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PARTIES VOW TO WORK TOGETHER ON CLIMATE CHANGE, BUT FACE A HUGE GULF: Democrats and Republicans of the House Energy Commerce Committee vowed Wednesday to work together to address climate change, but didn’t share much in the way of specific policies.

“To my friends across the aisle, I implore you now is the time to join us. We want to work together [on the] issue and opportunity of our time,” said Rep. Paul Tonko, D-N.Y., who led the committee’s first hearing on climate change since 2013. “This climate challenge is not beyond us. Time is running out, but it is not gone.”

Rep. Greg Walden of Oregon, the committee’s top Republican, promised to cooperate on “a bipartisan path forward to tackle this important issue that confronts not just our nation, but the world,” while acknowledging climate change is “real.”

Opposing the Green New Deal: But he criticized a push by progressives for an aggressive Green New Deal to shift the U.S. away from using fossil fuels for electricity, spend heavily on renewables, and guarantee jobs for Americans who want to work in a new clean energy economy.

A “longer conversation about the Green New Deal is necessary,” Walden said. But the Green New Deal “makes it more difficult to reach our shared environmental goals” because of its “huge cost,” he added. Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., derided the Green New Deal as a “radical wealth transfer scheme,” but said finding a bipartisan solution is “challenging but not impossible.”

Reasons for optimism: Democrats say they are thankful Republicans are at least appreciating the reality of climate change, after years ignoring the issue.

“I am glad to see the ranking member is saying it is something that needs to be dealt with and is real,” said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., the committee’s chairman.

Both sides of the committee touted bipartisan recent achievements on decarbonization, such as measures to boost zero-carbon advanced nuclear energy, hydropower, energy efficiency, carbon capture, and battery storage.

Solutions remain elusive: But they are nowhere near agreement on the need for a comprehensive policy to address climate change, such as a carbon tax or cap and trade program, which many climate change researchers say is necessary to avoid the worst consequences of global warming.

“We back sensible, realistic, and effective policies to tackle climate change,” Walden said, mentioning technology innovation, workforce training, and adaptation measures as his top priorities. “We are deeply concerned about the Democratic plans we believe will harm American consumers and American jobs by driving up costs and pushing jobs overseas.”

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2018 WAS EARTH’S 4TH HOTTEST YEAR ON RECORD, US GOVERNMENT SAYS: Last year was the fourth warmest ever recorded, according to data released Wednesday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA.

All of the hottest years have come recently, with 2016 being the warmest and 2015 and 2017 right behind it.

The two agencies keep independent records of the Earth’s temperature, but traditionally release their findings together.

The average global temperature during 2018 was 1.42 degrees Fahrenheit above the 20th-century average, NOAA said, marking the 42nd consecutive year with an above-average global temperature.

Nine of the 10 warmest years have occurred since 2005, with the last five years being the hottest.

Extreme weather events are happening too: The extreme temperatures are happening as weather events are becoming costlier.

There were 14 weather and climate disasters in the U.S. last year, with direct damages of more than $1 billion, and a total estimated cost of $91 billion.

The disasters killed at least 247 people.

Both the number of events and their cumulative cost ranked fourth highest since records began being kept in 1980.

Topping the list was Hurricane Michael in Florida, which caused $25 billion in damages, followed by wildfires out West, and Hurricane Florence in the Carolinas, which each caused $24 billion in damages.

BISHOP SAYS DEMOCRATS KEEPING GOP IN THE DARK ON CLIMATE AGENDA: The top Republican on the House Natural Resources Committee chided Democrats on Wednesday for keeping Republicans in the dark when it comes to their climate change legislative agenda.

“We have not been given the details of where these hearings are going,” said Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, at the first in a series of climate hearings in the committee. “We would like to know that in the future.”

Bishop questioned whether the climate change hearings scheduled for this month are designed for lawmakers to legislate, or to get favorable press coverage from reporters to “write cute stories.”

EPA CHIEF TRAVELS TO GEORGIA TO PROMOTE TRUMP’S INFRASTRUCTURE AGENDA: Environmental Protection Agency acting administrator Andrew Wheeler will travel to Georgia on Wednesday to put details to President Trump’s State of the Union address when it comes to infrastructure.

EPA announced the visit in an advisory on Tuesday before the State of the Union. Wheeler will be visiting a plant nursery in the Peach State that uses robots and other innovations to grow plants more effectively.

He will be promoting Trump’s State of the Union address, discussing EPA’s new proposed Waters of the U.S. rule, nutrient policy and ongoing efforts to modernize the nation’s aging infrastructure, EPA said.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee advanced Wheeler’s nomination to be the next EPA administrator on Tuesday, even though he has been serving as acting chief since July and has already been confirmed as EPA’s deputy before that.

Trump didn’t say much: Trump did not mention much on EPA efforts to roll back or curtail environmental and climate regulations, even though the agency is key to the administration’s deregulation agenda.

The EPA also has an infrastructure role when it comes to drinking water pipelines and helping to fund state drinking water infrastructure improvements through cost share programs and grants.

“President Trump continues to deliver on his promise to grow the economy, upgrade our Nation’s aging infrastructure, and protect the environment,” Wheeler said Tuesday night after the address.

