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87–546 2015

EPA’S REGULATORY THREAT TO AFFORDABLE, 

RELIABLE ENERGY: THE PERSPECTIVE OF COAL 

COMMUNITIES 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND 

INVESTIGATIONS 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND 

COMMERCE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

OCTOBER 29, 2013 

Serial No. 113–89 

( 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce 

energycommerce.house.gov 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE 

FRED UPTON, Michigan 

Chairman 

RALPH M. HALL, Texas 

JOE BARTON, Texas 

Chairman Emeritus 

ED WHITFIELD, Kentucky 

JOHN SHIMKUS, Illinois 

JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania 

GREG WALDEN, Oregon 

LEE TERRY, Nebraska 

MIKE ROGERS, Michigan 

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

Vice Chairman 

PHIL GINGREY, Georgia 

STEVE SCALISE, Louisiana 

ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio 

CATHY MCMORRIS RODGERS, Washington 

GREGG HARPER, Mississippi 

LEONARD LANCE, New Jersey 

BILL CASSIDY, Louisiana 

BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky 

PETE OLSON, Texas 

DAVID B. MCKINLEY, West Virginia 

CORY GARDNER, Colorado 

MIKE POMPEO, Kansas 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

BILL JOHNSON, Missouri 

BILLY LONG, Missouri 

RENEE L. ELLMERS, North Carolina 

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California 

Ranking Member 

JOHN D. DINGELL, Michigan 

Chairman Emeritus 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

FRANK PALLONE, JR., New Jersey 

BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois 

ANNA G. ESHOO, California 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

LOIS CAPPS, California 

MICHAEL F. DOYLE, Pennsylvania 

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

JIM MATHESON, Utah 

G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina 

JOHN BARROW, Georgia 

DORIS O. MATSUI, California 

DONNA M. CHRISTENSEN, Virgin Islands 

KATHY CASTOR, Florida 

JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland 

JERRY MCNERNEY, California 

BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa 

PETER WELCH, Vermont 

BEN RAY LUJAN, New Mexico 

PAUL TONKO, New York 

(III) 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

Chairman 

MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas 

Vice Chairman 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

PHIL GINGREY, Georgia 

STEVE SCALISE, Louisiana 

GREGG HARPER, Mississippi 

PETE OLSON, Texas 

CORY GARDNER, Colorado 

H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia 

BILL JOHNSON, Ohio 

BILLY LONG, Missouri 

RENEE L. ELLMERS, North Carolina 

JOE BARTON, Texas 

FRED UPTON, Michigan (ex officio) 

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

Ranking Member 

BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa 

BEN RAY LUJAN, New Mexico 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina 

KATHY CASTOR, Florida 

PETER WELCH, Vermont 

PAUL TONKO, New York 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

JOHN D. DINGELL, Michigan 

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California (ex officio) 

(V) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hon. Tim Murphy, a Representative in Congress from the Commonwealth 

of Pennsylvania, opening statement ................................................................... 1 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 3 

Hon. Diana DeGette, a Representative in Congress from the state of Colorado, 

opening statement ................................................................................................ 5 

Hon. John A. Yarmuth, a Representative in Congress from the Commonwealth of Kentucky, opening statement ............................................................. 6 

Hon. Fred Upton, a Representative in Congress from the state of Michigan, 

prepared statement .............................................................................................. 6 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 7 

Hon. H. Morgan Griffith, a Representative in Congress from the Commonwealth of Virginia, opening statement ............................................................... 8 

Hon. Henry A. Waxman, a Representative in Congress from the State of 

California, opening statement ............................................................................. 9 

WITNESSES

Albey Brock, Bell County Judge/Executive, Pineville, Kentucky ........................ 12 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 14 

Answers to submitted questions 1 ................................................................... 69 

Raymond C. Ventrone, Business Manager, Boilermakers Local 154, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania ............................................................................................ 17 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 19 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 72 

Roger D. Horton, Founder, Citizens for Coal, Holden, West Virginia ................. 23 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 26 

Answers to submitted questions 2 ................................................................... 77 

Daniel Weiss, Senior Fellow and Director of Climate, Center for American 

Progress ................................................................................................................ 29 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 31 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 80 

Olen Lund, Former County Commissioner; Delta County, Colorado .................. 43 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 45 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 89 

John Fetterman, Mayor, Braddock, Pennsylvania ................................................ 47 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 49 

Answers to submitted questions 3 ................................................................... 92 

John Pippy, Chief Executive Officer, Pennsylvania Coal Alliance, Harrisburg, 

Pennsylvania ........................................................................................................ 51 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 53 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 95 

SUBMITTED MATERIAL

Committee memorandum ........................................................................................ 66 

1Mr. Brock did not respond to submitted questions for the record. 

2Mr. Horton did not respond to submitted questions for the record. 

3Mr. Fetterman did not respond to submitted questions for the record. 

(1) 

EPA’S REGULATORY THREAT TO AFFORDABLE, RELIABLE ENERGY: THE PERSPECTIVE OF COAL COMMUNITIES 

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2013 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS, 

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 1:07 p.m., in room 

2123 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tim Murphy 

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Members present: Representatives Murphy, Burgess, Blackburn, 

Gingrey, Scalise, Harper, Gardner, Griffith, Johnson, Long, 

Ellmers, Upton (ex officio), DeGette, Braley, Tonko, Yarmuth, 

Doyle, McKinley and Waxman (ex officio). 

Staff present: Charlotte Baker, Press Secretary; Karen Christian, 

Chief Counsel, Oversight; Brad Grantz, Policy Coordinator, Oversight and Investigations; Tom Hassenboehler, Chief Counsel, Energy and Power; Brittany Havens, Legislative Clerk; Mary 

Neumayr, Senior Energy Counsel; Sam Spector, Counsel, Oversight; Peter Spencer, Professional Staff Member, Oversight; Tim 

Wilbur, Digital Media Advisor; Brian Cohen, Democratic Staff Director, Oversight and Investigations, and Senior Policy Advisor; 

Kiren Gopal, Democratic Counsel; and Kara van Stralen, Democratic Policy Analyst. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. TIM MURPHY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA 

Mr. MURPHY. Good afternoon everyone, and welcome to our subcommittee hearing, Oversight and Investigations, titled ‘‘EPA’s 

Regulatory Threat to Affordable, Reliable Energy: the Perspective 

from Coal Communities.’’ 

Before I start, I would just like to lay out our schedule today. We 

are going to be on a very tight schedule. I am going to have a very 

quick gavel, so if anybody tries to go over your time, we are going 

to stop you because at 3 o’clock, we have a hard stop time because 

of a special ceremony for former Speaker Foley. Also, approximately around 1:30, we will have votes. We will take a quick break 

at that time and then come back, so I ask that members rush back 

here after they vote on the floor. I will open up with my statement 

and then I will recognize Ms. DeGette. 

2 

A century ago, when my grandfather came to America, he 

worked in a coal mine. Things were different back then. Mines 

were extremely dangerous. Roofs would collapse. Mine injuries and 

deaths were all too common. Back then, factories, homes, and 

power plants burned coal without concern for the environment so 

the skies were dark with soot. Streetlights turned on at noon, and 

businessmen would take a second white dress shirt to work to 

change into at midday. 

Major changes in environmental practices have cleared the skies 

and reduced emissions by more than 50 percent even as coal usage 

tripled. We can always do better, and I support a real commitment 

to investing in clean coal, but that is made exceedingly difficult 

under the President’s budget, which cuts $230 million from cleancoal research at the National Energy Technology Laboratory. The 

Administration giving up on clean coal reminds me of the editors 

of New York Times, who opined in 1903 after a failed attempt at 

flight by the Wright Brothers, that it would be one million to ten 

million years before man could fly. On that same day, the Wright 

Brothers wrote in their diary, ‘‘Today we began construction on the 

airplane.’’ 

Instead, the Administration wants to direct billions in subsidies 

at unproven renewable energy projects. But you can’t make windmills without steel and you can’t make steel without coal. 

Coal is quite literally the bedrock of thousands of communities 

across the country. Powering 40 percent of our homes and factories, 

coal touches nearly every aspect of life. It fires the steel mills that 

have built the Empire State Building and the Golden Gate Bridge, 

and provides good jobs and paychecks to thousands of Americans. 

Today, we are going to hear from workers, local officials and others whose lives and communities depend on coal. In parts of Ohio, 

Kentucky, Colorado, and 22 other coal-producing States, families 

are going on the government dole, schools and municipal services 

are being cut, and communities are being driven into poverty partly because new regulations from the Environmental Protection 

Agency are destroying the prosperity of these coal towns. 

In June 2011, then-Administrator Lisa Jackson told this committee that the EPA does not look at the impact on jobs when they 

come up with new regulations. Today we will look in the eyes of 

those whom the EPA says are not important: the workers and families of coal. These are folks who lose their jobs and they get put 

on unemployment. When the unemployment runs out, they get put 

on welfare. When they can’t afford their home anymore, they are 

given public housing. When they can’t feed their kids, they are 

given food stamps. They never wanted a handout. All they wanted 

was a job. These workers bear the immediate cost of the EPA’s actions, and this hearing is not about why or how the EPA draws up 

new regulations or permitting requirements. As part of our oversight responsibilities, we regularly take testimony about the Agency’s decisions, and we will continue to do so in the months ahead. 

But too often, the practice in Washington is to listen as beltway 

experts and the EPA explain Agency actions. But this practice 

doesn’t capture the daily impact of Washington on the distant communities where good jobs, with good wages, support a proud way 

of life. 

3 

In my district, the Agency didn’t consider the nearly 400 people 

in Pennsylvania who were put out of work last week at the Hatfield and Mitchell coal-fired power plants in Greene and Washington Counties. This was after the plant’s owner spent nearly half 

a billion dollars making Hatfield one of the cleanest super-critical 

facilities in the country, only to throw in the towel when the EPA 

announced new unworkable mandates for 2016. The EPA did not 

consider the ten people who lost their jobs at Joy Mining in Houston, Pennsylvania last Friday, or the 130 individuals at PBS Coals 

in Somerset County who were laid off in May, the third round of 

layoffs at the company in less than a year. These Pennsylvanians 

joined the nearly 6,000 miners who lost their jobs in 2012 working 

directly in the coal mining industry and thousands of factory workers, boilermakers, laborers, electricians, operating engineers, 

steamfitters, plumbers, and machinists, all out of work or under 

threat of losing their jobs. 

Our witnesses today can speak to what the coal industry means 

to coal-reliant regions like eastern Kentucky, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and western Colorado. They can speak to what the industry has meant in terms of providing a good standard of living and 

the support for local governments, the schools and services critical 

to daily life. 

This is not an academic debate. For some of these communities, 

what happens here in Washington is the difference between a decent living and poverty. And when a person grows up in poverty, 

they are at higher risk of drug abuse, chronic depression, and other 

medical problems. A recent study by Georgetown University says 

these families have other risks for obesity, cancer, hypertension, 

stroke, and cardiovascular disease because of the stresses of poverty and unemployment. 

