TO THE MEMBERS OF THE SENATE COMMITTEES ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS AND ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES, AND THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE: The Chamber believes that durable climate policy requires bipartisan Congressional action. Legislation must encourage innovation and investment to ensure significant emissions reductions, while avoiding economic harm to businesses, consumers and disadvantaged communities. Any policy should also include well-designed market mechanisms that are transparent and not distorted by overlapping regulations. U.S. climate policy should recognize the urgent need for action, while maintaining the national and international competitiveness of U.S. industry and ensuring consistency with free enterprise and free trade principles.
While the Chamber, and the business community we represent, has clearly stated support for market-based mechanisms to accelerate the reduction of domestic GHG emissions, recent legislative discussions have focused on a Clean Electricity Standard (CES) approach. We, therefore, offer the following principles for consideration to ensure any CES includes market-based mechanisms and realistically considers and adjusts to technology development and deployment.