A lot on the list, but no climate change: Wheeler said the infrastructure role of the agency will be proposing a new Waters of the U.S. definition to keep regulations low for landowners, cleanup hazardous sites, and financing new water infrastructure.

“The state of our union and the state of our environment are stronger, safer, and healthier thanks to President Trump’s leadership,” he said.

GREENS GRASP FOR SILVER LINING IN TRUMP’S INFRASTRUCTURE PITCH: Trump didn’t offer an olive branch to environmentalists on climate change in his State of the Union address Tuesday night, but major groups say his call for infrastructure legislation could be an opening for cooperation.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, a major national environmental group, responded to the speech by urging Trump to include climate change-related measures in his infrastructure program.

“While we have fought against this administration’s efforts to gut protections for clean air and water, roll-back efforts to address climate change and lease public lands for oil drilling and mining, infrastructure is an opportunity for everyone in Washington to work together to achieve the investments we all need,” said Stephanie Gidigbi, infrastructure lead for the group.

Too late: But other environmental groups do not see the infrastructure push as an opening, as much as a worn out approach.

“We would welcome the president to this policy conversation, but so far, he has been not only resistant but counterproductive in the efforts to fight climate change,” Elizabeth Gore, senior vice president for the Environmental Defense Fund, told John.

The climate debate has shifted: Gore’s group, which has also been fighting the administration in court, says the climate debate squarely focused on making emission cuts and the energy mix.

Although improved infrastructure is important to adapting to more flooding, erosion, and storm surge due to global warming, the climate debate has shifted.

Trump has been unsuccessful in moving his infrastructure agenda over the last two years, and the prospects for moving a bill before the 2020 election season kicks in are poor.

TRUMP JUMPS THE GUN IN CLAIM US IS NET ENERGY EXPORTER: Trump jumped the gun in his State of the Union address when he claimed the U.S. is a net exporter of energy for the first time in 65 years.

“We have unleashed a revolution in American energy — the United States is now the number one producer of oil and natural gas anywhere in the world,” Trump said Tuesday night. ”And now, for the first time in 65 years, we are a net exporter of energy.”

While Trump is correct on the first point, he is getting ahead of himself on the second.

On an annual basis, the U.S. will export more energy than it imports by 2020 for the first time since the 1950s, the Energy Information Administration projected last month — but not this year.

The milestone will happen because U.S. production of crude oil, natural gas, and petroleum has outpaced growth in energy consumption.

Sharing the credit: The surge comes as the Trump administration has promoted “energy dominance” by taking a lighter touch to regulation, and used his first term to scrap or delay a number of Obama-era regulations targeting fossil fuel development.

But the shale oil and gas boom began under former President Barack Obama, who in 2015 signed a law passed by Congress ending a 40-year-old ban on oil exports.

CLIMATE GETS SCANT MENTION DURING SOTU, DEMOCRATIC REBUTTAL: Trump’s energy production boasts also ignored the elephant in the room — climate change. He never mentioned the issue in his State of the Union speech, as expected (he also dropped the “clean coal” references).

Critics were quick to point out the climate implications of the U.S. becoming a dominant fossil fuel producer, and exporter. U.S. carbon emissions rose in 2018 for the first time in years.

“Trump is correct that the US is the top producer of oil & natural gas,” said Jason Bordoff, director of the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University and a former energy advisor to Obama. “And that’s a remarkable turnaround w significant consequences,” Bordoff wrote in a Twitter post.

Former Vice President Al Gore, a leading climate change advocate, also poked Trump for not expanding his energy focus to include renewables.

“The President doesn’t get it,” Gore said in Twitter post. “Solar & wind represent the fastest growing job sectors. Costs of renewable electricity are declining rapidly. There is a Global Sustainability Revolution happening & he’s boasting about more dirty & outdated oil and natural gas projects?”

Democrats focus message elsewhere: But Democrats hardly emphasized climate change in their rebuttal to Trump’s State of the Union.

Stacey Abrams, the Democratic nominee for Georgia governor last year, referenced climate change once, instead focusing her speech on voting fairness and good governance.

“We can do so much more, take action on climate change, defend individual liberties with fair-minded judges. But none of these ambitions are possible without the bedrock guarantee of our right to vote,” Abrams said.

MEANWHILE, OPEC’S OIL EXPORTS TO US FALL TO FIVE-YEAR LOW: As Trump was hyping America’s trend toward being an energy exporter, new data Tuesday showed crude oil shipments to the U.S. fell to its lowest level in five years last month.

Oil exports to the U.S. from OPEC and its partners dropped to 1.41 million barrels a day in January, Bloomberg reported, mostly because of output cuts by Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia spearheaded an OPEC deal with Russia implemented in January to curb production in order to raise prices.

At the same time, OPEC member Venezuela’s exports to the U.S. dropped by nearly 30 percent in January, before the imposition of the Trump administration’s sanctions on state monopoly PDVSA.

RUNDOWN

Bloomberg Trump squeezes refineries with Venezuela sanctions and Keystone failure

Wall Street Journal OPEC pursues formal pact with Russia

Reuters Bet everything on electric: Inside Volkswagen’s radical strategy shift

Washington Post Federal judge orders Chemical Safety Board to require disclosure of chemical emissions from accidents

SPONSOR MESSAGE: 
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