We will hear from some who say coal plants are closing because 

natural gas is cheaper. Not true. They are closing because the EPA 

refuses to work out solutions that help coal move forward to be 

even cleaner than it already is. These plants are closing because 

the EPA makes it impossible to comply with Agency standards. 

Today’s hearing, I hope, will help Congress make the right decisions going forward so that more people can benefit from the good 

and honorable living the coal industry provides. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Murphy follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. TIM MURPHY

A century ago when my grandfather came to America, he worked in a coal mine. 

Things were different then. Mines were extremely dangerous. Roofs would collapse. 

Mine injuries and deaths were all too common. Back then, factories, homes, and 

power plants burnt coal without concern for the environment so the skies were dark 

with soot. Streetlights turned on at noon, and businessmen would take a second 

white dress shirt to work to change into at mid-day. 

Major changes in environmental practices have cleared the skies and reduced 

emissions by more than fifty percent even as coal usage tripled. We can always do 

better. I support a real commitment to investing in clean coal, but that’s made exceedingly difficult under the president’s budget, which cut $230 million from cleancoal research at the National Energy Technology Laboratory. The administration 

giving up on clean coal reminds me of the editors of New York Times, who opined 

in 1903 after a failed attempt at flight by the Wright Brothers, that it would be 

one million to ten million years before man could fly. 

Instead, the administration wants to direct billions in subsidies at unproven renewable energy projects. 

4 

But you can’t make windmills without steel and you can’t make steel without coal. 

Coal is quite literally the bedrock of thousands of communities across the country. 

Powering forty percent of our homes, and factories, coal touches nearly every aspect 

of life. Coal fires the steel mills that have built the Empire State Building and the 

Golden Gate Bridge, and provides good jobs and paychecks to thousands of Americans. 

Today, we are going to hear from workers, local officials, and others whose lives 

and communities depend on coal. 

In parts of Ohio, Kentucky, Colorado, and the 22 other coal producing states, families are going on the government dole, schools and municipal services are being cut, 

and communities are being driven into poverty partly because new regulations from 

the Environmental Protection Agency are destroying the prosperity of these coal 

towns. 

In June 2011, then-Administrator Lisa Jackson told this committee that the EPA 

does not look at the impact on jobs when they come up with new regulations. Today 

we will look in the eyes of those whom the EPA says are not important: the workers 

and families of coal. 

These workers bear the immediate cost of EPA’s actions. This hearing is not about 

why or how the EPA draws up new regulations or permitting requirements. As part 

of our oversight responsibilities, we regularly take testimony about the agency’s decisions, and will continue to do so in the months ahead. 

Too often, the practice in Washington is to listen as beltway experts and the EPA 

explain agency actions. But this practice doesn’t capture the daily impact of Washington on the distant communities where good jobs, with good wages, support a 

proud way of life. In my district, the agency didn’t consider the nearly 400 people, 

who were put out of work last week at the Hatfield and Mitchell coal-fired power 

plants in Greene and Washington Counties. This was after the plant’s owner spent 

nearly half-a-billion dollars making Hatfield one of the cleanest super-critical facilities in the country—only to throw in the towel when the EPA announced new unworkable mandates for 2016. 

The EPA didn’t consider the ten people who lost their jobs at Joy Mining in Houston, Pennsylvania last Friday, or the 130 individuals at PBS Coals in Somerset 

County who were laid off in May, the third round of layoffs at the company in less 

than a year. 

These Pennsylvanians joined the nearly 6,000 miners who lost their jobs in 2012 

working directly in the coal mining industry—and thousands of factory workers, 

boilermakers, laborers, electricians, operating engineers, steamfitters, plumbers, and 

machinists, all out of work or under threat of losing their jobs. Our witnesses today 

can speak to what the coal industry means to coal-reliant regions like Eastern Kentucky, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Western Colorado. They can speak to what 

the industry has meant in terms of providing a good standard of living and the support for local governments, the schools, and services critical to daily life. 

This is not an academic debate. For some of these communities, what happens 

here in Washington is the difference between a decent living and poverty. And when 

a person grows up in poverty, they are at higher risk of drug abuse, chronic depression, and other medical problems. A recent study by Georgetown University says 

these families have other risks for obesity, cancer, hypertension, stroke and cardiovascular disease because of the stresses of poverty and unemployment. 

We will hear from some who say coal plants are closing because natural gas is 

cheaper. Not true. They are closing because the EPA refuses to work out solutions 

help coal move forward to be even cleaner than it already is. These plants are closing because the EPA makes it impossible to comply with agency standards. 

Today’s hearing, I hope, will help Congress make the right decisions going forward so that more people can benefit from the good and honorable living the coal 

industry provides. 

# # # 

Mr. MURPHY. With that, I will end early and recognize Ranking 

Member DeGette for the purposes of an opening statement. 

5 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DIANA DEGETTE, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF COLORADO 

Ms. DEGETTE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to 

welcome all of your constituents, Mr. Doyle’s constituents, and even 

Mr. Lund, who is from Colorado, western Colorado—like me, a Colorado native. We are glad to have all of you here with us today. 

You know, Mr. Chairman, I know the witnesses here have really 

compelling testimony, and I want to thank each and every one of 

you for coming. I don’t take the concerns that you are going to talk 

about today lightly. I think we do need to think about the economies of all of these communities, and frankly, Mr. Chairman, we 

need to talk about more than just the EPA regulations. We do also 

need to talk about the real reality that as natural gas becomes 

cheaper than coal and more and more other utilities and others 

transfer to natural gas, it is the invisible hand of the free market. 

Utilities are moving to natural gas because it makes business 

sense. So we do need to talk about that, and as we think about 

what is happening with the loss of jobs in coal country, we need 

to think about the inevitable hand of the free market and what we 

do about that. 

Something else we need to think about is why the EPA is making 

these regulations, and they are making these regulations because 

there is another real threat aside from the loss of these jobs, which 

is an important issue. We also have a catastrophic issue facing us, 

and that issue is the issue of climate change. If you look at what 

happened one year ago today when Hurricane Sandy made landfall 

in the United States, over 100 people were killed. There was devastation throughout the East Coast. And when you look at what happened in Colorado this summer in my home State where we saw 

the potential impacts of climate change firsthand with 11,000 people being evacuated from their homes, 19,500 homes being damaged and over 1,500 being destroyed in these catastrophic floods. 

And so when you look at climate change, you have to say why is 

EPA making these regulations and what we can do. 

And so as we look at this whole issue, we look at, number one, 

the need to reduce carbon pollution, we need to protect public 

health and the environment, and we also need to provide assistance to communities and individuals that are hard hit both by the 

shift from coal and also by climate change so that people can transition to improved technologies that will meet our energy needs. 

Mr. Chairman, I am open to any ideas that my colleagues or the 

witnesses have today about how we can help these communities 

move forward. We should do more than just have this one hearing. 

We should do more than just hear one side of the story. We should 

have hearings also on climate change so that we can hear from witnesses in Boulder and Salina and Jamestown, Colorado, from New 

York and New Jersey, who have lost their jobs. We need to have 

a comprehensive look at this and see what we can do. 

And with that, I am happy to yield 2 minutes to Mr. Yarmuth, 

the newest member of this committee, and we are so delighted to 

have him. 

6 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN A. YARMUTH, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE COMMONWEALTH 

OF KENTUCKY 

Mr. YARMUTH. I thank the ranking member. 

According to the title of this hearing, we are going to hear about 

the perspective of coal communities, but let me assure you, the concerns of residents in the coal communities of Kentucky do not stop 

after they open their utility bill. They are interested in their health 

and the harm mountaintop removal mining is doing to their families, friends and neighbors. 

Two recent studies found communities near mountaintop removal sites showed elevated risks of birth defects, while adult hospitalizations for chronic pulmonary disorders and hypertension increase in these communities as coal production does. So do the 

rates of mortality, lung cancer and chronic heart, lung and kidney 

disease. We must also consider the impact on the communities that 

are downwind. In Kentucky, one in five adults and one in 10 children suffer from asthma, which is exacerbated by the pollution that 

results in part from unrestricted carbon emissions. 

Mountaintop removal isn’t just impacting the residents in coal 

communities. It is also taking their jobs. The decline in mining jobs 

did not start 2 years ago or 6 years ago when this President took 

office. It started more than three decades ago with the advent of 

mechanized mining and mountaintop removal. During that time, 

the number of mining jobs in Kentucky declined from approximately 47,000 in 1977 to 12,000 today. Meanwhile, coal production 

remains steady with the exception of recent drops due to the natural gas surge. In other words, the only ones who benefited from 

mechanized mining are the coal companies whose profits have remained far, far healthier than the local economies where they operate. 

You know, there is a reasonable dispute that we have to address 

our carbon problem, but we tried to do that in 2009 after the Supreme Court required the government to develop limits on carbon 

pollution. We passed a Republican idea to create an emissions market, and I worked closely with other coal State members to ensure 

we wouldn’t drive up utility costs to harm our States’ economies. 

Unfortunately, Republicans blocked that legislation, and because of 

that, we are here today. I yield back. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. We now recognize the chairman of the 

full committee, Mr. Upton, for 5 minutes. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. FRED UPTON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN 

Mr. UPTON. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

You know, when the work underground stops, everyone above 

pays the price. That observation made by a Boone County, West 

Virginia, TV reporter back in September of 2012, who succinctly 

captures the plight of America’s coal communities. Over the past 5 

years, as the Nation has struggled to emerge from the great recession, we have witnessed an onslaught of EPA rules and proposals 

that have significantly targeted the Nation’s energy and manufacturing sectors, the vitality of which is essential for putting this Nation back on a path to long-term prosperity. 

7 

We have conducted a number of hearings looking closely at the 

regulatory proposals and what they add up to in terms of compliance costs, and ultimately the prospects for people to have access 

to the affordable energy and the goods and services they rely on. 

Nowhere have we seen the risks to prosperity more clearly than in 

the continued accumulation of regulations facing the coal sector of 

our economy, and our coal communities have suffered greatly. 

Today we are going to hear important testimony that is going to 

provide the perspective of the communities that help provide Americans with the benefits of this abundant resource and the electricity 

that it produces. The views of the local officials and workers provide a testament to the importance of coal, as a source of good, 

meaningful work, and as a support for the quality of life that all 

communities around the Nation strive for. But the testimony also 

paints a troubling picture about the real damage that occurs when 

plants shutter, mines close, and people lose their jobs. 

It shouldn’t have to be that way. I have been calling attention 

in recent months to the urgent need for ensuring that this Nation 

can embrace its energy abundance. This requires building the infrastructure and producing the fuels that provide power for our 

homes and our commerce and our manufacturing. It is only possible with a regulatory structure that encourages production of our 

diverse and abundant natural resources, including coal. 

The great irony is that coal has done so much to ensure affordable, reliable power for the majority of Americans for multiple generations. It has been a core fuel behind the great accomplishments 

of our manufacturing industry. And to a point underscored by the 

testimony today, coal has done much to lift so many out of poverty 

in this Nation. Today’s hearing should remind us of these accomplishments that are at risk. 

