On the recordJanuary 24, 2011
I want to keep reiterating, air quality in Texas is improving. It is improving. The Clean Air Act gives the Federal Government, through the Environmental Protection Agency, the right to preempt States when the States either don't implement the Federal regulations on the Clean Air Act, or if the States simply turn it back and ask the Federal Government to take over. So the EPA does have the right under certain circumstances to preempt State implementation. But in this case, I would postulate, and each of you are former judges before you became Congressmen, that since the State of Texas has complied and air quality is improving and there is a debate about whether CO2 should be regulated under the Clean Air Act, which is a separate issue, that the Federal Government has overstepped its bounds to come in and unilaterally, against the wishes of the State of Texas, repeal these permits and require that they all be resubmitted and not only resubmitted, but resubmitted in a very specific way. The State of Texas air quality permitting program has been flexible, says we will regulate an entire site and as long as you are under that cap, you can implement new equipment and new procedures as long as your emissions stay the same or go down. And under the Texas flexible permitting program, they have gone down, in some cases as much as 20-30 percent. This is in a State where population has gone up, where productivity has gone up, and output has gone up.
