Predictions from industry as to what will happen in the upcoming reauthorization of the Clean Air Act (CAA) remain uncertain due to the narrowly divided nature of the U.S. House and Senate. Some observers believe that the divided Congress will prevent any major overhaul of the CAA, but will allow for minor changes.
There was some action during the 106th Congress, which ended in December. U.S. Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., held three hearings during the last Congress to explore an array of reauthorization issues. Inhofe plans to hold 40 more CAA hearings during the 107th Congress as well as introduce several bills on specific CAA issues.
The White House has signed off on a new regulation that calls for, by 2006, most of the diesel fuel sold in the United States to meet stringent new sulfur content standards. The decision settles a dispute between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Energy Department over how quickly to bring the new fuel to market. The rule will require the sale of diesel fuel for on-road use containing not more than 15 parts per million sulfur, down from 500 parts per million.
Key Republican and Democratic U.S. senators have called on the Clinton administration to continue the administration's fight to guarantee that land masses or “sinks” that absorb carbon will be part of the world's framework to reduce greenhouse gases and combat global warming. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., and Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., sent a letter saying “any agreement reached by the United States and the European Union must preserve incentives for forest and agricultural landowners in this country to undertake new activities that increase carbon stocks, thereby contributing to efforts to combat global warming.” The letter was sent to Secretary of State Madeline Albright after a breakdown of talks at The Hague over ways to implement the Kyoto Protocol.
At the time of the writing of this article, the U.S. Senate had not yet determined what the makeup of its power structure would look like as a result of an evenly split Senate. The makeup of the Senate committees is one of the issues Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., and Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., are discussing. Democrats would like to see evenly divided committees as well as co-chairs, or some Democrat-led chairmen of committees as well as Republican-led committees to reflect the split nature of the Senate. Republicans generally prefer to have a Republican-led committee coupled with a one-seat majority in each committee to reflect the fact that Vice President Dick Cheney, as president of the Senate, will be the deciding vote on any split votes of bills.
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AutoInc. Magazine ® Vol.XLIX, February 2001
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