GOP offers plan to curb regulations in 2017

Republican leaders in the US House of Representatives are planning a renewed legislative push to constrain federal environmental regulations they say unnecessarily hold back the US energy industry.

House speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) today unveiled a plan that would overhaul how federal agencies develop rules, along with the legal standard through which courts review their legality. The 57-page plan, if put into practice, would give the US Congress broad new powers to block regulations and make it harder for federal agencies to implement existing environmental laws.

The plan represents a rebuke to hundreds of rules President Barack Obama's administration has finalized since 2008. Republican lawmakers argue those rules place excessive burdens on oil and gas producers, coal producers, power plants, refiners and pipelines. New rules have made US industry less competitive and resulted in thousands of job losses, Republicans say.

Democratic lawmakers say regulations have produced vastly more benefits than their costs, saving thousands of lives and protecting the environment. Obama's supporters note the US oil and gas industry has thrived despite their supposedly heavy regulatory burden, while power companies have met new restrictions on air and water pollution without significant price increases.

House Republicans began writing the plan earlier this year, as part of a six-part agenda they say they will advance should a Republican take control of the White House in 2017. Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump last month said he would scrap "unnecessary" regulations and reject regulations that are not "good for the American worker."

The new plan includes legislation that has already passed in the US House but have no chance of making it into law under Obama, such as a requirement for Congress to approve any regulation expected to cost more than $100mn/yr.

Republicans also want to expand cost-benefit analyses of regulations so they would cover the entire US economy. The plan would block federal courts from deferring to agency expertise when reviewing the legality of regulations. Republicans also want to make it easier for US oil and gas producers to drill on federal lands.

Much of the plan is aimed at constraining the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). It would require EPA to review ambient air quality standards every 10 years, rather than every five years. EPA would also be prohibited from considering in its regulations a group of scientific studies that include confidential health data on the effects of air pollution, which Republicans have argued lacks transparency.

As far as financial regulation, the Republican plan would require the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to conduct a full cost-benefit analysis of all new regulations. The CFTC as an independent federal agency is not required to conduct cost-benefit tests of its rules.