With help from Gavin Bade, Eleanor Mueller, Eric Wolff and Zack Colman
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— Democratic candidates for president will take the stage again tonight — but if last night was prologue, don’t expect a deep look at climate policy specifics.
— FERC will hear from federal reliability officials, regional grid operators and electric utilities today during its annual technical conference on grid reliability.
— The Senate Energy Committee will tackle nuclear waste storage this morning with a hearing to examine options for interim and long-term storage.
HELLO, IT’S THURSDAY! I’m your host, Kelsey Tamborrino. Shane Schulz of QEP Resources knew Smokey Bear is the other figure, besides the president, with his own ZIP code (It’s 20252). For today: Who moderated the first televised presidential debate? Send your tips, energy gossip and comments to ktamborrino@politico.com.
POLITICO’s 2020: The Issues is the most comprehensive guide anywhere to the issues shaping the Democratic presidential primary, driven by dozens of expert journalists in the nation’s most robust newsroom covering policy and politics.
SEVEN MINUTES: The first mention of climate change came last night in the first minute of night one of the Democratic primary debates. The first question on the much-touted topic didn’t arrive until close to an hour and a half later — and then it was all over in seven minutes.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee responded to questioning on whether his climate plan would “save Miami” by saying that he’d take the filibuster away from Mitch McConnell and then pivoted to a clean electrical grid in his home state. “This has to be the top priority of the United States,” he said on climate change.
Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke touted “renewable and sustainable agriculture to make sure we capture more carbon out of the air and keep more of it in the soil.” Former HUD Secretary Julián Castro discussed a shift away from coal-fired power plants toward solar and other renewables as a means for job creation, and called for national disaster resilience.
Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) responded to a question on paying for climate mitigation by calling on Democrats to reconnect with working people. And former Maryland Rep. John Delaney was cut off before he could dive too deeply into his carbon “cap and dividend” plan. “You can’t put a price on carbon, raise energy prices and not give the money back to the American people,” he said.
All of the candidates were asked about the biggest geopolitical threat to the U.S. — and O’Rourke, Castro and Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) listed climate change.
That was largely it on the climate questions. Those responses came after moderator Chuck Todd teased a “big” line of questioning.
— The lack of specific and substantive questioning on the topic only stoked further calls for a climate-specific debate from environmental groups who say that it’s needed to get into the policy specifics. Youth climate activists with the Sunrise Movement staged a sit-in at the Washington headquarters of the DNC this week, demanding they host a debate singularly devoted to climate change. After the debate, Sunrise renewed that call. “That was downright irresponsible,” Sunrise said of the event.
But DNC chair Tom Perez said afterward the event had more discussion about climate change than in the previous presidential election. “Is that enough? Absolutely not, but we have already done tonight more than we did in 2016,” he said. “… I said repeatedly we will talk about climate change early, often, and in depth. We saw that down payment tonight.”
WHAT’S NEXT? Now the rest of the Democratic field will face questions on the debate stage, and among the ranks tonight, even fewer of them have already laid out specific plans on climate change.
— Who’s on stage tonight? Marianne Williamson, John Hickenlooper, Andrew Yang, Pete Buttigieg, Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand, Michael Bennet and Eric Swalwell.
Catch up on the plans: Biden’s $1.7T climate plan | Hickenlooper’s plan to address climate change | Bennet’s climate change plan
UTILITIES EYE HIGHER TRANSMISSION PAYMENTS FOR RESILIENCE: FERC received scores of comments Wednesday on its return on equity policy for gas pipelines and its incentives for transmission lines. Consumer groups argued the transmission incentives paid to power line builders are high enough already, while some utilities argued they should be paid more for transmission lines that enhance grid resilience.
American Electric Power and its trade group Edison Electric Institute, which represents investor-owned utilities, proposed an approach in which utilities would file individual resilience plans with the commission in conjunction with a request for higher transmission incentives. “FERC would assess the resilience benefits of the plan, and determine an appropriate incentive,” AEP wrote, “informed by how the plan supports the Commission’s resilience policies.”
FERC is still working to define those policies as part of its longstanding resilience docket, set up in Jan. 2018 when the agency rejected a coal and nuclear bailout from DOE. Chairman Neil Chatterjee said in March that transmission could be a solution in that docket, and later that month the commission opened inquiries on both its pipeline and transmission incentives.
