Energy Policy After the 2018 Midterms

November 7, 2018 by AEA Leave a Comment

Full PDF.

The voters have spoken. It’s time to listen to them and focus on policies that expand the availability, affordability, and reliability of energy, rather than on policies that make energy more scarce, more expensive, and less reliable.

For partisans on either side, the 2018 midterm elections will go down as a mixed bag. Democrats won control of the House, though not by the landslide they hoped. Republicans gained seats in the Senate, though mostly at the expense of red-state Democrats who were on the defensive. At the state level, Democrats claimed numerous victories in governor’s races, but pending a couple races still to be called, those wins likely won’t even get them back to 50-50 parity.

On energy issues, however, the 2018 election results look clearer. At the state level, destructive anti-energy ballot measures were defeated in Arizona, Washington, and Colorado. Only Nevada and California stand as the outliers in trending negative, against favorable energy measures. Unfortunately, with the Democrats gaining control of the House of Representatives, a larger threat looms for those who stand for pro-energy policies. House Democrats will surely do everything in their power to thwart the president’s energy agenda. At the same time, the increased pro-energy majority in the Senate bodes well for the nomination prospects of conservative judges and administration officials. Overall, the 2018 elections may slow but will hopefully not reverse the positive energy policy environment of the last two years.

The Senate pro-energy majority increases

The Republican victories in North Dakota, Missouri, Indiana, and Florida all represent significant pro-energy shifts for the Senate. While the Democrats who lost would occasionally cross the aisle on the odd energy issue, the shift to the ‘R’ column is an unequivocal improvement in each case. Also important is the loss of Sen. Heller in Nevada. One of the most unreliable Republican senators on pro-market energy issues, he lately became the face of permanently extending the wasteful electric vehicle tax subsidy. In addition to the Heller loss, two other Republicans with inconsistent energy voting records, Senators Flake and Corker, have also been replaced. Tennessee Senator-elect Marsha Blackburn has a long record of staunchly pro-energy positions, representing a major upgrade. The exit of these three senators combined with the increased Republican majority means that future nominees and votes will be less likely to be held hostage or swayed by moderate Republican senators.

Republicans will likely increase their total to 53 seats in the Senate (including the likely victory in the Mississippi special election runoff). This increased Republican majority will be better able to overcome Democratic obstruction on nominees, which will mean more and stronger pro-energy officials making regulatory decisions.

Democrats narrowly take the House

While not unexpected, the flipping of the House of Representatives to Democratic control represents a serious setback to the energy progress we’ve made at the federal level since 2016.

The Democrats in Congress will make it their mission to try and drive up the costs of the electricity and transportation that Americans rely upon. Quite candidly, the party platform calls for the elimination of natural gas, coal, and oil from our society. We see this in a number of forms. One is the drive to marginalize the internal combustion engine through the use of taxpayer funds to subsidize expensive technologies like electric vehicles and the setting of impossible-to-reach mandates on fuel economy. Contrary to what they’d have you believe, these policies don’t help average people—they directly benefit the politically connected and the wealthy, while limiting transportation options for the rest of us.

Another front in this war on energy is electricity generation, where the Democrats will attempt to spend taxpayer money on their preferred sources of generation, namely, windmills and solar panels. The Democrats are “committed to getting 50 percent of our electricity from clean energy sources within a decade, with half a billion solar panels installed within four years and enough renewable energy to power every home in the country.” This flies in the face of reality, it will threaten the reliability of our electricity grid, and it will send electricity bills through the roof.

Fueled by the environmental left, today’s Democratic Party has unambiguously turned its back on abundant, affordable and reliable energy. The Democrat-controlled House will do whatever it takes to thwart the president’s progress towards unleashing our energy potential and deny American families the economic benefits that come from affordable and reliable domestic energy.

To add insult to injury, the Democrats have made it clear they will seek to single out conservative 501(c)4 organizations like the American Energy Alliance with unjust scrutiny and harassment. But we’ve stared down these challenges before, and we stand ready to do so again.

