The new chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Henry Waxman, has reconfigured the committee. (See Le roi est mort. Vive le roi., among other posts, on the critical importance of Waxman replacing John Dingell as chair of the full committee.)
Very significantly, the Subcommittees on Energy and Air Quality and Environment and Hazardous Materials have been combined into one: Energy and Environment. (The old Health and Environment Subcommittee was chaired by Waxman from 1979 to 1994, so he really knows this area. I’ve been a fan of Waxman’s for years, owing to his superb performances on clean air legislation way back when.)
The chairman of Energy and Air Quality, Rick Boucher, has been replaced by climate activist Ed Markey as chair of Energy and Environment. This is further evidence of the seriousness of Nancy Pelosi and the rest of the leadership in their focus on energy and climate change. Markey was appointed to chair a special Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming in the last Congress and will continue in that role, although the new Subcommittee is going to be where a lot of rubber is going to meet the road.
Boucher was closely allied with the deposed chairman, John Dingell, and was felt to not be at all on the same wavelength as Waxman and the leadership. See this from this “Boston Globe” as well. I think the comments from the president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, as Howard Cosell might say, tell it like it is: “”In the last Congress, the two people who were in charge of writing global warming legislation in the House of Representatives . . . were big auto and big coal,’ said Kevin Knobloch, president of the Cambridge-based Union of Concerned Scientists, referring to Dingell’s and Boucher’s support for their local auto and coal industries. Markey’s ascension “is part of an exciting, game-changing leadership in the Congress on climate and energy,’ Knobloch said.” See more from the Gristmill.
