Here's What 2014 Could Mean; Inhofe @ Environment/Public Works, Murkowski @ Energy/Natural Resources

[hatrack]

EDIT

Environmental rules and other regulatory actions would also be under intense scrutiny in Republican-chaired committees, particularly at the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), a leading climate skeptic, is expected to take the helm. Inhofe would be expected to “put the agency through its paces” on its power plant regulations, through hearings focused on how its carbon rules could hurt job growth and through repeated requests for documents, Scott Segal, an attorney with Bracewell & Giuliani, told Bloomberg BNA.

A Republican takeover of the Senate also would put Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) in charge of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, where she would be likely to hold hearings on electricity grid reliability and other impacts of the power plant regulations. Murkowski in 2007 co-sponsored climate legislation to set mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions, but in more recent years she has become a staunch opponent to EPA climate regulations.

EDIT

Scalise said many of those bills were included in a consolidated energy package that passed the House Sept. 18. Hinting at what Republican priorities might be with control of both chambers, the legislation included measures to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, block power plant carbon pollution limits, limit regulation of hydraulic fracturing and expand onshore as well as offshore drilling.

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), a member of Senate Republican leadership, said legislative action to block the carbon pollution standards for power plants and halt the proposed waters of the U.S. regulation would be his “top two” priorities if the chamber flipped. “Those two regulatory acts that EPA has out right now will do unbelievable economic damage and not produce the result that EPA suggests,” Blunt told Bloomberg BNA. “The one on carbon only raises utility bills with very little to be gained on solving the carbon problem, and the one that expands the Clean Water Act goes way beyond the law's intention of navigable waters.”

EDIT

http://www.bna.com/republicans-target-epa-n17179897274/

[pscot]

1. Blunt is right about the one on carbon

We should really just shut down all coal fired generation and close the mines.