Fortunately, the Republican controlled Senate and the threat of a Presidential veto will at least contain the Democratic controlled House.
One other note about last night’s House results is the fate of the Climate Solutions Caucus (CSC). Combined with previously announced retirements, the CSC is set to lose at least 20 Republican members, including its co-founder and figurehead Rep. Carlos Curbelo. The failure of Rep. Curbelo’s carbon tax proposal gambit and the decimation of the CSC should be a lesson to Republican elected officials: backing more taxes and regulation is not going to help reelection prospects. Ultimately what the CSC stands for is raising energy prices for consumers—something that will not win favor with Republican supporters.

Washington state carbon tax fails again

The third time was not the charm in Washington State, as voters again rejected an attempt to impose a carbon tax. In 2016, voters rejected what was billed as a “revenue-neutral” carbon tax. Further, during the last session of the legislature, legislation to create a carbon tax foundered as legislators faced the true costs such an idea would impose on the state’s economy. This election season, the environmental left proposed a carbon tax of its own, promising to redistribute the revenue to various pet causes.

In 2016, large parts of the environmental left came out against the “revenue-neutral” carbon tax ballot initiative mainly because it failed to spend the new revenues on growing government. This exposed the game that some carbon tax proponents play, pretending that a carbon tax is about helping the environment when it’s really about imposing new taxes. With the 2018 initiative, proponents at least get points for honesty, transparently seeking to use the potential $1 billion a year to spend on new government programs. But voters once again showed their disapproval, defeating the initiative by a wide margin.

Colorado voters are wise to the game

In Colorado, voters decidedly rejected a ballot proposition that would have increased setback distances for new oil and gas wells (setbacks are regulations requiring wells to be a certain distance from a given class of buildings, which vary by state: residences, schools, water sources, etc.). The proposition was designed to sound innocuous by claiming to add protections for health and safety, but the effect of the setbacks would have been anything but innocuous. State energy regulators estimated that more than 85% of all non-federal acreage in the state would have been made off limits by the expanded setback requirements. This near-ban on oil and gas development was not accidental. The whole point of the proposition was to ban hydraulic fracturing in the state after other efforts failed. Thankfully, voters saw through the ruse, rejecting the proposition by a lopsided 14-point margin.

A second question on the ballot, to compensate landowners for losses from legal and regulatory actions, also failed. That question was primarily placed on the ballot in reaction to the potential damage from the setback proposition. Its failure is rendered far less significant given the rejection of the setback proposition.

Nevada votes for higher electricity bills

Voters in Nevada simultaneously rejected a ballot question that would have required an end to the state’s monopoly electricity system while approving a question to mandate 50% electricity generation from renewables by 2030.

Question 3 proposed to require the legislature to pass a law to open up the state electricity market to competition. The Nevada electricity market is a state enforced monopoly in that consumers have no choice in their electricity provider. The lack of competition and captive consumer base means that the utilities are insulated from any market signals. Common effects of such a system include regulatory capture, where the regulators and utilities collude against ratepayers, and what is known as gold-plating, where a utility builds expensive, often unneeded, new facilities or infrastructure, knowing they can raise rates to pay for it.

Ballot Question 6 purports to require that electricity generation in Nevada be derived from 50% renewable energy by 2030. The question takes no account of how much this would cost taxpayers and ratepayers. Nevada is already about halfway to that 50% threshold (mainly thanks to geothermal generation), so they are better placed than, for example Arizona, to reach it. However transitioning to 50% renewables is going to raise costs for ratepayers since some sort of backup capacity will have to exist for when the wind is not blowing and the sun is not shining. That backup may come from natural gas or coal plants sitting idle until needed (while costing money to maintain) or it may come from constructing expensive battery capacity. Wherever it comes from, it will cost a significant sum of money, and that is on top of the costs of installing and maintaining vast acres of new wind and solar capacity. Fortunately, Question 6’s victory is not the final story. Nevada law requires constitutional amendments to be passed by voters in two consecutive elections. In order for the renewable mandates to go into effect, Question 6 will need to win as a ballot proposal again in 2020.

