🎧 Listen: In today's episode of The Journal podcast, siobhanehughes explains how Democrats tried and ultimately failed to unite behind the most ambitious climate legislation in decades—and where this leaves the U.S. in its fight against climate change
This transcript was prepared by a transcription service. This version may not be in its final form and may be updated.
Speaker 5: The most sweeping climate measure in the bill, aiming to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Siobhan Hughes: So the electricity sector is the second largest source of carbon emissions in the United States after transportation. So going after that problem tackles one of the biggest problems. The other thing is that the power sector is where the very fastest and cheapest emissions reductions lie. And so if he's going to reach his goal and do it with some haste, because speed here is important, that is the appropriate target.
Siobhan Hughes: So the Clean Electric Performance Program has been through multiple iterations, but what it does in its current form would be to provide grants to utilities that increase the amount of clean electricity they use by at least 4% a year and penalize utilities that do not meet that standard. And in the version approved by a House Committee, Congress would allocate 150 billion for those grants. And the important thing about this program is it's got penalties.
Siobhan Hughes: So the progressive community supports this enormously. It's championed by Bernie Sanders. It's championed by the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which has about a 100 different House members. The environmental community loves it. A Senator named Tina Smith from Minnesota who considers this her baby emerges as a strong voice for it. It's embraced by really, at least on the Senate side, the entire Senate Democratic caucus, almost.
Siobhan Hughes: So the Clean Electricity Performance Program has been wrapped into a much bigger bill that was initially set at 3.5 trillion. And the reason it was wrapped into this bill is because Democrats are aiming to pass really the bulk of President Biden's agenda through a process called reconciliation.
Siobhan Hughes: This gets into really complicated Senate procedure, but basically reconciliation can only be used once per budget. That's basically once for every fiscal year bill.Ryan Knutson: Got it. So what else is wrapped up into this reconciliation bill? Joe Manchin: We're looking for all that. We'd love to. We're a natural for all that, but the bottom line on that is-
Ryan Knutson: So if Joe Manchin is not going to support this, what does that mean for the Clean Electricity Program?
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