On pipelines, environmentalists and public interest groups asked FERC to reduce the return companies receive for building pipelines, which can routinely hit 14 percent, while the gas industry argued no change is needed.
Cyber focus at FERC reliability conference: This summer’s edition of FERC’s annual technical conference on grid reliability features an enhanced focus on cybersecurity as concerns mount in the energy industry over the vulnerability of power and gas infrastructure to digital incursions. Regulators will hear from the head of the North American Electric Reliability Corp. at the 9 a.m. panel discussion, with grid operators, utilities and technology companies sprinkled throughout the full-day event. The schedule.
REVERSE, REVERSE: EPA will resume work to reverse an Obama-era bid to block the proposed Pebble Mine in Alaska, Pro’s Alex Guillén reports. According to a memo, EPA is considering revoking the Obama administration’s proposed preemptive veto of the mine. Former Administrator Scott Pruitt suspended work withdrawing the veto last year over concerns of the project’s potential impact to natural resources. That suspension by Pruitt may violate the settlement reached with Pebble’s developers in 2017, EPA General Counsel Matthew Leopold wrote in a memo to Region 10 Administrator Chris Hladick.
PELOSI WEIGHS IN: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was wary Wednesday of a climate-specific debate this early in the process. “I don’t know how much debate you get with 20 people up there,” she said. “… I think this has to be a central focus of this presidential election.”
“What’s the point?” Pelosi added. “So everybody can say for two minutes what they think? I would rather they use their energy to just educate the American people as to why this should be a reason for them to vote.”
ON TAP TODAY: The Senate’s National Defense Authorization Act, S. 1790 (116), is expected to pass the chamber today after a deal was struck Wednesday between Republican and Democratic leaders to hold a debate on Iran on Friday. As ME noted earlier this week, the NDAA substitute amendment contains numerous bipartisan provisions to tackle toxic PFAS chemicals.
— House picks up PFAS: The House Rules Committee will take up amendments to its NDAA bill when lawmakers return from the July Fourth recess. Several PFAS amendments to the measure are similar to the Senate package, like a phase-out of the military use of PFAS in firefighting foam.
One big difference, however, is Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell‘s amendment that would require EPA to list PFAS chemicals as hazardous substances under CERCLA within one year. That’s a key priority for communities battling PFAS, as it would force the entities responsible for the contamination to pay for clean-ups.
NOT WASTING TIME: The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will hold a hearing this morning on options for interim and long-term storage of nuclear waste and to examine the bipartisan Nuclear Waste Administration Act, S. 1234 (116). The bill was reintroduced in April by Chairman Lisa Murkowski and Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). It would allow for a consent-based process for siting nuclear waste facilities while creating a new federal organization to manage nuclear waste and remove it from DOE’s responsibilities.
Speaking of: Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth introduced a bill Wednesday with Republican Sen. Susan Collins that would provide federal assistance to communities that store stranded nuclear waste.
NATURAL RESOURCES ADVANCES PARKS BILL: The House Natural Resources Committee advanced ranking member Rob Bishop‘s bill, H.R. 1225 (116), that would establish a fund to address the maintenance backlog on federal lands. Only two members voted against the bill: Reps. Garret Graves (R-La.) and Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.). Lawmakers adopted by voice vote a substitute amendment from Chairman Raúl Grijalva (R-Ariz.), which would make changes he said would help prioritize projects advancing “long-term sustainability.”
I’LL BE DIRECT: The Bipartisan Policy Center will announce today the creation of its Direct Air Capture Advisory Council to examine the opportunities and challenges of direct air capture. The new advisory council will focus particularly on federal policy that facilitates cost improvements and deployment in large-scale DAC applications.
The inaugural council will include former Florida Rep. Carlos Curbelo; former North Dakota Sen. Byron Dorgan; Roxanne Brown, legislative director at United Steelworkers; and Marty Durbin, former executive vice president of the American Petroleum Institute.
— “Former Trump FEMA chief repaid taxpayers only 2 percent of $151k spent on personal travel,” via POLITICO.
— “Macron calls climate change a ‘red line’ issue at G20, rebuking Trump,” via The New York Times.
— “Blind spot: Miners died while their bosses refused safety equipment,” via The Center for Public Integrity.
— “EPA unilaterally imposes new union contract slashing telework, easing firing,” via Government Executive.
— “Big plastic user Japan fights waste ahead of G-20 summit,” via The Associated Press.
THAT’S ALL FOR ME!
