In Harrisburg yesterday, the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee approved Senate Bill 950 and House Bill 2025, the companion bills introduced by Senator Joe Pittman and Representative Jim Struzzi to open the door for the legislature to be involved in decision on whether or not the state should join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, known as RGGI.
The bills affirm that the Department of Environmental Protection does not have the authority to joint RGGI, which is a ten-state compact that imposes a carbon tax on electricity generation and requires power pants using fossil fuels, such as those in Indiana County, to purchase allowances in order to stay in business. Officials at those power plants say they will be forced to shut down if the state joins RGGI, costing our area thousands of jobs at the plants and in supporting businesses.
Summarizing the bills, Senator Joe Pittman said Governor Wolf has shut out the legislature from the debate.
Pittman says the people of the 41st District, which is home to three coal-fired power plants, a waste-coal plant, and a natural gas plant, are apprehensive about their future if RGGI takes effect.
Democrats on the committee contended that when a previous legislature enacted the Air Pollution Control Act, it gave the governor the authority to unilaterally join the compact.
Republicans have said in the past that if Wolf pushes forward with RGGI, as he has said he will, they will go to federal court to stop him.
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