Coal should continue to provide this Nation its tremendous benefits. It is a critical and important part of this Nation’s future and 

a vital source of energy and jobs for millions of people in communities around the Nation. Our work on this committee, through 

oversight of EPA and through our legislative initiatives, will help 

to make that happen. We are a nation of opportunity, and while 

others may want to ban the use of coal, we will keep fighting to 

ensure that coal indeed remains an important part of our open, allof-the-above energy plan. 

Thank you all for being here. I yield the balance of my time to 

the gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Griffith. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Upton follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. FRED UPTON

‘‘When the work underground stops, everything above pays the price.’’ That observation made by a Boone County, West Virginia, television reporter in September 

2012 succinctly captures the plight of America’s coal communities. Over the past 

five years, as the nation has struggled to emerge from the great recession, we have 

witnessed an onslaught of EPA rules and proposals that have significantly targeted 

the nation’s energy and manufacturing sectors—the vitality of which is essential for 

putting this nation back on a path to long-term prosperity. 

We have conducted a number of hearings looking closely at the regulatory proposals and what they add up to in terms of compliance costs, and ultimately the 

prospects for people to have access to the affordable energy and the goods and services they rely upon. 

8 

Nowhere have we seen the risks to prosperity more clearly than in the continued 

accumulation of regulations facing the coal sector of our economy—and our coal 

communities have suffered greatly. 

Today we will hear important testimony that will provide the perspective of the 

communities that help provide Americans the benefits of this abundant resource 

and the electricity it produces. 

The views of the local officials and workers provide a testament to the importance 

of coal, as a source of good, meaningful work, and as a support for the quality of 

life that all communities around the nation strive for. But the testimony also paints 

a troubling picture about the real damage that occurs when plants shutter, mines 

close, and people lose their jobs. 

It shouldn’t have to be this way. I’ve been calling attention in recent months to 

the urgent need for ensuring this nation can embrace its energy abundance. This 

requires building the infrastructure and producing the fuels that provide power for 

our homes and for our commerce and manufacturing. This is only possible with a 

regulatory structure that encourages production of our diverse and abundant natural resources, including coal. 

A great irony is that coal has done so much to ensure the affordable, reliable 

power for the majority of Americans for multiple generations—it has been a core 

fuel behind the great accomplishments of our manufacturing industry. And to a 

point underscored by the testimony today, coal has done much to lift so many out 

of poverty in this nation. Today’s hearing should remind us these accomplishments 

are at risk. 

Coal should continue to provide this nation its tremendous benefits. It is a critical 

and important part of this nation’s future and a vital source of energy and jobs for 

millions of people in communities around the nation. Our work on this committee, 

through oversight of EPA and through our legislative initiatives, will help to make 

that happen. We are a nation of opportunity, and while others want to ban the use 

of coal, we will keep fighting to ensure coal remains an important part of our open, 

‘‘all of the above’’ energy plan. I thank the witnesses for reminding us why this work 

is so important. 

# # # 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE COMMONWEALTH 

OF VIRGINIA 

Mr. GRIFFITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to have a minute for an opening statement. 

I represent deep southwest Virginia, which is also the coal-producing region of the Commonwealth, and I can tell you that we are 

going to hear some great stories today and we are going to find out 

what is going on from people on the ground, but every time I am 

in the area, not here in D.C., I see new mom-and-pop businesses 

that have closed down because of this war on coal. I see what is 

happening out there day in and day out. I pick up the newspapers 

and read reports about different manufacturing facilities, not just 

the coal mines, but manufacturing facilities in the district that are 

laying people off or shutting down. It is devastating what is happening, and it is not just the price of the natural gas, because they 

fluctuate, and a lot of businesses over the years have said we know 

the prices fluctuate but we are going to stick with coal because long 

term it makes sense for us, but now with this regulatory environment in Washington, they are saying we can’t do that because we 

know that even if we comply with today’s regulations, the EPA and 

this Administration right around the corner will have another set 

of regulations that impact us. 

So we are bankrupting not only the power companies, as the 

President said that he would do, but we are bankrupting the momand-pop businesses. We are bankrupting car dealerships. We are 

9 

bankrupting restaurants. We are bankrupting mom-and-pop businesses all over this country for little gain in the environment, and 

what we need to do is, we need to make sure that the science leads 

us on the regulations instead of the regulations forcing people out 

of business because they don’t have time to wait for the science to 

catch up with the regulations. 

I know that for some they are incredulous when you hear things 

like that but chemical looping, all kinds of things are out there but 

we can’t have the science that people are experimenting with come 

to fruition in time to meet the EPA’s current regulations. And with 

that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. MURPHY. The gentleman yields back. With that, I now recognize for 5 minutes for an opening statement the gentleman from 

California, Mr. Waxman. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. HENRY A. WAXMAN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is ironic: Today is 

the 1-year anniversary of Hurricane Sandy, a terrible tragedy. 

Rather than pay any attention to that landmark, we are talking 

about EPA’s supposed regulatory threat to coal communities. 

We should be talking about the costs of inaction. Hurricane 

Sandy battered the Mid-Atlantic and the Northeast, killing hundreds and inflicting billions of dollars in damages. And our taxpayers all across the country helped to pay for that. We have had 

wildfires raging across the West. Floods decimated communities in 

Colorado. Every week you can find historic, record-setting climate 

events that are catastrophic. 

Now, we have in the audience several people who survived Hurricane Sandy, and I am glad they are here. Their stories are a vivid 

reminder of the fact that we should be talking about how extreme 

weather events like these are becoming more and more common because of climate change caused by our failure to reduce carbon pollution. 

I have written almost 30 letters to Chairman Upton and the Republican leadership of this Committee and I said we ought to have 

a hearing on the science. We ought to bring in the leading scientists to talk about the science that would lead to good regulation. 

Well, we have had a refusal to even hold one hearing with the scientists. Instead, as the threat from climate change becomes more 

and more dire, and the scientific consensus of the threat becomes 

even clearer, we are having another hearing focused on the alleged 

war on coal. 

Now, the primary threat to coal is not EPA’s mythical war 

against coal; it is cheap natural gas that is being used as a substitute. It is more affordable, as is renewable energy, and it has reduced coal’s market share for electricity generation. This isn’t 

something the government did. This is something that the market 

dictated. 

Now, I know that many of you are here from the coal industry. 

Let me tell you, I have been in Congress for a long time. When we 

tried to deal with the acid rain problem, I suggested everybody in 

the country pay a fee to help pay for the scrubbers to stop the acidVerDate Nov 24 2008 11:36 May 20, 2015 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00015 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 113\113-89 CHRIS
10 

ity that was going up to the northeast and Canada. And you know 

what we were told? Forget it; there is no problem. And when President George H.W. Bush signed the law, we required the reduction 

to be made in the cheapest possible way. And what did they did 

is they switched to low-sulfur coal and destroyed the high-sulfur 

coal industry. 

In 2009, we proposed giving the coal industry billions to develop 

coal technology that would remove this problem, and instead, we 

were told that there is no such problem. We have had many hearings on this issue. We all represent different parts of the country. 

We need to hear from everybody. 

And I want to yield the balance of my time, plus some, to Mr. 

Doyle. 

Mr. DOYLE. Thank you. I appreciate you yielding. 

I agree, this is an important topic and we need to explore it, and 

as a representative from Pittsburgh, I know firsthand the devastating effects of the decline in the coal industry. But if we want 

to accurately examine this issue, which I believe we should, then 

we need to look at the facts, not just point fingers at an easy target. 

And for starters, I would like to remind my colleagues of a little 

bit of Congressional history. During this hearing, my colleagues on 

the other side of the aisle are going to blame the Obama Administration’s air pollution regulations that have gone into effect over 

the last 5 years. The only problem with that is that many of these 

regulations were begun in the 1990s and the 2000s, not under this 

Administration. 

So what has this Administration actually done that impacts the 

future of coal? Well, since the beginning of this Administration, the 

Department of Energy has invested around $6 billion to develop 

clean coal communities: capture, utilization, and storage. In fact, 

one of the first votes during the Obama Administration on the 

stimulus package included $3.4 billion for carbon capture and sequestration. You know how many Republicans voted for that? Zero. 

Later that same year, this committee worked tirelessly to put together a comprehensive energy strategy, which included multiple 

provisions to further development of CCS technology to take the 

burden away from the coal industry and the electric utility industry. That bill received eight Republican votes, only one from this 

committee. 

So I just want to remind my colleagues today that while they are 

throwing the Obama EPA under the bus, this Administration has 

given us multiple opportunities to support the coal industry, and 

we ought to stop the political drama and start working together to 

retain this industry and our country. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. The gentleman’s time is expired. 

I would now like to introduce the witnesses for today’s hearing. 

Our first witness is Judge Albey Brock. He is the Judge/Executive 

for Bell County, Kentucky, which is located in the southeastern 

corner of the State. He has been the Judge/Executive for Bell County since 2007. 

Our second witness is Raymond Ventrone. He has been the Business Manager for Boilermakers Local 154 since 1996. Local 154 encompasses Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. 

11 

Our third witness is Daniel Weiss, who is a Senior Fellow and 

the Director of Climate Strategy at the Center for American 

Progress in Washington, D.C., where he leads the center’s Clean 

Energy and Climate Advocacy Campaign. 

Our fourth witness is Mr. Roger Horton, a miner by trade. He 

is the Founder of Citizens for Coal, which is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping maintain the vitality and productivity of 

the coal industry in West Virginia. 

Next, we have Olen Lund. He is a former County Commissioner 

for Delta County, Colorado, located in western Colorado. In this capacity, his responsibilities include the appropriations and budget 

for Delta County. 

Our sixth witness is Mayor John Fetterman, the Mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania, a town 10 miles north of Pittsburgh, an advocate for revitalizing the town by creating youth-oriented programs, 

attracting artists and pursuing green urban renewal and economic 

development. 

Our final witness is John Pippy. He is the Chief Executive Officer of the Pennsylvania Coal Alliance, which represents the interests of over 250 member companies and 41,500 workers in the coal 

industry. He also served 16 years in the Pennsylvania General Assembly and in the Pennsylvania State Senate. He is an Iraq war 

veteran and a graduate of West Point. 

I will now swear in the witnesses. You are all aware that the 

committee is holding an investigative hearing, and when doing so 

has the practice of taking testimony under oath. Do any of you object to testifying under oath? Seeing no one object to that, the chair 

then advises you that under the rules of the House and the rules 

of the committee, you are entitled to be advised by counsel. Does 

anyone desire to be advised by counsel during your testimony 

today? And no one has asked to be advised by counsel. In that case, 

would you all please rise and raise your right hand and I will 

swear you in. 

[Witnesses sworn.] 

Mr. MURPHY. All witnesses have answered affirmatively. You are 

now under oath and subject to the penalties set forth in Title 

XVIII, Section 1001 of the United States Code. You may now each 

give a 5-minute summary of your written statement. We will start 

with Mr. Brock. 