Gubernatorial seats and state legislatures hold in some states, fall in others

Democrats made substantial gains in gubernatorial races where they flipped control of Illinois, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, and Wisconsin. This is not surprising as Republican control of many of those offices was the result of historic performances by the GOP in previous elections. Republicans maintained control over the governor’s office and the state legislature in the key battleground states of Florida, Iowa, and Ohio. This is encouraging as going into election night, the governor’s office was considered to be in play in all three of these states.

Two states that are worth a deeper discussion are California and Colorado as they have been battlegrounds for energy issues in recent years. The situation in California appears to have worsened as the newly elected Governor Gavin Newsom’s approach to energy issues will make Jerry Brown’s policies appear moderate in comparison. Newsom has promised to accelerate “decarbonization” in California and has promised to put the state on a path to 100 percent renewable energy. He has also promised to achieve zero diesel emissions by 2030, ensuring that residents of California should expect higher energy prices in the foreseeable future. The election of Newsom as well as voters rejecting a measure to undo recent increases to state gas taxes and vehicle registration fees is emblematic of the broader gap between California and the rest of the country when it comes to energy policy.

We should celebrate the defeat of Proposition 112 in Colorado, but the broader political trends in the state are concerning. The election of Rep. Jared Polis to the governor’s office is a setback for the state as he has characterized America’s use of affordable energy as an “addiction” to fossil fuels. Democrats also won control over the state Senate, giving them complete control over the state’s governor’s office and legislature. This shift means we have not seen the end of the Keep it in the Ground movement in Colorado, and proponents of free market energy policies should be prepared to battle proposals like 112 in the state legislature.

Conclusion

This election can perhaps best be understood as a reversion to the mean. The average loss for a president’s party in the first midterms since World War II has been about 30 seats in the House. The Republicans will probably lose a bit more than that but nowhere near the washouts of 1994 (52 seats during the Clinton Administration) or 2010 (63 seats during the Obama Administration).

As for ballot measures, the 2018 midterms were mostly positive for our cause of affordable, abundant energy through freer markets. The continued disdain from voters in a variety of states for the more foolish energy policy ideas shows that there is still a strong bedrock of common sense that a free market energy policy has to build on. The opportunity to consolidate and improve upon the policy gains of the last two years, thanks to a pro-energy Trump Administration, is still very much alive.

While the flip of the House of Representatives is indeed a concern and will mean a larger threat of interventionist policies that hurt consumers, the midterm elections proved that when put to a vote, voters reject policies that threaten the affordability and reliability of the energy they depend upon. The American Energy Alliance will continue its fight for affordable, abundant, and reliable energy for American consumers and businesses no matter which way the political winds blow.

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Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: 2018 election, 2018 midterm election, midterm

Voters Know Best

November 7, 2018 by Erin Amsberry Leave a Comment

WASHINGTON – As the dust settles from the 2018 midterm election, several states have determined the effects of energy-related ballot measures impacting the affordability of energy and consumer choice. American Energy Alliance President Thomas J Pyle made the following statement on the results of some of these energy ballot initiatives:

“What we learned from this election, in states like Colorado, Arizona, and Washington, is that voters reject policies that would make energy more expensive and less reliable to them, their families, and the larger economy. There is little doubt that those who authored the defeated initiatives will try again, but we hope they have finally learned their lesson.The voters have spoken. It’s time to listen to them and focus on policies that expand the availability, affordability, and reliability of energy, rather than on policies that makes energy more scarce, more expensive, and less reliable.”

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For media inquiries, please contact Erin Amsberry
[email protected]

Filed Under: Press Releases Tagged With: 2018 midterm election, Election, press release, press releases

Fringe Activists vs. Colorado Energy

October 29, 2018 by Robert Bradley Leave a Comment

First published by the Pueblo Chieftain

Next month, Colorado voters will decide whether to stymie a thriving industry for ideological purposes.

