This afternoon the National Association of Manufacturers joined a large business coalition in filing petitions with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit for an “en banc” rehearing of the cases against the Environmental Protection Agency (American Chemistry Council v. EPA and Coalition for Responsible Regulation, Inc. v. EPA) over the costly greenhouse gas regulations. Essentially the petitions ask the court for a new hearing before the entire court, not just the three judge panel.

The EPA’s greenhouse gas regulations are one of the most costly and burdensome regulations facing manufacturers. The regulations will allow the EPA the authority to go into businesses and dictate how they conduct their business and run their operations.

Under these regulations the EPA will eventually require new burdensome permitting requirements for more than 6 million stationary sources, including 200,000 manufacturing facilities, 37,000 farms and millions of other sources such as schools, universities, hospitals and even homes. Essentially these regulations will impact every aspect of our economy.

According to the latest NAM/IndustryWeek Survey of Manufacturers the unfavorable business climate due to regulations and taxes is the top concern of manufacturers. The EPA’s greenhouse gas regulations directly contribute to this uncertainty.

Ross Eisenberg is vice president of energy and resources policy, National Association of Manufacturers.

A new analysis just released by National Economic Research Associates (NERA) shows that two costly Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed regulations on the utility industry will cost jobs and also drive up electricity prices.

Specifically, the study looked at the economic impacts of the EPA’s proposed Transport Rule and the Maximum Achievable Control Technology (MACT) requirements for power plants. This demonstrates what we have been saying here at the National Association of Manufacturers, that the continued overreach by the EPA will hurt jobs throughout the country.

According to a press release from the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), the proposed regulations, “would lead to nationwide employment losses totaling 1.44 million job-years by 2020 and increase Americans average electricity bills by 11.5 percent.” A job-year is one job for one year.

Manufacturers use approximately one-third of the energy consumed in the United States, so they are particularly sensitive to overreaching EPA proposals that will drive up energy prices. Now saddled with onerous greenhouse gas regulations and the specter of a more stringent ozone air quality standard, manufacturers are extremely reluctant to expand their facilities and create the jobs needed to put our struggling economy back on track. It’s time for the EPA to scale-back on these damaging regulatory proposals.

Alicia Meads is director of energy and resources policy, National Association of Manufacturers.

So here’s a public opinion survey from the League of Conservation Voters trumpeted in a news release, “New Poll Shows Strong Public Support in Midwest for EPA Setting New Standards to Limit Pollution, Opposition to Delay.”

Wow. Striking results. Too bad the LCV does not list any of the polling questions, even in the polling memo it posts from Geoff Garin at Hart Research Associates.

But judging from the topline results summarized by Garin, the survey tested public opinion about “carbon pollution.” IV, for example:

Regarding the potential impact of new standards on carbon pollution, voters are just as likely to believe new standards that limit carbon pollution will have a positive impact on jobs and the economy (33%) as those who think that new standards will have a negative impact on jobs and the economy (35%).

Carbon pollution? You mean carbon dioxide, the gas emitted by all living creatures? Because that’s what the EPA intends to regulate under the Clean Air Act. It’s good ol’ CO2 and other greenhouse gases.

You can bet that people who hear the term “carbon pollution” think smoke and soot and dirt. Those aren’t at issue this week in the Senate.

While never having studied statistics or polling, we used to report on politics and later worked on campaigns. We had a technical term for these kinds of opinion surveys, ones that purposely presented the public with misleading terminology and loaded questions. They’re called “crap.”

The House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Commercial and Administrative Law held a hearing Monday that served as a background Executive Branch’s handling of regulations under the Administrative Procedure Act. The hearing was entitled, “The APA at 65 – Is Reform Needed to Create Jobs, Promote Economic Growth and Reduce Costs?”

Jeffrey A. Rosen of Kirkland & Ellis LLP was one of the witnesses, and in his prepared testimony he discussed various Administrations’ approaches toward cost-benefit analysis of federal regulations. He made a timely observation:

President Clinton’s Executive Order No. 12866 was retained and has been the policy of the Obama Administration since January 30, 2009. In no uncertain terms, Executive Order No. 12866 requires that federal agencies “shall assess both the costs and the benefits of [an] intended regulation and, recognizing that some costs and benefits are difficult to quantify, propose or adopt a regulation only upon a reasoned determination that the benefits of the intended regulation justify its costs.” …

[EPA’s] December 2009 Endangerment Rule, which would enable regulation of most sectors of the economy, provided no cost-benefit analysis at all, nor does EPA capture and contain such costs elsewhere. The President’s commitment to Executive Order 12866 failed to prevent EPA from proceeding as it did, and it instead has fallen to the courts to review the concerns about EPA’s arbitrary action on other legal grounds rather than the executive order.

It’s not too late for the Obama Administration to engage in an analysis of the costs, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) believes. On Monday the Senator asked the White House to use the Administration-wide review of federal regulations to also consider the costs of greenhouse gas limits. In its coverage, “Senator urges White House to assess economic impact of GHG rules,” Platts quotes his letter:

As part of the review process, I urge you to include an assessment of the economic repercussions and potential unintended consequences of the greenhouse gas regulation on manufacturers, farmers, electric power generators, and our nation’s economy as a whole.