12 

TESTIMONY OF ALBEY BROCK, BELL COUNTY JUDGE/EXECUTIVE, PINEVILLE, KENTUCKY; RAYMOND C. VENTRONE, 

BUSINESS MANAGER, BOILERMAKERS LOCAL 154, PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA; ROGER D. HORTON, FOUNDER, 

CITIZENS FOR COAL, HOLDEN, WEST VIRGINIA; DANIEL 

WEISS, SENIOR FELLOW AND DIRECTOR OF CLIMATE, CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS; OLEN LUND, FORMER 

COUNTY COMMISSIONER; DELTA COUNTY, COLORADO; JOHN 

FETTERMAN, MAYOR, BRADDOCK, PENNSYLVANIA; AND 

JOHN PIPPY, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, PENNSYLVANIA 

COAL ALLIANCE, HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA 

TESTIMONY OF ALBEY BROCK 

Mr. BROCK. Chairman Murphy, Ranking Member DeGette, members of the committee, thank you for having me here today. 

My name is Albey Brock, I am the Bell County Judge/Executive, 

and I appreciate this opportunity to provide testimony regarding 

the devastating impact EPA regulations are having on families and 

our economy in eastern Kentucky I proudly call home. 

My position has placed me on the front lines and in the trenches 

of a battle between the rapidly growing needs in my county as unemployment explodes coupled with shrinking budgets and revenues 

decrease. The duties of a County Judge Executive are similar to 

that of a county Mayor. I have the fiscal responsibility for operating all things related to county government—the sheriff’s office, 

the jail, animal control, the road department, and ambulatory services to name a few. 

Today I am not here testifying as a bystander, but as an expert 

witness, a colleague reporting conditions from the field where I live 

and serve as County Judge. 

For the purpose of perspective, I want each of you to understand 

that eastern Kentucky’s economy is more dependent upon coal than 

Detroit is upon the auto industry. In eastern Kentucky, we have 

lost 7,000 coal-mining jobs in less than 2 years. 

Economists estimate that one coal-mining job supports three and 

a half other jobs in our economy. That means that beyond the 7,000 

coal-mining jobs already lost, an additional 24,500 jobs in our region will be affected. The average family size is three. That means 

94,500 people, nearly 20 percent of our entire population in eastern 

Kentucky, has been directly impacted by coal industry job losses. 

The average wage of the 7,000 lost coal jobs is just over $78,000 

per year. When you multiply that wage by the 7,000 jobs lost, and 

then multiply the other 24,500 jobs lost by a conservative figure of 

20,000, over $1 billion worth of earned wages will be removed from 

our region’s economy. That deserves repeating: $1 billion a year. 

Many eastern Kentuckians are leaving their homes, their communities, and their families to work in other parts of the country. 

What does the future of our region hold for those of us that remain? Already we are seeing dramatic increases in childhood homelessness as families lose their homes. In some schools this fall, 

nearly 50 percent of the children had at least one unemployed parent as a result of coal layoffs. 

These are not young people fresh out of high school about to debate their career path. Every day in my job I am approached by 

13 

proud, mature men and women with young families. Workers that 

feel the effects of time and toll on their bodies and have retirement 

just within their sights, they approach me almost daily. They both 

have made choices about their careers, worked hard, made sacrifices and now regardless of what some of you may think, because 

of recent decisions made by the EPA they face hardship and uncertainty. 

I have personally witnessed them selling their life’s possessions 

in yard sales. Their credit is being damaged beyond repair as they 

are forced to send their kids to school for dependency on free lunch, 

food stamps, and other government programs in an attempt to get 

through another week. These are men and women that have believed that basic American promise. They believed that if they 

worked hard that they could do well enough to raise a family, own 

a home, and send their kids to college, and put a little away for 

retirement. 

Keeping that promise alive is what President Obama named as 

the defining issue of our time. I agree with him. Don’t we all? Can’t 

we find a way to undo what is being done? What is the future of 

eastern Kentucky and Appalachia? 

Knott County, neighboring Knott County, is representative of our 

region. In 1960, just before the War On Poverty was declared, 76.5 

percent of Knott County citizens lived in poverty. By 2011, only 

24.5 percent were living in poverty. Now that the coal workforce in 

Knott County has suddenly been reduced to half of what it was in 

2011, poverty is on the rise again. 

I cannot imagine that the EPA calculated the human impact of 

their decisions that have so negatively impacted the coal industry 

in eastern Kentucky, put thousands of families and children at 

risk, and threatened decades of progress. But if they did, they callously disregarded that calculation and violated the most basic 

moral imperative of our government, which is to protect its people. 

Today, energy produced in America by coal is as clean as it has 

ever been and the technology is in place to make it even cleaner. 

I am a resident of Eastern Kentucky, my family is from eastern 

Kentucky, my friends and my constituents are in eastern Kentucky. I am asking you to please help stem the tide of unemployment and poverty by stopping the EPA regulations that so drastically impact the production of Appalachian coal. As my friend and 

fellow Bell Countian, Jimmy Rose, has reminded us all recently on 

the hit show America’s Got Talent, coal does keep our lights on. I 

thank you, and I will be happy to entertain any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Brock follows:] 

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Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. 

I now recognized Mr. Ventrone for 5 minutes for your opening 

statement. 

TESTIMONY OF RAYMOND C. VENTRONE 

Mr. VENTRONE. Mr. Chairman Murphy, committee members, my 

name is Raymond Ventrone, Business Manager, International 

Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Local Lodge 154 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I represent more than 2,000 boilermakers in western 

Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia. My members are learning 

the hard way that the EPA’s goal isn’t clean air, it is eliminating 

coal and our way of life. 

The boilermakers have always been on the forefront of making 

the United States’ coal-powered power plant fleet the cleanest in 

the world, and I am here to defend our interests. 

The boilermaker trade is vital to the construction industry. We 

are constantly expanding our manpower and recruitment resources 

to meet the needs of the industry we serve. We have built our reputation by dispatching trained, skilled, and productive craftsmen to 

every job site, regardless of its size. 

A boilermaker is a tradesperson who possesses a full range of 

knowledge and skills required to work in the construction industry. 

The duties of a boilermaker include welding, acetylene burning, asbestos abatement, rigging, scaffolding erection and dismantling, 

stack work, steel erection, tube rolling, impact machine operating, 

and such other items regarded as boilermaker journeyman work. 

The broad scope of the boilermaker trade includes construction 

maintenance work performed in the field and in industrial and 

commercial plants, such as power plants, retrofit coal-fired units, 

steel mills, electric power generation, thermal, nuclear, hydro 

plants, refineries, oil and chemical, gas turbines, gas processing 

plants, water treatment facilities, cement plants, fertilizer plants, 

breweries, pulp and paper mills, and many other industrial and 

commercial facilities. 

The International Brotherhood of Boilermakers has long been a 

proponent of sensible legislation and regulatory action. However, 

the Environmental Protection Agency recently proposed rule restricting carbon emissions from new power plants appears to be a 

calculated move to ensure that coal will no longer be a part of that 

strategy by setting impossible CO2 limits for new fossil-fueled 

plants. Effectively, the EPA’s New Source regulations will end future coal-fired power plant construction, despite enormous progress 

that has been made in recent years with advanced emission-limiting technologies. 

Just 3 years ago, hundreds of construction workers and boilermakers from Local 154 installed state-of-the-art pollution control 

equipment on a 1,700-megawatt coal-fired power plant. More than 

a half a billion dollars was invested in this plant, proving that coal 

and clean air were not mutually exclusive. However, despite having 

invested a half billion dollars to upgrade the power plant, two 

weeks ago marked its permanent closure because the plant owner 

cited the new EPA regulations as being too costly to keep the electricity-generating facility operational. 

18 

Now, those breakthrough technological upgrades approved by the 

Environmental Protection Agency only 3 years ago have been 

deemed insufficient by the very same agency by virtue of new regulations created without a vote in Congress or input from the public. 

These new regulations forced the shutdown of the Hatfield’s Ferry 

Power Plant, Masontown, Pennsylvania, and Mitchell Power Plant 

in New Eagle, Pennsylvania, putting hundreds of utility workers 

and boilermakers out of work. 

Typically, 154 manpower is dispatched to the Hatfield Ferry 

Power Plant in Masontown, Pennsylvania, every spring and fall for 

maintenance outage work for 6 days a week for an approximate 15- 

week duration with manpower demand of 400 boilermakers. Consequently, as a direct result of the shutdown at the Hatfield Ferry 

Power Station, roughly 360,000 Boilermaker Local 154 man-hours 

will be lost every spring and fall. 

Critics of coal malign the thousands of boilermakers, mine workers, and hardworking men and women who earn an honest living 

in our region from coal. They insult us, calling us polluter, murderers. Pittsburgh press editorials refer to us as coal barons and 

have made outrageous claims about our livelihood, attacking our 

integrity, and ignoring the tremendous environmental gains made 

by coal. In the last three decades, coal usage has tripled but pollutants like sulfur dioxide have fallen by 56 percent. 

As stated in the New York Times by Elizabeth Muller, Executive 

Director of the Climate Research Group, China’s greenhouse gas 

emissions are twice those of the United States and are growing at 

8 percent to 10 percent per year. By 2020, China will emit greenhouse gases at four times the rate of the United States, and even 

if America’s emissions were to suddenly disappear, world emissions 

would be back at the same level within 4 years as a result of China’s growth alone. 

Clearly, the one-sided reduction of the American coal industry 

will not solve global change, but will shut down existing investment in new research that holds the key to huge reductions in CO2

emissions from the coal-fired plants while the rest of the world is 

free to continue to expand the use of this reliable and economic energy source that has fueled our economy for more than a century. 

The skeptics in this debate are those who ignore that coal is used 

cleanly. The deniers are those who won’t acknowledge the true social cost of the EPA’s anti-coal agenda and the hundreds of southwestern Pennsylvania families who are losing their paychecks. We 

can have clean air and keep coal as a vital part of our economy, 

but we can’t do it if the EPA and their allies are allowed to continue waging a devastating war against our jobs. 

On behalf of the boilermaker construction industry, I am calling 

upon Congress to come together to amend the EPA regulation that 

has blocked future coal-fired power plants construction and has a 

devastating direct impact on our jobs, our future and our union. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ventrone follows:] 

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Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. 

Mr. Horton, you are recognized for 5 minutes, and I ask everyone 

to please try and keep within their time. Go ahead, Mr. Horton. 

TESTIMONY OF ROGER D. HORTON 

Mr. HORTON. Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak 

here today. My name is Roger Horton. I am now a retired coal 

miner. I am a member of the United Mine Workers of America and 

president of Citizens for Coal, a group I formed 5 years ago to provide a voice for the working men and women of the coal industry 

and their families. I would like to thank each of you for the opportunity to talk with you today and share with you what is happening in communities across the Appalachian coal fields. 

Today’s hearing is intended to investigate the damage being done 

to the coal industry by the Obama EPA and their war on coal. Let 

me say bluntly, there is a war on coal. I have seen it and lived it 

every day for the past 5 years. Over the past year alone, West Virginia has lost more than 3,500 direct coal-mining jobs and approximately 10,000 more indirect jobs. Using the average wage of coal 

mining and coal support jobs as the standard, that means that our 

state has lost an estimated $924 million in wages. That is right, 

almost a billion ripped from the economy in just the past year. 

