Isra-Mart srl:Republicans promise full House vote on EPA climate rules within weeks

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Republican efforts to strip the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions completed their first legislative step yesterday, when a key House subcommittee approved the controversial Energy Tax Prevention Bill.

The bill, which was authored by Republican Representatives Fred Upton and Ed Whitfield, would reverse an EPA ruling that greenhouse gas emissions present a threat to human health and can therefore be regulated under the Clean Air Act and permanently stop the agency from introducing rules designed to address climate change.

It was approved along party lines by the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Energy and Power subcommittee and is expected to be voted on next week by the full Energy and Commerce Committee. As anticipated, Democrats opposed to the bill chose to keep their powder dry and put forward no amendments to the draft bill.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said that the bill would be scheduled for a full vote on the House floor within weeks.

It would then move to the Senate where it is widely expected the Republicans will struggle to secure the 60 votes required to pass the bill, despite news that a similar Senate bill put forward Republican Senator James Inhofe has secured the support of rogue Democrat Senator.

Even if the bill gains Senate approval, White House officials have signaled that President Obama would veto the legislation.

Presenting the bill to the subcommittee, Upton attempted to position the move to neuter the EPA as part of wider Republican efforts to tackle rising fuel prices "This committee is working hard to ease the economic pains of rising gas prices. This bill is the first step," he said.

Democrats again responded angrily to Republican claims the EPA's climate change rules would drive up fuel prices, arguing that the GOP's claims were based on a review of different cap-and-trade legislation that was presented back in 2009.

"Just because it's politically convenient to evoke peoples' fears over rising gasoline prices doesn't mean it's responsible to pull out a study from over two years ago on an entirely different proposal," said Democrat Representative Mike Doyle.

His colleague Henry Waxman again accused Republicans of supporting legislation that would gut the Clean Air Act and attempt to overturn established climate science. "In short it is anti-science, a know-nothing, do-nothing approach to the most challenging environmental problem of our time," he said.

The subcommittee vote came as Republicans set out a wide-ranging package of proposals designed to bring down soaring oil prices, including a rapid expansion of domestic oil drilling and new incentives for natural gas vehicles.

Speaking to reporters House Speaker John Boehner, said the Obama administration had "consistently blocked American energy production that would lower costs and create new jobs".

Democrats said they were taking action to reduce US dependence on foreign oil through increased investment in clean energy and pointed to a series of economic analyses that suggest increased US drilling would have a negligible impact on global oil prices.

The White House also confirmed that President Obama will stage a press conference to discuss rising fuel and energy prices sparked by unrest in Libya and the Middle East later today.