields we may not be aware of were covered, and thankfully we didn’t have to tweak much … to put it in a place to have this be positioned to be the Democratic energy policy document going forward.”

He added that conversations with Jeffries' office were “ongoing” and that the “Jeffries team is very supportive.”

Levin echoed the sentiment: “We’ve been communicating with him every step … as we’ve pulled together this bill. He knows it’s a strong, Democratic bill, and we’re going to keep working with him.”