Climate Change Legislation in the 113th Congress
Released: 2014-03-12T00:00:00

Introduction

In the 113 th Congress, Members have introduced multiple bills that include provisions that would directly or indirectly address climate change. This report describes and compares the bills and provisions that directly address climate change, as opposed to those that primarily address other issues (e.g., energy efficiency) but could have ancillary impacts on climate. In some cases, it is difficult to distinguish between direct and indirect climate change bills, because a specific bill or action may seek to achieve multiple objectives.

This report focuses on legislative actions—including comprehensive bills with individual climate change titles, sections, or provisions—that explicitly address climate change issues. The provisions in these bills fall into six general categories:

1. carbon price (i.e., tax or fee) on greenhouse (GHG) emissions; 2. other mechanisms intended to encourage mitigation of GHG emissions (e.g., sequestration of emissions); 3. research on climate change-related issues; 4. adaptation activities related to expected climate change impacts; 5. support for international climate change-related activities; and 6. action that limits or prohibits climate change-related authorities, efforts, or considerations.

Table 1 lists the proposals in the 113 th Congress by these six broad categories. These categories are not mutually exclusive, and several bills address more than one of the above categories. Other reviews of the same legislation may identify a different list of bills with different categorization.

Table 2 provides a brief summary about each bill, including the primary sponsor, short title, major actions, and key climate change-related provisions.

As of the date of this report, one bill— S. 332 (Sanders)—would attach a price to GHG emissions. Table 3 compares that carbon price proposal with selected state and international programs. In addition, Representative Waxman and Senator Whitehouse offered a carbon tax "discussion draft" on March 12, 2013.