If passed, Proposition 112 would greatly expand the existing no-drilling zones surrounding occupied buildings. That would effectively prohibit Colorado oil and gas firms, which support 230,000 local jobs and add $31 billion annually to the state economy, from drilling new wells.

Grounded in science and countless studies, Colorado already has strict, common sense boundaries to protect public health and the environment: 500 feet for homes and 1,000 feet for high-occupancy buildings, such as offices and schools. Prop 112 unnecessarily ratchets up the existing setbacks to 2,500 feet — nearly half a mile — creating a patchwork of prohibited zones that would render 85 percent of all non-federal land off limits to energy extraction, according to the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

The consequences would be dire. Once existing wells deplete, the state will have to import oil and gas at greater cost from other states, even requiring new long-distance pipelines. At risk are 140,000 direct Colorado jobs and $7 billion in Colorado’s gross domestic product in the first five years of the de facto ban.

The state’s budget would certainly suffer. Oil and gas companies are a crucial source of public revenue, paying over $1 billion a year in state taxes. Most of that revenue is earmarked specifically for vital public services.

Consider the Colorado Land Board, a state agency responsible for 4 million acres of energy assets. This board generates hundreds of millions of dollars every year through user fees and taxes. And 95 percent of its revenues go to public education. If energy companies can’t drill, that income will fade away. Schools would be forced to find new funding — ironic, given another ballot measure to raise taxes for education.

It’s no wonder, then, that educators staunchly oppose Prop 112. Bob Schaffer, the headmaster of Liberty Common School in Fort Collins, has condemned it as “irresponsible” and “dangerous.”

Green activists claim Prop 112 is an environmental imperative. “We are protecting homes, schools, playgrounds, and water sources,” boasted Anne Lee Foster, a chief organizer of Colorado Rising, the group that led the signature collection drive to put Prop 112 on the ballot.

Foster and allies have focused their ire on “fracking,” an innovative drilling technique. When companies frack a well, they pump water, sand and a small amount of lubricants into underground rock formations at high pressure. This mix creates fissures in the rock, allowing companies to extract the embedded oil and gas. Activists claim the expanded buffer zones will prevent fracking from polluting local waterways with dangerous chemicals.

Yet fracking has been examined thoroughly and found safe. Twenty-six separate studies, including one from Colorado State University, have concluded that fracking does not contaminate groundwater. There is no scientific evidence that increasing the setback distance would improve health or protect anyone from anything — it is a political ploy designed to stymie an essential industry.

The de facto drilling ban contained in Prop 112 is the latest battle in the keep-it-in-the-ground war against fossil fuels. New York state outright banned fracking; Colorado’s proposition is the back-door version of the same thing. That’s why the Washington D.C.-based lobbying group Food and Water Watch gifted $160,000 to Colorado Rising’s issues committee.

Colorado policies should be up to Coloradans, not special interest groups in Washington. And it is a colossal waste that the petroleum industry has had to pony up significant monies for an unnecessary political fight, funds that could have gone to employees or shareholders, not to mention to new drilling efforts to reduce energy costs for consumers.

Historically, Coloradans has proven they can successfully balance environmental and economic concerns. Regulators have set smart rules that protect precious national resources and ensure public health. Colorado was the first state in the country to require water sampling around drilling sites and the first to require methane capture. At the same time, energy developers have always been afforded the flexibility needed to grow and generate wealth.

Prop 112 threatens this balance. Let’s hope voters see through the ruse come Nov. 6.

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: colorado, keep it in the ground, Proposition 112

Denver CBS 4 explains Colorado’s Proposition 112

October 29, 2018 by AEA Leave a Comment

With a little more than a week to the midterm elections, the American Energy Alliance would like to take one more opportunity to remind our audience about an important ballot initiative in the state of Colorado: Proposition 112. If passed, 112 would require a 2,500-foot barrier between new oil and gas drilling projects and any occupied structure or loosely defined “vulnerable area” in the state of Colorado.