When you look across the Appalachian coalfields, more than 

10,000 coal miners and another 50,000 support workers and people 

whose jobs depend on coal mining are now unemployed across the 

coal fields of West Virginia, western Virginia and Kentucky. These 

people are unemployed today for one primary reason: the anti-coal 

policies of this Administration. 

While it is true that part of the problem in the short term is the 

artificially and unsustainable low price of natural gas, this Administration and the EPA have made it next to impossible to use coal 

as a fuel for electric generation or even to mine it in the first place. 

These factors have led many utility companies to take steps to 

close older coal-fired power plants, and it appears likely if the policies continue into the future, even newer coal plants will begin 

closing. Meanwhile, it is almost impossible to get the permits necessary to mine steam coal, which has historically accounted for approximately 60 percent of the area’s production. 

The result of all this is a steep decline in production from 168 

million tons in 2008 to just 110 million tons in 2012 in West Virginia, and an even sharper decline in Kentucky. Employment has 

fallen just as steeply, with seemingly weekly announcements of another mine closing taking hundreds more jobs with it. 

Yet the EPA, the White House, and some of their friends in the 

media claim there is no war on coal, but even Obama’s Science Advisor Daniel Schrag has admitted this war is being waged. He recently said politically, the White House is hesitant to say they are 

having a war on coal. On the other hand, a war on coal is exactly 

what is needed. Now you can make the claim, as some do, that 

other factors have hurt coal, and, yes, that is true, but the bottom 

line is that the Obama Administration has single-handedly made 

it nearly impossible to get a permit to mine coal, forced the closure 

of hundreds of coal-fired power plants as well as now setting the 

stage for the closure of hundreds more over the next few years, and 

24 

now they are trying to make it impossible to export our coal to 

countries who do not understand the value of cheap, affordable energy. Obama, Schrag and others are determined to destroy the coal 

industry and have been since Obama took office in January 2009. 

Even before the election, Obama said plainly and simply that he 

would put in place regulations that would bankrupt anyone wanting to build a coal-fired power plant, and sadly that is a promise 

he has kept. 

Today, our electricity grid is strained to meet demand, with rolling blackouts imposed in rural areas of the PJM Connectors district as recently as 3 weeks ago. While these blackouts are couched 

as a voluntary demand response to meet temporary conditions, the 

reality is, no matter how you cut it, is that the grid was short of 

capacity and voluntary rolling blackouts were imposed to cut demand allowing the grid to avoid massive blackouts in urban areas. 

I believe it is vital that we keep our electric generation grid nimble and able to readily switch between fuels, including coal, natural 

gas, oil and renewables. I remember clearly 5 years ago, before the 

beginning of the great recession when our economy and the world’s 

economy was humming along, we were screaming out for every ton 

of coal, every gallon of oil, every cubic foot of natural gas and every 

other source of energy we could find. Prices of all forms of energy 

were going out the roof because supply couldn’t keep up with demand. 

Hopefully, we will find our way out of the current economic 

downturn and restore our economy and that of the world to something approaching normal and when we do we will once again find 

our economy needing all sources of fuel. If we retire coal-fired capacity and essentially shut the door to it in the future, we are setting the stage for a major inflationary spiral in our energy costs 

and with it the downstream costs of every other good in our economy. We need to protect our coal-fired capacity in order to provide 

for the widest possible fuel choice down the road. 

Just a few weeks ago, a group of local Democratics leaders from 

my State went to Washington to try to discuss the issues with the 

EPA. They came away believing it might be a new start but those 

deals fell to the floor this past month when it became clear the 

EPA would not announce the new regulations that would effectively end the use of coal for electric generation. It is clear that this 

Administration and the national Democratic Party care nothing for 

the hardworking men and women who mine coal for a living. 

Sitting in the Senate is a basket of bills, already passed by the 

House of Representatives, that would effectively end the Obama 

war on coal. However, the bills are being stonewalled by the 

Obama Administration and its lapdog Senate President Harry 

Reid. 

Mr. MURPHY. The gentleman’s time is expired. We need you to 

wrap up. 

Mr. HORTON. In closing, I simply observe that the President 

speaks a lot about economic justice and hope and promise. I would 

like to use this hearing to directly ask the President, where is the 

justice for West Virginia and Appalachia? Where is the hope and 

justice for our coal-mining families? There are few other career options available for many of our miners, and by his actions, this 

25 

President is effectively condemning them to lives of poverty and despair. Again, I ask where is the justice? Why are our families less 

important to you than others? Why don’t we matter to you, Mr. 

President? Please, let us work and power America. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Horton follows:] 

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Mr. MURPHY. The gentleman’s time is expired. We are going to 

try and see how fast we can get to the next couple witnesses, depending on how much time. They called a vote. We have 11 minutes left to get to the vote, so Mr. Weiss. 

TESTIMONY OF DANIEL WEISS 

Mr. WEISS. Thank you, Chairman Murphy, Ranking Member 

DeGette and members of the subcommittee. Thanks for the opportunity to testify on this important topic. 

The Center for American Progress has great respect for the sacrifices that coal miners and their families have made for this Nation. They face working underground with the threat of cave-ins, 

explosions and fires, all while breathing in toxic pollution. Miners 

and their families have made genuine sacrifices and deserve real 

solutions to the economic challenges they face today, not the false 

hopes based on unsuccessful efforts to block essential public health 

protections. 

The economic challenges of the coal industry are due to the following factors. Productivity has increased, allowing far fewer miners to produce more coal. There were 700,000 miners in 1923 while 

there are only 89,000 today. Each miner produces 15 times more 

coal compared to 90 years ago. Coal’s competitiveness for electricity 

generation is declining with the advent of cleaner, less expensive 

power. Natural gas is only one-third the price it sold for in 2008. 

Wind and solar electricity has become more cost-competitive without the pollution coal produces. This price competition led to the 

announced retirement of aging, dirty, and often inefficient coalfired power plants. The plants scheduled to close in Colorado, Kentucky, Pennsylvania and West Virginia were built an average of 

more than 50 years ago. 

Coal’s impact on public health has been widely recognized as 

hazardous. For instance, an American Lung Association study estimates that soot pollution from coal-fired power plants leads to 

13,000 premature deaths annually. Pittsburgh and Harrisburg 

have the 8th and 19th most soot pollution in the United States. A 

Harvard Medical School study concluded that ‘‘the health damages 

conservatively doubles to triples the price of electricity from coal.’’ 

On the first anniversary of Superstorm Sandy, we must acknowledge the growing human and economic costs from climate change 

related to extreme weather. A Center for American Progress analysis estimates that federal taxpayers spent $136 billion on climaterelated federal disaster recovery efforts over the past 3 years. Coalfired power plants are the largest source of domestic climate pollution. Coal-fired electricity is only cheap if one ignores the health 

and economic costs. 

There is a positive economic return on pollution rules and fewer 

job losses than predicted from them. The EPA estimates that for 

every dollar spent reducing mercury and toxic pollution from coalfired power plants, it will yield $3 to $9 in health benefits, a return 

on investment that would make Donald Trump proud. 

EPA found that its predictions of significant mining losses under 

the acid rain program of the Clean Air Act of 1990 did not occur. 

In 2001, EPA predicted there would only be 50,000 miners by 2010. 

In fact, there were 89,000 that year. Advances in technology, marVerDate Nov 24 2008 11:36 May 20, 2015 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00035 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 113\113-89 CHRIS
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ket prices and health factors have increased the risk and price of 

using coal. These trends are expected to continue, requiring Congress to continue to help families and communities transition to 

sustainable jobs. 

We would respectfully suggest this subcommittee consider two 

specific actions to increase opportunity for effective people and communities. First, reduce investment uncertainty created by regulatory confusion. By allowing EPA to proceed with commonsense 

rules to protect public health and the climate, companies will have 

the certainty they need to make pollution control investments, strategically plan for new business opportunities and cleaner energy 

technologies, and develop new employment opportunities. The draft 

bill by Representative Whitfield and Senator Manchin announced 

yesterday would prolong uncertainty, stalling investments while 

health and economic damages continue to mount. Second, develop 

a comprehensive community assistance strategy in order to help 

identify pathways for a prosperous future for affected families and 

communities. One important change would allow early vesting in 

retirement and pension plans for coal workers near retirement age. 

For younger workers, education and job training assistance should 

be offered as it was under the Clean Air Act of 1990. For those interested in developing carbon capture and storage technology to 

burn coal without carbon, the Government Accounting Office says 

the number one way to make that technology a reality is to have 

a limit on carbon pollution. 

We would welcome the opportunity to work with you to develop 

these and other ideas, and we hope that you will soon have a hearing on the cost of inaction on climate change on public health and 

on taxpayers. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Weiss follows:] 

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Mr. MURPHY. I think at this point we are going to take a quick 

break so members can get over and vote and come right back, so 

we will be as quick as possible. Don’t go anywhere, please. We will 

be back probably within about 10 minutes. Thank you. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. MURPHY. We will commence our hearing here, and now turn 

to Mr. Lund, recognized for 5 minutes. Go ahead. 

TESTIMONY OF OLEN LUND 

Mr. LUND. Thank you. Chairman Murphy and committee members, thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. I went 

through my notes here and marked a lot of things off to try and 

be short and quick but you have already gone and done your thing 

now, so I can wander on. 

My name is Olen Lund. I am a former Delta County Commissioner, so I understand well the impacts that coal mining have on 

our local economy. For explanation, Delta County is a midsized 

county in western Colorado with the primary industries of agriculture and coal. I guess it is important to note at this point that 

neither I nor any member of my family has ever been directly employed by a coal mine. The nearest thing is that when I was in high 

school, I did some work for an environmental research firm, did 

some surface environmental air quality evaluation stuff for a new 

mine that was being set up. 

I am here basically to speak on behalf of my neighbors and 

friends. I want to also note that nobody is paying my way. I came 

here, and it is a long ways, as Representative DeGette will vouch. 

I came here on my own. A lot of people were excited literally that 

I am here and testify for them. 

What I want to talk about or try to convey is that there is more 

than just impact on jobs, there is more than impact on families but 

really there are impacts on the communities. That is what I want 

to talk about. Coal mines, there are three coal mines basically. Two 

of them are in a neighboring county but because of the topography, 

nearly all of the workers live in Delta County. All of the coal is 

shipped out by railroad that comes through Delta County, so really, 

Delta County is the location where the most impact from the coal 

mines occurs. The one coal mine that is in Delta County is the 

number one property taxpayer in the county. The interesting thing 

to note is, after that, the next largest is the railroad company, 

Union Pacific Railroad Company, which has a spur that serves the 

coal mines. Although it is not exclusively dedicated to the mines, 

the vast majority of the freight that the railroad hauls is the coal 

produced by the mine. The next largest taxpayer is the rural electric co-op, the Delta Montrose Electric Association. So it permeates 

extensively. It permeates the income of the county. Somewhere between 900 and 1,000 people, which is almost 10 percent of the 

workforce of Delta County, is employed by those three mines. 

