National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016--Conference Report

Floor Speech

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Mr. INHOFE. Thank you very much.

TSCA REFORM

Mr. President, let me first mention that you don't see many things around this Chamber that are truly bipartisan, and you are about to see one now.

I have to give credit to the Senator from New Mexico for the great job he has done in making it a possibility to even be talking about this now. I am honored to be chairman of the public works committee. We do a lot of significant work in that committee. We just passed out arguably the second most significant bill of the year, which was the highway reauthorization bill, and others. It is a very busy committee. However, the issue we are concerned about today--and I want to talk about it a little bit--is the bill we have been working on for a long period of time.

We had a great Member--Frank Lautenberg--of the Senate for a number of years. He and I became good friends on this committee when Democrats were for 8 years the majority party, and prior to that we were in the majority for a long time. During that timeframe, Frank Lautenberg and I became good friends. We had some things in common people were not aware of; that is, we both came from the corporate world. We were involved in doing things together and looking at things through a corporate mind.

But this bill we are talking about now is one where we are enjoying 60 cosponsors.

I would mention that Bonnie Lautenberg is in the Gallery today. She has been so cooperative. If you can single out one legacy of the great Frank Lautenberg, it would be this bill. I can remember calling Bonnie and asking if she would be willing to come and testify before the committee--this was some time ago--and she was more enthusiastic than I expected she would be, and she has been a big help.

It is great to see so many of my colleagues excited about TSCA reform and specifically the Lautenberg bill, which now has overwhelming support on both sides of the aisle. For a long time, we have been focused--and rightfully so--on the public health and environmental benefits of reforming this 39-year-old failed law. I know a lot of my friends across the aisle who are here will continue talking about that today, so I wanted to take my time on the floor to tell them some of the benefits of TSCA reform that they might not be aware of, from a Republican perspective.

TSCA reform, in addition to providing greater protections for families in my State of Oklahoma and the rest of the country, can play a pivotal role in boosting our economy, creating well-paying American jobs, and creating regulatory certainty for businesses not only in the United States but across the world.

Today, the U.S. chemical industry is experiencing a resurgence. Nobody had ever predicted it. For years, chemical manufacturing has been moving its way out of this country, relocating in places such as China, Saudi Arabia, and South America.

One of the reasons for this is that we have this antiquated law on the books that made it very difficult for them to operate in the United States. So we kind of got used to this. Everyone was leaving the United States because of that. Now they are coming back. The interesting thing is, there are two reasons that I am going to mention to you in a minute for why they are coming back and what it means to us economically.

In the last few years, one thing has completely flipped the idea on its head that we are not going to be able to change the laws that are regulating the chemical industry. Natural gas liquids are the primary feedstock for chemical manufacturing in the United States. Due to the shale boom or the shale revolution--we are very sensitive to that in my State of Oklahoma--natural gas production from companies such as Continental Resources, Devon, Chesapeake Energy--all in my home State of Oklahoma--manufacturers have an abundant and reliable source of natural gas for decades to come.

This provides the stability and certainty that manufacturers need to once again make major investments in the United States. There is no better example of an industry reinvesting in this country because of our energy revolution than the chemical industry. As of this June, the chemical industry has announced 238 investment projects valued at $145 billion. Let me repeat that: $145 billion in new capital investments in the United States of America by the chemical industry in large part due to American natural gas production.

This investment is predicted to be responsible for over 700,000 new jobs along with $293 billion in permanent new domestic economic output by 2023. The benefits don't stop there. This investment is also predicted to lead to $21 billion in new Federal, State, and local tax revenue in the next 8 years and will lower our trade deficit by increasing our exports by nearly $30 billion by 2030.

Right now the U.S. chemical industry is capturing market share from around the world, and all of those facilities that packed up and moved to China, moved to the Middle East, and moved to Western Europe are rushing back. You don't have to look any further than comments by folks such as Antonio Tajani, the European Commissioner for Industry, who said:

When people choose whether to invest in Europe or the United States, what they think about most is the cost of energy. The loss of competitiveness is frightening.

In North America as a whole, chemicals and plastics production is predicted to double in the next 5 years, while it falls by one-third in Europe. In other words, it will go down by one-third in Europe. At the same time, it doubles in the next 5 years in the United States. Some of you may be wondering what this has to do with TSCA reform because I am talking about the cheaper prices of energy. The main stock for chemicals is natural gas.

Specifically, the Lautenberg bill, what we are talking about today--let me tell you, passing this bill and getting TSCA reform signed into law not only provides these domestic industries with one manageable national rule book so products can be manufactured and distributed in all 50 States consistently, it also provides necessary regulatory certainty, the lack of which could be the one thing to drive away this much needed economic investment.

Moreover, today global chemical manufacturing and use, in the absence of a coherent and functioning U.S. chemical policy, is dominated by the European system called REACH. I will not get into much detail about the European regulatory system, but it is significantly more burdensome and costly than many of our businesses can afford to deal with.

Unfortunately, today it is the global standard. By enacting meaningful U.S. chemical policy, our Nation will be on the path to once again be the world leader, not only in chemical manufacturing or manufacturing in general but to set the global standard in how chemicals should be managed. That is what we are talking about. That is what this is all about. So there are two things that are bringing this industry back to the United States. One is our plentiful and cheap natural gas and the other is this legislation.

Imagine people anticipating that the legislation is going to pass and making corporate decisions bringing back many jobs to the United States. So there is going to be a surge in economic benefit, and consequently right now the price of natural gas, the main feedstock that goes into chemical manufacturing, is far cheaper in this country than it is in Europe.

So I say to my good friend who has carried this ball, Senator Udall, that it is great that those two things are happening at the same time. Again, when I looked around at the press conference we had this morning--and we saw everyone ranging from the most liberal Democrats and the most conservative Republicans. That does not happen very often in Washington, DC. I think a lot of it is due to my good friend from New Mexico, along with Senator Vitter, who has been carrying this ball.

I would vacate the floor and ask for any comments.

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Mr. INHOFE. If the Senator will yield, I would observe the number of people who said--when the bill first started out, there was a lot of opposition. There was opposition in our committee. I think a lot of the people on the committee were surprised when we passed it on a bipartisan basis. Then, of course, once it got down to the floor--this is going to have support from all corners.

Again, yes, it was a bipartisan effort. It is kind of rewarding to have that happen now and then. This is a good example.

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