Recently, Denver CBS 4’s Shaun Boyd discussed the topic on her popular political fact-checking segment “Reality Check.” The American Energy Alliance encourages voters in the state of Colorado to view the segment here, as it offers a brief, yet thorough, explanation of the economic harm Proposition 112 would cause the state of Colorado if it were to pass on Election Day.

A recent poll from the University of Colorado’s American Political Research Lab shows that voters are evenly split in their support for Proposition 112. For this reason, we want to highlight an important part of the CBS 4 segment; mainly that it draws attention to the wide-ranging bipartisan opposition to Proposition 112, which can be attributed to the severe economic harm it would cause to the state of Colorado.

The segment walks us through claims being made in a television ad featuring prominent opponents of the ballot initiative. In the ad, Democrat Ken Salazar, the former U.S. Senator of Colorado and the former Secretary of the Interior to the Obama Administration points out that Proposition 112 is “effectively a ban on oil and natural gas in Colorado.” It then cuts to the former Republican Governor of Colorado Bill Owens where he explains, “112 will cost thousands of good jobs across our state.” CBS 4’s Boyd calls each of these claims “alarming and true.”

Boyd also points out that other opponents of the proposition include environmentalists like former Colorado Governor Bill Ritter who called the proposal a “keep-it-in-the-ground effort,” that was “arrived at in a very non-Colorado way… without dialogue or debate, by a group of advocates.”

The segment then goes on to expose other important factors of this initiative, including this report from the Colorado Oil & Gas Conservation Commission, which explained that 112 would ban fracking on at least 85 percent of non-federal land in Colorado. Colorado Rising, the group responsible for bringing 112 to the ballot, has disputed this claim. But as the segment explains, the supporters of 112 are relying on a single academic paper from an assistant professor at the Colorado School of Mines, which Boyd explains, “included big caveats and has since been debunked by his colleagues.”

For a more detailed analysis on Proposition 112, we also encourage readers to listen to a recent episode of our partner organization’s podcast where IER’s staff discussed the proposition with Kelly Sloan of the Centennial Institute at Colorado Christian University to discuss the initiative.

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: CBS, colorado, fracking, oil and gas, Proposition 112

Nevada’s Tesla scam reaches the federal level

October 16, 2018 by Alexander Stevens 2 Comments

In the last two weeks, two different bills, both sponsored by Republicans, were introduced to the House of Representatives. One would extend the electric vehicle tax credit, the other would revoke it.

Plenty of people have pointed out problems with the EV tax credit with the main issue being that it subsidizes wealthy people purchasing luxury goods. The Pacific Research Institute published a study earlier this year showing that 78.7 percent of the EV tax credits went to households with an adjusted gross income of $100,000 or higher, and more than half went to households with an adjusted gross income of more than $200,000. Additionally, that same report concluded that federal policies to promote the manufacturing and purchasing of EVs including tax credits for new buyers, financial support for the industry that produces them, and programs that promote efforts to educate consumers about electric vehicles will have a total budgetary cost of about $7.5 billion through 2019.

Last week, Senator John A. Barrasso of Wyoming introduced a bill to revoke the federal tax credit for electric vehicles (EVs), which offers a $7,500 tax credit to purchasers of the first 200,000 EVs sold per manufacturer. Today, in direct conflict with Senator Barrasso’s bill, Senator Dean Heller of Nevada quietly released a bill that would eliminate the cap on the first 200,000 vehicles sold and extend the tax credits to 2022. This raises a question: why is Sen. Heller introducing a bill in direct opposition to his colleague that would extend the federal EV tax credit? The answer: crony capitalism is alive and well in Nevada and Republican politicians are to blame.

In 2014, Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval approved a $1.3 billion subsidy package to Tesla,Inc. The biggest chunk of the deal gave Tesla sales tax exemptions for 20 years as well as payroll tax exemptions through 2024. In exchange, Tesla agreed to build a $5 billion lithium-ion battery factory outside of Reno. The deal also required at least half of all workers hired by Tesla to be Nevada residents.