Some might argue the Administration has already done the necessary, heavy duty economic analysis, concluding objectively: “It will create jobs!”

Sen. Brown also proposes some sort of “collaborative approaches” — Platts refers to a “settlement” — with energy-intensive industries to arrive at an agreement about emission limits and government investment in industry. He compares the idea to the deal with the auto manufacturers on tailpipe emissions, but here’s the thing: Limits on greenhouse gases will affect every economic activity. A “settlement” would amount to government command and control over the entire economy.

Also, Congress is the policymaking branch of government.

Stipulated: President Obama’s address to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a good thing, showing the President’s recognition that you can have employees with employers. Good luck to President Obama and the Chamber both on a successful event.

We one wonders which storyline will predominate in media reports about President Obama’s address this morning to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. We speculate:

• President continues to woo big business.
• Business, President reach wary accord.
• In Chamber speech, President promotes exports, “new energy” economy to create jobs. Briefly mentions free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama.
• President renews call for lower, simpler corporate taxation.
• De facto drilling moratorium continues to hamper job growth, Chamber president tells Obama.
• Presidential motorcade travels two blocks to U.S. Chamber to avoid protesters.
• Green Bay Packer analogies spoil speech’s impact, irk Steelers’ fans.
• President defends economy-crushing greenhouse gas regulations, which EPA will impose on job creators despite having no statutory basis to do so and vehement opposition from policymaking branch of government, Congress, but the rules will spur new technologies, the President argues to restive audience of business owners who contemplate layoffs in response.
• Greenhouse gas regulations left unmentioned in President’s address to business.

AP’s preview indicates the odds-on favorite theme: “WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama continues his efforts to make peace with big business Monday with a speech at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.”

Big business, big business, big business. That’s a tired and inaccurate throw-away description. Sure, the Chamber isn’t the NFIB, but still: “The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is the world’s largest business federation representing 3 million businesses of all sizes, sectors, and regions, as well as state and local chambers and industry associations. More than 96% of U.S. Chamber members are small businesses with 100 employees or fewer.”

One can watch the President’s address at the Chamber website.

The 112th Congress better not try to block the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulation of greenhouse gases, The New York Times warns not so subtly in its news pages, “E.P.A. Limit on Gases to Pose Risk to Obama and Congress“:

[The] newly muscular Republicans in Congress could also stumble by moving too aggressively to handcuff the Environmental Protection Agency, provoking a popular outcry that they are endangering public health in the service of their well-heeled patrons in industry.

“These are hand grenades, and the pins have been pulled,” said William K. Reilly, administrator of the environmental agency under the first President George Bush.

He said that the agency was wedged between a hostile Congress and the mandates of the law, with little room to maneuver. But he also said that anti-E.P.A. zealots in Congress should realize that the agency was acting on laws that Congress itself passed, many of them by overwhelming bipartisan margins.

The final paragraph is a paraphrase of Reilly’s comments, so who knows if he actually used the invidious word “zealots,” but we’ll assume that he did argue that the EPA is acting on a Congressionally passed law.

That’s just not so. The 111th Congress failed to pass the Waxman-Markey bill or any legislation to regulate greenhouse gases. The Clean Air Act, which the U.S. Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA expanded far beyond its original legislative intent, contained no authority for the EPA to single out specific emitters like refineries and power plants for regulatory limits. The EPA’s “tailoring rule” that does so is an obvious tactic meant to ease the adoption of an economy-controlling regulatory regime for which there is neither constitutional nor statutory authority.

If the Times — and the Obama Administration — were so confident of the story’s thesis, the paper wouldn’t have had to grant anonymity* to a senior official on the weakest of grounds: He, or more likely she, feared being criticized. To wit:
(continue reading…)

Kevin Bogardus at The Hill has one of those fun list-based stories that will soon sweep through end-of-the-year journalism, “The Top 10 lobbying victories of 2010“:

Looking back over 2010, several companies, business associations and public interest groups racked up significant lobbying victories, despite going against the White House and powerful lawmakers in both parties.

1. U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, National Mining Association

Business groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the National Mining Association helped inflict a series of body blows to the big cap-and-trade bill that narrowly passed the House in 2009. The lobbying effort against the bill helped thwart one of the Obama administration’s three major legislative priorities, alongside the reforms of healthcare and financial services.

Cap-and-trade sputtered in the Senate amid resistance from Republicans and conservative Democrats. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) did not even bring a scaled-back version from Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) up for a vote. Shortly after the GOP gains in the elections, Obama admitted that cap-and-trade would be off the table for years to come.

Thanks for noticing! Still, let’s remember that trade associations represent members. In the NAM’s case, that’s some 11,000 member manufacturing companies, other business groups and state organizations. It’s these members, speaking by themselves and through the NAM, who raised serious, legitimate and well-documented objections to the disastrous economic impact of cap-and-trade legislation.

And the NAM’s victories and defeats all come from exercising the Constitutional rights guaranteed to the people:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.