Coal production is like any other business that employs people. 

There are questions, I guess, different numbers that are thrown 

out, but we figure those dollars turn over seven times within the 

community, giving the community its wealth. If you close the mine, 

or the mines, in this case, you not only lose the primary jobs of production, you also lose the jobs that support those primary jobs. In 

44 

other words, you lose the banks, the grocery stores, the dry cleaners, car dealerships, the mechanics, parts stores, et cetera. In government services, also, you definitely lose clinics and hospitals. You 

even lose the gift shops. I had one person I talked to as I was talking to different ones about coming here and what I would say who 

told me of a gift shop that their family ran, and as long as the coal 

mines were working, they did well, but as soon as the coal mines 

faltered, they didn’t have the income and the gift shop went out of 

business. That is the case with a lot of small businesses. I just 

picked out gift shop because typically you would think of that as 

more of a tourism-type business. 

As I mentioned earlier, I have talked to a lot of people in the 

past few days and asked them what I should share with you. Almost invariably I have been told that if the mines shut down, it 

would be devastating to the local society and then our society 

would dry up. I don’t think that that is the most effective way to 

tell you just what the situation is. I see that I am getting low on 

time here so I won’t go further. I have gotten written testimony to 

really explain how these things affect the community as a whole, 

not just those production jobs that are lost. 

In summary, I would like to certainly thank the committee for 

the opportunity to speak here and look forward to answering any 

questions that I can. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Lund follows:] 

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Mr. MURPHY. Thank you, Mr. Lund. 

Mayor Fetterman, you are up, and I apologize for saying you are 

north of the city of Pittsburgh. You are southeast on the beautiful 

Monongahela River across from Kennywood. Thank you. You are 

recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. FETTERMAN. What was that? 

Mr. MURPHY. I was just saying when I introduced you before, I 

had mistakenly said north. I know that you are not north of the 

city of Pittsburgh. 

TESTIMONY OF JOHN FETTERMAN 

Mr. FETTERMAN. That is OK. Chairman Murphy and everyone, 

thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts today. My 

name is John Fetterman and I am the Mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania. 

Braddock is a small town on the Monongahela River where both 

the steel industry and Andrew Carnegie got their start with the 

founding of the Edgar Thompson steel plant in 1875. Braddock is 

hardcore blue collar and the quintessential mill town. So much so 

that Hollywood recently filmed a $40 million movie about life in a 

mill town starring Christian Bale, Woody Harrelson and Forrest 

Whitaker that is being released in December. 

During the second half of last century, my community sustained 

a 90 percent population loss and is perhaps the poorest community 

in the Commonwealth. There is no one testifying today, or any day, 

before this body that can outflank Braddock in terms of economic 

hardships, the importance of good jobs, and the lessons of the free 

market 

Many of the people speaking today are paid to present you with 

what I respectfully believe is a false choice: that we as a society 

must choose between a healthy environment or healthy industry. 

As the parents of two children under the age of 5 and a wife that 

is expecting a third, my wife and I are grateful the last functioning 

steel mill in the entire region is in our community, grateful for the 

jobs it provides, grateful for the tax revenue it provides, grateful 

for the sense of pride it instills. However, as parents, we are also 

grateful for the appropriate environmental controls, safeguards and 

protections that the EPA and other government regulations provide. 

You see, my family and I live directly across the street from the 

Edgar Thompson steel mill, which runs 24/7 365 days a year. My 

family and I are the living embodiment of healthy coexistence of 

regulation and industry. Yet another example—— 

Mr. MURPHY. Is your microphone not working? Mr. Pippy, if you 

could put your microphone towards him too, that might help. 

Mr. FETTERMAN. Coke, of course, is a product of coal. However, 

it seems that the primary reason—and thankfully, we do not have 

to choose between jobs and our health, and I don’t believe anyone 

here today has to do the same, especially since the primary reason 

we believe that the coal industry is facing challenges are due to 

some of the fundamental free market forces that favor natural gas. 

However, do not take this small town mayor’s word for it. A 

much more informed spokesman of it is the president of Consol Energy, the largest producer of coal in the eastern United States, and 

48 

on Monday, Consol sold five of their largest coal mines to a private 

buyer. The company, Consol, based in Pittsburgh said on a conference call with reporters that five mines being sold to the privately held Murray Energy in the transaction are worth $3.5 billion to $4.4 billion, and they are a ‘‘very profitable business and a 

very stable business.’’ Furthermore, from the New York Times, 

Consol is planning to increase natural gas production 30 percent a 

year for the next 3 years, and in the next 10 years will invest $14 

billion in developing Marcellus shale in West Virginia and nearly 

$8 billion in Marcellus shale in Pennsylvania along with, of course, 

retaining $2.5 billion in Pennsylvania coal mines that it is retaining. Thus, according to Consol, the largest producer of coal in the 

eastern United States, not only are they drastically ramping up 

their investment in natural gas to the tune of $22 billion, their current book of business is ‘‘a very profitable, very stable,’’ readily 

found a buyer and are retaining billions in coal holdings in my 

home State of Pennsylvania. 

Very respectfully, this does not sound like an industry under 

siege. Instead, it sounds like an industry responding to the free 

market, something traditionally considered a virtue, particularly 

for our friends across the aisle. Increasing our domestic energy production and moving towards energy independence is something we 

as Americans can all be proud of. Government should not be in the 

business of picking industry winners and losers; that is the job of 

the free market. Government should be in the business of protecting its citizens with sensible environmental legislation, including regulating carbon. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Fetterman follows:] 

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Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. 

Mr. Pippy, you are recognized for 5 minutes. 

TESTIMONY OF JOHN PIPPY 

Mr. PIPPY. Thank you, Chairman Murphy, Ranking Member 

DeGette, members of this House Subcommittee. It is a privilege to 

be here with you today. As you heard, my name is John Pippy. I 

have the privilege of being the CEO of the Pennsylvania Coal Alliance. I will give you a little snapshot of Pennsylvania coal. We represent the bituminous side. Pennsylvania ranks fourth when it 

comes to coal mining in the country. We have over 41,000 jobs, a 

$7.5 billion impact, and we have a significant role in the electricity 

production in our Commonwealth, over 42 percent. A lot of people 

talk about jobs and living wages and the economy. Well, a coal 

miner in Pennsylvania averages about $75,000 a year. That is 

$30,000 more than your average other job in the Commonwealth, 

which is $45,000. 

We are very proud of what we have in Pennsylvania. We have 

a very robust natural gas industry. Many of the members of my 

coal alliance actually have holdings on that side because of 

Marcellus shale is underneath the bituminous shale or the bituminous coal in western Pennsylvania, so there is a synergy there, 

and there are market forces. We don’t shy away from that, and we 

would actually tell you that by 2017, the Department of Environmental Protection in Pennsylvania says that our CO2 levels will be 

below our 2005 CO2 levels. That will be a 17 percent reduction. By 

the way, ironically, that is exactly what the President is asking for 

in his carbon reduction plan. So if you get out of our way, we could 

actually get it done with our market forces. 

One of the things we like to argue and talk about many times 

is that coal right now is suffering with three challenges. The first 

two are normal. One is the economy. No one is arguing that we are 

out of the recession yet, and that is having a tremendous impact 

on the metallurgical and the export markets but it is also having 

a tremendous impact in the energy usage side. So that is the market. Natural gas right now is at one of the lowest it has ever been, 

and no one is arguing again, although I would point to, 2010 natural gas was at about $2.50 something MCF. Last year it was 

about $3.50 MCF. Once it hits $4, you start dispatching coal. In 

2013, coal has seen an increase of 8 percent in the United States 

over natural gas. But that is a market fluctuation. No one argues 

that. We expect it. We anticipate we can deal with it. 

The third part of what we are here to talk about today, which 

is the regulatory burden that the EPA in particular is putting on 

us, but most egregiously right now is the new standards that would 

limit CO2 emissions to a level that is not reachable with current 

technology. Now, back in 1992 when I was at West Point, I was the 

first class to graduate as an environmental engineer. It was an upand-coming field. I believe in technology and it can help make the 

world a better place and help us deal with the legacies we have 

had in the past. However, we have to recognize what is occurring. 

My friends will say that natural gas is going to continue to be 

cheaper. That is just not true. Use your own numbers from the 

EIA. Right now they are anticipating this year will be about $4 

52 

MCF. By 2020 it will be over five, coal will still be under four. By 

2030, it will be $8. By 2040, it will be $12 MCF. In 2040, coal is 

predicted to be at $5. So you either want to have twice the cost of 

energy or we can have a balanced portfolio, which I would argue 

is in the best interest. 

Now, I was going to originally talk about Greene County in particular, but because of limited time, I will just address some of the 

challenges that we are facing and some of the comments that have 

been said. Greene County is our largest coal-producing county. 

They make about 85,000. You can read the testimony. Some have 

argued, we have people in the room today that we deserve to get 

involved with the climate change. I would argue 100 percent. As an 

environmental engineer, we need to have that debate. But when 

you have that debate, you have to tell the people the truth. You 

have to tell them that U.S. coal emissions are less than 3 percent 

of manmade emissions, which are less than 3 percent of total 

greenhouse gases, that if we completely eliminate CO2 from our 

coal producing, we would have a minimal impact on the global 

greenhouse gas emission. And these are all numbers that aren’t 

coming from the Coal Alliance. They are coming from your own 

government. So I would argue that if you care about global climate 

issues, we would be looking at a global solution. I am OK with the 

hand of the free market being engaged. That is normal. That is innovation. That is technology. That is what American is made of. 

What I am concerned about is the sledgehammer of government 

slamming us with a regulation that is not achievable with current 

technology. Please look at your own numbers and you will see that 

even they are predicting that we won’t be able to get there until 

2025 at the earliest. If we get there in 2025, give us a regulation 

in 2025, not right now. 

I appreciate the opportunity to testify, and thank you so much 

for your time. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Pippy follows:] 

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57 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you, and I appreciate all the witnesses 

speaking here today. I am going to yield myself 5 minutes and we 

will go back and forth with some questions for everyone. 

Judge Brock, thank you for your testimony. Now, you are responsible for making sure that the county and all its services have the 

money to operate. Am I correct on that? 

Mr. BROCK. Yes, sir, that’s correct. 

Mr. MURPHY. So could you tell us how have the coal layoffs you 

cite affected your budget? 

Mr. BROCK. Well, a large majority of our budget comes back 

through coal severance tax, a tax charged on the per-ton rendered, 

and what we have seen over the course of the last 18 months is 

up to 25 percent decrease in those revenues. Ultimately, it is going 

to have a negative impact on public safety because with the large 

number of folks that are unemployed, the tax revenue, just general 

tax revenues down, when that coal severance, which is affected by 

production, is down, it is going to affect how we fund our jails, our 

ambulance services, our animal control. It will lead to even more 

layoffs within government. So it is really—Congressman Waxman 

said that a hurricane had hit. I could say to him if he were here, 

we are facing an economic tsunami in southeastern Kentucky and 

throughout Appalachia as a result of this. 