After the deal was finalized, Republican politicians took an opportunity to celebrate their ability to hand out special favors to a privileged political firm. During the deal’s signing ceremony, Governor Sandoval proclaimed, “Nevada has announced to the world – not to the country, but to the world – that we are ready to lead.” Additionally, Assemblyman Ira Hansen, a Republican from Sparks, Nevada, said the deal was “arguably the biggest thing that has happened in Nevada since at least the Hoover Dam.”

Four years later, crony capitalism has run its course in Nevada as serious concerns about the direction of Tesla abound and a recent court filing has shown that Tesla was delinquent on more than $650,000 in Nevada state taxes. In that context, Senator Heller’s attempt to extend the federal EV tax credit and eliminate the 200,000-vehicle cap makes sense: it’s an attempt to keep the rent-seeking casino open so that politically-connected groups in Nevada can continue to benefit at the expense of the American people.

Last month, AEA spearheaded a coalition of free market think tanks that sent a letter to House Ways and Means Committee Chair Kevin Brady explaining the problems caused by efforts to expand the EV tax credit. Those problems are worth outlining again here as a critique of Sen. Heller’s new bill. The elimination of the 200,000-vehicle cap would be fiscally irresponsible as the liability to taxpayers would be limitless; despite generally positive feelings about electric vehicles as a whole, recent polling shows that 67 percent of voters believe they should not be forced to subsidize electric vehicle purchases; electric vehicles do not necessarily pollute less than modern internal combustion engines; and subsidies for electric vehicles overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy. It’s time to end the EV tax credit gravy train and force electric vehicles to compete on a level playing field.

Filed Under: Blog, Electric Vehicles

AEA Announces 2018 American Energy Champions

October 15, 2018 by AEA Leave a Comment

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today the American Energy Alliance is pleased to announce the 2018 American Energy Champion award recipients for both U.S. House and Senate members. This award goes to members who scored a 90 percent or higher on AEA’s American Energy Scorecard for the 2017-2018 legislative session.

“This award goes to the members of Congress who have demonstrated a commitment to pro-growth policies that will lead to more affordable energy for American families,” AEA president Thomas J Pyle said. “The American Energy Scorecard is an essential tool for engaged citizens to determine how their representatives voted on the most important energy votes of the year. We’re encouraged to see 198 House members and 48 Senate members remain committed to free-market principles and continue to fight for less government intrusion into Americans’ energy choices.”

On the House side, AEA scored 13 votes including legislation related to repealing the overreaching WOTUS definition, cutting spending authority for ATVM loan programs, and expressing the sense of Congress that a carbon tax would be detrimental to the U.S. economy.

On the Senate side, AEA scored five votes including legislation related to drilling in ANWR, the Stream Protection Rule CRA, and BLM Planning 2.0 CRA.

The American Energy Scorecard was launched in 2015 as the first free-market legislative scorecard dedicated to energy policy. For more on the principles behind the American Energy Scorecard click here.

See the full list of the 2018
American Energy Champions

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Filed Under: Press Releases Tagged With: press release, press releases

AEA to President Trump: “Reject Big Ethanol’s Call for a Special Deal”

October 9, 2018 by Erin Amsberry 1 Comment

WASHINGTON – Today, President Trump urged the EPA to waive seasonal restrictions on E15 fuel thus allowing for year-round sales. AEA President Thomas J. Pyle made the following statement:

“We are disappointed that Big Ethanol has convinced President Trump to request the EPA to overstep its authority and extend a waiver for year-round E15 sales, something not within EPA’s power to even grant and will assuredly be challenged in court. EPA is given no statutory authority to grant RVP waivers beyond levels set by Congress. The specification in the Clean Air Act 42 U.S.C. 7545 (h)(4) only allows a waiver for up to E10 gas and cannot extend to E15 gas without clearly violating the law.”

