U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) has announced that the House will be advancing a jobs agenda this fall. As part of the House Republican effort to protect and create American jobs, Cantor said in a memo that Rep. David McKinley’s (WV) jobs legislation on coal ash, H.R. 2273, will hit the floor this coming October or November. “These anti-infrastructure regulations, commonly referred to as the ‘coal ash’ rules, will cost hundreds of billions of dollars, affecting everything from concrete production to building products like wall board,” Cantor’s memo states. “The result is an estimated loss of well over 100,000 jobs. H.R. 2273, the Coals Residuals Reuse and Management Act, would create an enforceable minimum standard for the regulation of coal ash by the states, allowing their use in a safe manner that protects jobs.”
In a response letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner, President Obama acknowledged that his EPA’s proposal to regulate coal ash as a hazardous material is one of the seven most costly regulations his entire administration has proposed. According to a June 2011 Veritas economic report the President’s estimate that the coal ash rule would cost the economy up to $1.5 billion annually is grossly underestimated. The report stated that the EPA’s hazardous designation would cost up to $110 billion over 20 years with estimated job losses ranging from 184,000 to 316,000.