Mr. MURPHY. Now, you also witnessed homelessness. How does 

the county provide for the homeless now with declining budgets, 

and has that population grown? 

Mr. BROCK. Fortunately, we supplement that. Some of the things 

that we fund are in whole, some are in part. We have local missions that have picked up the slack and assist us with our homeless shelters. We use coal severance funds as line items within the 

state budget to supplement those homeless shelters. Now, once that 

supplement is gone or diminished we will have it pretty bad as it 

applies to homeless. 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Ventrone, you said you are the business manager for about 2,000 boilermakers. How much do boilermakers 

make on average? What is their annual income in general? 

Mr. VENTRONE. About $75,000 a year during the good times. 

Mr. MURPHY. During the good times. Mr. Weiss had talked about 

other training opportunities, perhaps they can get other jobs, et 

cetera. Do you have any comments on that and what that would 

mean to some of your boilermakers to start new careers, other 

training and move on to other things? 

Mr. VENTRONE. Training for new jobs? At this point what kind 

of jobs? I mean, these guys have been boilermakers. That is all 

they know. I wouldn’t even know where to send them for new jobs. 

These are great-paying jobs that are going by the wayside. That is 

all we have done all our lives. I mean, I have been at this for 40 

years and I wouldn’t even know where to send these guys. We 

chased the steel industry out of the country. We chased the auto 

industry out of the country. Now we are going to send the power 

industry out of the country. I just don’t understand. We need to be 

put on an even playing field. We are selling our coal to China and 

India, and they are not held at the same standards yet we are 

going to shut down our coal-fired power plants and send all our 

58 

jobs out of the country. I don’t understand what we are thinking 

about. 

You know, this is my President. I voted for Obama. I went door 

to door and asked people to vote for this President. All I want is 

it to be put in the hands of Congress. I think that this is Congress’ 

job to put a bill and let them debate what should go on here, not 

the EPA. I don’t think the EPA should be setting the standards for 

what is going on right now. That is why I am here today. 

Mr. MURPHY. I have about 1 minute left. I am going to ask each 

of you one question and I want you to make it extremely short like 

a 5-second sentence. In the past we had the Director of the EPA 

here. She said she did not look at the impact upon jobs of regulations. If each of you just had one thing you could say to her very 

briefly, what would it be. 

Mr. BROCK. Shame on you. 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Ventrone, what would you say to—with regard 

to looking at jobs and issue of EPA regulations, what would you 

say to her? 

Mr. VENTRONE. Shame on you, that is a good one. 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Horton, what would you say to her? 

Mr. HORTON. It is unconscionable. 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Weiss? 

Mr. WEISS. I would say work with the Congress to develop a plan 

to help people in the situations that we have been hearing today 

while we protect public health. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. Mr. Lund? 

Mr. LUND. I would say how can you not consider that. Isn’t that 

what government’s job is? 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Fetterman? 

Mr. FETTERMAN. I would also agree that jobs are an important 

consideration. 

Mr. MURPHY. And Mr. Pippy? 

Mr. PIPPY. I would say you have to accept the reality of what is 

occurring in the world and make decisions based on that. 

Mr. MURPHY. In the interest of time and moving forward, I am 

going to yield now to Ms. DeGette for 5 minutes. 

Ms. DEGETTE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Weiss, coal’s share of U.S. power generation has been in decline for years, long before the EPA regulations started to come 

into effect. Is that correct? Yes or no. 

Mr. WEISS. Yes, it is. 

Ms. DEGETTE. And can you tell us briefly about the market 

forces that have caused this to happen in our economy? 

Mr. WEISS. Well, the biggest thing is another American innovation, which is the development of hydraulic fracking which, although it needs a lot more environmental oversight, as I know that 

you are familiar with, has opened up the possibility of producing 

shale gas. We have got a huge increase in supply. The price has 

dropped. The Henry Hub price for natural gas was $2.75 yesterday. 

Ms. DEGETTE. Now, Mr. Pippy said that over time, though, that 

these economic factors won’t continue and that in fact coal will become economically superior to natural gas. Do you agree with those 

statistics? 

59 

Mr. WEISS. I believe that coal is not economically superior to natural gas and never will be until you incorporate the cost of the 

health care damage and global warming damage from burning coal 

into the cost of the coal. 

Ms. DEGETTE. Now, speaking of that, Mr. Weiss, natural gas also 

has advantages in terms of environmental impact. Can you explain 

very briefly what those advantages are? 

Mr. WEISS. Yes. Burning natural gas produces almost no mercury, almost no sulfur, less nitrogen oxide, almost no soot particles, 

which Mr. Pippy’s town has the 18th worst amount of soot particles 

in the country and that can trigger asthma attacks and harm people who have heart conditions. 

Ms. DEGETTE. Well, but you know, somebody—I forget who, I 

think it was Mr. Pippy—I don’t mean to pick on you, Mr. Pippy— 

has testified that the amount of pollution from coal is actually very 

small in this country. Do you agree with that? 

Mr. WEISS. No. Burning coal for electricity is a source of onethird of all the climate change pollution in the United States. I 

think the point that he was making is that it is such a small share 

of the worldwide emissions that why bother regulating it. But in 

fact, any single source is a small share. In fact, we need—the 

United States has already led on fuel economy standards. Now we 

need to lead on clean electricity. Then we can get other countries 

to follow and hopefully make the technologies they are going to use 

to—— 

Ms. DEGETTE. So it can go around the world? 

Mr. WEISS. That is right. 

Ms. DEGETTE. Thank you. I yield the balance of my time to Mr. 

Doyle. 

Mr. DOYLE. Thank you. I appreciate that. 

I don’t sit on this particular subcommittee but I wanted to waive 

on to the committee today because this is an important issue, and 

we have three distinguished Pittsburghers on this panel. I have 

known Ray Ventrone a long time. He is a great labor leader in 

Pittsburgh. He fights for his workers, and Ray, believe me, we 

share your concerns. Our mayor, John Fetterman from Braddock, 

my dad worked at Edgar Thompson for 32 years and I grew up 

near that town, and John Pippy, also another good friend. 

Energy never used to be a partisan issue in this Congress. I have 

been here 19 years. It is not a Democrat or Republican issue. We 

need energy to power this country. And Ray, you said something 

that I agree 100 percent with. This should be Congress’s responsibility to do this, and what is frustrating to a lot of members in my 

party is that we tried to do this comprehensively 2 years ago and 

we just couldn’t get any support. We couldn’t get bipartisan support to pass a bill that would help give coal a future. We dare not 

put all our eggs into the natural gas basket. I want to say that 

right now. That is a dangerous prescription for the future. We need 

the whole breadbasket. We need coal. We need natural gas. We 

need nuclear. We need renewables. We need them all. And if we 

become too dependent on any one source of energy, that is going 

to be very dangerous for our country. But for coal to have a future, 

we need to invest in the technologies that allow us to burn that 

coal cleaner. 

60 

Just like in nuclear, we have got to solve the disposal problem. 

Nuclear emits no greenhouse gases but we have a debate over what 

to do with Yucca Mountain or how to dispose. These are technology 

questions, and what this Congress should be doing is a mission to 

the moon project on research on how to deal with this issue. Maybe 

the answer is at the front end of the coal before it goes into the 

furnace. We don’t know because we have not made this important 

enough to put our best and brightest people on it. 

In the cap-and-trade bill, which we weren’t able to get passed in 

Congress, that I sat on this committee and supported, we were 

going to have $10 billion allocated to do clean coal demonstration 

projects and technology to give coal a future in this country so that 

we could coexist environmentally and keep the jobs in the country. 

That is what I want to see this Congress start to do. But now we 

are in a sequester, and what that means is, is that the discretionary part of our budget that funds research is being greatly curtailed. So while we are in the sequester, the idea that we could 

generate the money or get the votes to spend the money to do this 

is very questionable. 

So I think what we need to do as a Congress is Democrats and 

Republicans need to work together and find the technology solutions that allow us to have this breadbasket of choices: coal, nuclear, natural gas, renewables, and that is in the best interest of 

this country and that is what people like myself and both parties 

ought to be about. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your courtesy. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. I now turn to the gentleman from 

Georgia, Mr. Gingrey, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. GINGREY. Mr. Chairman, thank you. 

I just want to make note, Mr. Weiss just a second ago mentioned 

the large amount of pollutants released into the air by burning 

coal. Well, none of the pollutants that he mentioned, to my knowledge, are what we would call greenhouse gases, and indeed, the 

coal industry in response to EPA rules and regulations under the 

Clean Air Act I think has done a great job of reducing these classical pollutants, sulfur dioxide, particulate matter, all these things. 

But what the EPA has done basically is, they keep moving the 

goalpost, and all of a sudden because of the Supreme Court allowing them to do that, greenhouse gases, which could result in global 

warming, are pollutants. You know, I am putting out a lot of CO2

right now and I hope I am not making any of you sick. But that 

is what we are talking about here, and it is making it absolutely 

impossible for this industry. 

I want to thank Chairman Murphy for holding the hearing, educating members of the subcommittee on the impact of the Obama 

Administration’s continued, and make no mistake about it, war on 

coal is what it is, is having on local communities, and we have 

heard that from several of our witnesses. I want to thank each of 

the witnesses here today for providing your unique perspective on 

how these looming regulations will harm your communities. 

Mr. Chairman, like many of the panelists, my home State of 

Georgia has been negatively impacted by these EPA regulations. 

Earlier this year, Georgia Power, the main subsidiary of the Southern Company, they serve 2.4 million customers in Georgia out of 

61 

10 million in almost every county of our State. They announced 

that they were closing 15 coal and two oil-fired plants as a result 

of these recent EPA regulations. This alone has significantly impacted almost 500 jobs. Since the EPA has announced these heightened regulations, 303 coal-fired units in 33 States will be closing 

in addition to the potential increase in energy costs for these local 

communities, and it may take a few years, yes, when the price of 

natural gas goes back up. I would like to focus on the further economic impact that these plant closures will have on these communities. So therefore I am going to direct my questions to Mr. Brock 

and Mr. Lund, and I would like to go into further depth of how 

these EPA regulations have impacted your local economies. 

Given your roles, how have these regulations and plant closures 

impacted the local tax base with regard to sales and property 

taxes? 

Mr. BROCK. Well, naturally, when you don’t have any competition 

for the purchase of a home, that is going to have declining value 

on property valuations, and we are seeing that. Furthermore, we 

are seeing that those laid-off individuals, whether they be miners 

or someone that is involved in the support industry are having a 

hard time paying their property taxes which directly impacts the 

bottom line in the fact that they just can’t do it. They have to make 

choices between, do we buy medicine and groceries or do we pay 

our property tax and I think if any of us were faced with those decisions, it would be a no brainer; we are not going to pay our property tax. 

Mr. GINGREY. Mr. Lund? 

Mr. LUND. I would echo the same sorts of things. I would point 

out that certainly the direct income from the mines is a very important thing to the economy but there is still that multiplier of seven 

there of the rest of the community and how the rest of the community survives when the coal mines are gone, how do those individuals pay their property taxes. That is also a very big concern in the 

country. 

