Chemical Related Congressional Outlook for 2011

C&EN has a nice rundown in it's January 17 Issue concerning congressional outlook for 2011 on matters that will affect the chemical industry, academia, government, and taxpayers.

I will ignore the obvious ones covered by TV news, such as health care reform and reducing the budget. I will concentrate on key science and technology issues.

Both the House and Senate will work toward renewing chemical plant security regulations, reforming the patent system, and ensuring drug safety. This is all good, providing so many restrictions are not used as to discourage economic development.

Representative Fred Upton, Darrell Issa, and Doug Lamborn all have a clear desire to investigate and eliminate regulations that have killed jobs, held back American business and hurt workers and their families. Congratulations! Let's see what they can do. Fred Upton wrote Energy Secretary Chu last November criticizing the Administration' stimulus spending and demanding answers to a detailed list of questions about spending of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds. There is no indication of whether he received an answer.

Darrell Issa asked 150 associations to specify regulations that have negatively impacted job growth in their industries and should be examined by his committee. There has been a good response. Let's see what kind of action his committee will take.

Additionally, Upton and Issa have made it clear that their top environmental priority would be challenging EPA's plan to control industrial emissions of carbon dioxide through provisions of the Clean Air Act. Hooray! Let's get the EPA out of politics of the Obama Administration, which in this case is using CO2 as a probable new source of tax revenue. The key point is not to allow the EPA to regulate something which has not been legislated. Upton says EPA's Jackson has her foot firmly on the throat of our economic recovery. Go get her Fred! The Democrats, and especially Barbara Boxer, want to make a fight of it. Let's hope that the general public is adequately informed to the extent that Boxer will lose her seat in her next reelection campaign. She wants to challenge "any legislative effort to threaten the health, safety, or well-being of the people of America". A wonderful platitude but lacking in detail and reality.

Lamborn says he will focus on the Department of Interior and the what he sees is its tardiness in opening federal lands to energy development. Hooray for Lamborn! This will also take it back to Obama and Ken Salazar, who have sacrificed US fossil fuel production in an effort to promote more expensive alternate energy, such as wind and solar.

Jeff Bingaman wants to promote development of renewable energy sources. Let's kill that. We already had too much of it from President Obama and Secretary Chu. Solar and wind energy are too expensive. The cheap and proven way to go is with oil, natural gas, and coal. Utilities are making huge long-term investment decisions on new power plants. Government needs to tell them to avoid renewable energy facilities, such as solar and wind. We must dry up the subsidies for these proven losers.

Pershing, a US government political hack, said that failure of the US to cut greenhouse gas emissions will be noticed internationally. I hope so! I agree with the supposition that lack of action by the US could limit the willingness of other countries to control their own release of greenhouse gases. Great! This would be a major advance for world economics.
Chemical plant security regulations are also being considered. This is a good move. Too many plants are operating with unnecessary storage of dangerous materials. These materials could be generated on-site, as they are necessary for use.

The EPA has been working on a program to screen chemicals for potential hormonal impact on people. We have lots of health problems, which can likely be traced to hormone disruption. EPA should be encouraged to continue with this program, especially since it would take their minds off the political football of climate change. Pesticides should be looked at especially carefully, including those for home use.

The America Competes Act was reauthorized in December. This is not an area in which government should be involved. It's business and business organizations have adequate facilities to handle their own promotion. Ralph Hall says, "the measure continues to be far too expensive, and particularly in light of the new and duplicative programs it creates". "The bill goes beyond the goals and directions of the original America Competes Act, taking us from good solid fundamental research and much too far into the world of commercialization". Amen! If we cannot scuttle the bill, let's at least limit funding to starve it to death. This is another great opportunity to cut the budget and reduce the size of government.

NASA is also on the agenda for review. Its continued existence is controversial, but I believe they have done some good work and should be continued at least in part. However, this should include at least getting them off the kick of global climate change caused by carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It is likely that they have only included this in condescending to the political agenda of the Obama administration.

The National Nanotechnology Initiative should be scuttled. Any practical advantages for using nanotechnology can easily be handled by private industry. There is some evidence of toxicity problems caused by nanotechnology, but this could be handled by the EPA and OSHA.