“President Trump should reject the corn lobby’s special deal and instead urge Congress to find a comprehensive solution to the renewable fuels mandate that addresses RVP waivers and sunsets this program once and for all. The mandate is a fundamentally unnecessary policy of yesteryear that is only alive today because of presidential politics.”

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For media inquiries, please contact Erin Amsberry
[email protected]

Filed Under: Press Releases, Renewable Fuel Standard Tagged With: E15, ethanol, press release, rfs

Key Vote YES on Kavanaugh Confirmation

October 5, 2018 by Erin Amsberry Leave a Comment

The American Energy Alliance urges all Senators to support Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court of the United States.

As a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, Judge Kavanaugh has established a firm track record of fairly evaluating important regulatory issues relating to energy and environmental policy, and applying the Constitution in an impartial and consistent manner.

Judge Kavanaugh has shown a willingness to challenge regulatory overreach and we expect he will fortify citizens’ protections from the administrative state. His critical stance toward the doctrine of Chevron Deference, in particular, promises to wrest authority from federal bureaucrats and return it to the elected representatives of the public in the United States Congress.

The American Energy Alliance urges all Senators to vote YES to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court and will include this vote in its American Energy Scorecard.

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: kavanaugh, Key Vote, scorecard

Free Market Coalition to Congress: Don’t Extend the Federal Electric Vehicle Tax Credit

September 19, 2018 by Erin Amsberry Leave a Comment

WASHINGTON – This morning, a coalition of 30 free market policy groups, led by the American Energy Alliance, sent a letter to House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady objecting to any expansion of the federal electric vehicle tax credit.

The letter encourages Chairman Brady to reject attempts by the EV lobby and their allies in Congress to slip a tax-credit cap increase into upcoming spending packages. Congress has a responsibility to spare American taxpayers increased economic harm from a subsidy that benefits only those who can afford expensive electric vehicles.

American Energy Alliance President Thomas J. Pyle made the following statement:

“The electric vehicle tax credit subsidizes expensive vehicles that only a fraction of wealthy Americans want and that do not necessarily pollute less than modern internal combustion engines.

“Why should a typical middle class American family — with a median annual income of $44,000 — subsidize the lifestyles of the rich and famous? Political leaders should recognize that Americans can make their own decisions about how to spend their money and what cars they want to drive. We shouldn’t give handouts to wealthy individuals to help defray the cost of their luxury vehicles.”

The letter was signed by the following organizations who share AEA’s wariness of the irresponsibility of extending this massive government handout:

The full letter can be read here.

For more about electric vehicles, click here, here, and here.

Filed Under: Press Releases, Uncategorized Tagged With: electric vehicles, press release, tax credit

Release: AEA Applauds Trump Administration For New Waste Prevention Rule

September 18, 2018 by Erin Amsberry Leave a Comment

WASHINGTON – Today, the Department of the Interior announced its final rule reforming methane regulations by revising the 2016 Waste Prevention Rule (also known as the Venting and Flaring Rule). American Energy Alliance President Thomas J. Pyle issued the following statement:

“We are pleased to see the Trump administration taking an opportunity to reduce the burden of another costly and unnecessary regulation that threatens to derail efforts to achieve U.S. energy dominance. The BLM has no authority over regulation of air emissions, which is more properly a function of the state governments as specified by the Clean Air Act. Not only that, but the energy sector is already significantly reducing methane emissions without this top-down directive from the federal government, in part, because methane itself is a valuable resource that producers have incentive to capture and sell.

“Had the Trump administration not undone this costly regulation, the cost of complying with this regulation would ultimately fall on the shoulders of the American people. Today’s reform will save millions in regulatory costs annually and is another example of President Trump’s truce in President Obama’s ongoing war on affordable energy.”

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For media inquiries, please contact Erin Amsberry
[email protected]

Filed Under: Press Releases, Uncategorized Tagged With: methane, methane emissions, press release