Mr. GINGREY. In follow-up to both of you, we can all agree that 

these regulations have impacted the private sector. At the same 

time, through the loss of jobs in your local areas, what has been 

the subsequent impact on essential public services as a result of 

the reduced tax base? Mr. Lund, you start, and then Mr. Brock. 

Mr. LUND. The essential services, depending on what you call essential, I suppose, have had to decrease. I am no longer a commissioner. I was term-limited. I was not allowed to run again. But during my tenure as county commissioner basically our responsibility 

was finances for the country. There were a lot of things that we 

had to cut through that time, and really, we left things pretty thin, 

cut pretty thin, pretty spare when I left office last fall, and now 

that they are beginning to be closures of the mines, it basically is 

devastating as I said in my earlier summary. 

Mr. GINGREY. I am not going to go back to Mr. Brock, because 

in the last seconds I have got left, I want to make a comment. 

The federal government has this bad tendency of torching a village to kill a gnat, and I think that is the real problem here, and 

I yield back. 

62 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. The gentleman’s time is expired. Now 

to Mr. Yarmuth. You are recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. YARMUTH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, let me thank all the witnesses and particularly Judge 

Brock. It is good to see a fellow Kentuckian here, and I want to 

stress that I don’t think there is anyone on either side of the aisle 

that doesn’t have a great deal of sympathy for those miners and 

boilermakers and others who have lost their jobs for whatever reason, and I have spent a lot of time over the years, first as a journalist looking at the situation in Appalachia and particularly in 

Kentucky, and have enormous affection for that region and the people in it. 

When we are talking about EPA, we are talking about a variety 

of issues here and its effect on actually the burning of coal and in 

your particular case, Judge Brock, it is the mining of coal, and certainly there is a connection but it is a different kind of dynamic 

that is at work here because you are mining coal. People mine coal 

when there is a demand for coal and when the price is right, when 

they can sell it at a profit and keep people working. So if you look 

at the employment factors under the Obama Administration in coal 

mining, actually the coal mining from 2009 until 2013, the latest 

figures we have, is significantly higher than it was during the Bush 

Administration, and in fact, the period from 2011 to 2012, that 2- 

year period, according to Mining Safety and Health Administration, 

was the highest employment in coal mining in the last 15 years. 

So if he is actually engaged in a war on coal as it affects coal miners, he is not doing a very good job of it because coal mining employment has actually improved. 

So my question to you is, for the sake of the question, if we stipulate the argument that coal mining has been at relatively high levels over the last 4 or 5 years, even though there are blips, there 

is no question about that, and I know there have been significant 

layoffs in the last few weeks in Kentucky, would you not accept the 

argument that there is a regional aspect to this and a geological 

aspect to it as well, that the nature of the mining operation has 

something to do with the economics of it, and that while in eastern 

Kentucky recently there have been a lot of jobs lost, in western 

Kentucky, there have been no jobs lost. In Wyoming, there have 

been no jobs lost. Employment has held relatively high levels there. 

So wouldn’t that indicate that the EPA’s actions are not necessarily 

the prime factor, even much of a significant factor, in coal-mining 

jobs? 

Mr. BROCK. First, I certainly don’t agree with that assessment. 

What I believe you—what you are trying to say is that it is OK to 

pick winners and losers, that we are going to have regulations that 

cause a coal-fired power plant to be shut down, that by necessity 

needed low-sulfur, low-ash coal that is mined in Appalachia. Those 

that are still operating, they are scrubbing their coal, so that is 

why you see the western Kentucky-Illinois basin—— 

Mr. YARMUTH. Well, that is actually one of the points I made. 

Mr. BROCK. But if that is allowed to continue, if you can continue 

that string, where are we going to be? 

Mr. YARMUTH. But my point—— 

63 

Mr. BROCK. If we all move to western Kentucky, Appalachia will 

dry up. 

Mr. YARMUTH. My point is, as Mr. Doyle also said, back in 2009 

we knew that the EPA or Congress had to do something about carbon emissions and coal-fired plants. We knew that then. And yet 

coal-mining employment still increased from 2009, 2010, 2011, 

2012. So I think we need to look for other reasons than EPA regulations for the current situation with coal-mining employment. 

Mayor Fetterman, I just want to ask you one question. Your situation is not unlike Judge Brock’s. 

Mr. FETTERMAN. Correct. 

Mr. YARMUTH. What innovative steps that you have used in 

terms of revitalizing the economy that might be applicable to Judge 

Brock and Bell County? 

Mr. FETTERMAN. I would just piggyback off my friend, Congressman Doyle’s sentiments. I was closely involved with the Environmental Defense Fund to help pass cap-and-trade legislation, which 

again, I would point out is a conservative ideal in order to work 

towards removing carbon, and as Congressman Doyle pointed out, 

there were a lot of provisions for clean coal, and that is one of the 

reasons why—you know, it pains me to hear those power plants 

closing. I know better than anybody perhaps what is like to lose 

that amount of jobs, but we need a comprehensive solution and we 

need a bipartisan solution, and again, I thought Congressman 

Doyle hit the nail, you know, on the head there. It is time for both 

sides to work closer together. 

Mr. YARMUTH. Thank you. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Harper for 5 minutes, and we are really 

pressed for time here. 

Mr. HARPER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank each of 

you for being here, and I think it is important to realize where we 

were when the President was sworn in in January of 2009, that gas 

prices, the average for a gallon of gas was $1.84. I can’t remember 

it being under $2 a gallon but history tells us that it was, and so 

this is not just about coal. This is a fundamental war on energy by 

this Administration. Coal is just one of the components of that. You 

see what we tried to do with the Keystone XL pipeline and the inability to get something as basic as that done, even when the Secretary of State’s department has determined the environmental impact studies are OK, that there is no reason not to do that. You 

see what we have tried to do on nuclear energy with the basically 

removing Yucca Mountain as a place for the storage of spent nuclear fuel, and you see particularly what is happening to many of 

you in the room as we look at the impact on coal, and coal is an 

important part of our overall energy portfolio. It is important for 

what we do for our citizenry. You have to have affordable, cheap 

fuel sources in this country. We are one of the few countries that 

won’t use all of their own natural resources. This is something that 

we can do. We can do it in an environmentally safe manner. We 

need to try to that and, you know, improve where you can improve 

but the regulatory burden that is upon the coal industry is really 

second to none, and it is impacting many of you here and those 

who you represent and work with. 

64 

So, coal means jobs, and jobs means you can support your family, 

and you remove that and you see the impact across the country, 

and it is something we need to do, and the regulatory burden that 

the Environmental Protection Agency has put on us has been very 

difficult. 

And so Mr. Ventrone, in your testimony you mentioned that just 

3 years ago, hundreds of construction workers and boilermakers 

from Local 154 installed state-of-the-art pollution control equipment on a 1,700-megawatt coal-fired plant, and this reflected a significant investment, I believe more than $500 million in the plant. 

Is that correct? 

Mr. VENTRONE. Yes, sir. 

Mr. HARPER. And these upgrades were up to EPA’s standards 3 

years ago. Is that right? 

Mr. VENTRONE. Right. 

Mr. HARPER. But what has happened to the plant? 

Mr. VENTRONE. It shut down. 

Mr. HARPER. And that is despite the upgrades? 

Mr. VENTRONE. Right. 

Mr. HARPER. And why do you believe that is the case? 

Mr. VENTRONE. Because now they are under the new standards. 

They are not going to put the money that—— 

Mr. HARPER. Exactly. 

Mr. VENTRONE. They are not going to put that money into the 

plant because they can’t recoup it. 

Mr. HARPER. The goalposts get moved constantly. You think, OK, 

we are going to make a good-faith effort to meet the regulatory requirements. You do it, and guess what? It is a new game, an additional cost, and you say is there ever an end, and we go back to 

the philosophies that we see from this Administration and from 

this President when he was on the campaign trail that he would 

make it so expensive on the regulatory end that he would basically 

shut down the industry, and we are seeing it. I think he meant it 

when he said it. And now you are left dealing with this issue of 

how do you make sure that you are a good citizen and you are in 

compliance, you spend a fortune, you are less profit, less economical, and then guess what? You are no longer in compliance even 

though you thought you were or were going to be. 

Mr. MURPHY. Could the gentleman yield for one second? 

Mr. HARPER. So these are difficult—I will yield. 

Mr. MURPHY. We only have 2 1⁄2 minutes left. 

Mr. HARPER. How about if I yield back? 

Mr. MURPHY. Because I would like to see if Gardner—— 

Mr. HARPER. I will yield to Mr. Gardner the remainder of my 

time. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Mr. 

Harper as well. I just appreciate the witnesses for being here. It 

is great to see Mr. Lund from Colorado here, and thank you. And 

Mr. Pippy, we worked together in the State legislature. Great to 

see you as well. 

Mr. Lund, just real quick and then I will yield to Mr. Griffith, 

a couple things that you would like to have at the EPA listening 

session tomorrow in Denver, just a brief comment that you hope to 

share with the EPA listening session in Denver tomorrow. 

65 

Mr. LUND. Well, I hadn’t thought through that so I guess basically I would like to say that I have had a manager, and in particular I will say this as an example. One manager spoke to me 

just the other day and said really, we are not looking for favors, 

we are just looking to be able to compete, just to have, as Congressman Harper said, the goalposts not be moved on us. That is what 

we are looking for. All these issues of compliance and such are really different from what we are producing in our area because we are 

producing a super-compliant coal, very clean coal. Basically it has 

been almost used as a niche market for blending with other coals 

to bring the quality up, to be able to meet the emissions requirements that they have to have. Now the market for that is going 

away. Where they are going now to try and sell their coal is overseas. That is where they are shipping their coal out. That has now 

become the big issue of ports and how they do that. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you, Mr. Lund. 

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. Griffith, you have 30 seconds and then we are 

hitting the gavel. 

Mr. GRIFFITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate it. 

Judge Brock, Mr. Horton, some of the comments that you made 

are the same things that my district, which adjoins your area, 

Judge Brock, is very close to yours, Mr. Horton. Our economy is 

being hammered the same way that yours is. We are doing everything we can here. I appreciate you all being here and making comments on that. 

Mr. Lund, we opened up a coal-fired power plant. It was the 

cleanest in the world when it opened up about a year and a month 

ago in my district, and we cannot meet the new regulations if they 

are applied, and I know they aren’t, but if they were being applied 

to existing facilities, that new plant that did everything right 

wouldn’t meet the regs. I yield back. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. I wish we had more time for other folks 

here, but there is a special ceremony now for former Speaker of the 

House Tom Foley, who sadly died a few days ago, and out of respect to my colleagues, we will end this hearing here. 

However, Ms. Ellmers, Mr. Johnson, if there are questions you 

want to submit and have the witnesses answer those, we will do 

that. 

In conclusion, I want to thank all the witnesses today and members that participated in today’s hearing. I remind all members 

they have 10 business days to submit questions forthe record, and 

I ask the witnesses if you would all please agree to respond to 

them promptly. 

With that, this committee is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 2:59 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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