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Title: Energy Consumers Relief Act of 2013
Vote Smart's Synopsis:
Vote to pass a bill that prohibits the Administrator of the Environment Protection Agency from establishing an energy-related rule if the rule will cause "significant" adverse effects.
Highlights:
- Requires the Secretary of the Department of Energy (DOE) to review any energy-related rule proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that is estimated to cost more than $1 billion and to determine if the rule has an effect on any of the following (Sec. 3):
- Fuel diversity;
- Reliability of electricity; or
- Energy price, supply, distribution, or use.
- Requires the Secretary of the DOE to determine whether the energy-related rule will cause “significant” adverse effects to the economy by considering certain information including, but not limited to, the following information (Sec. 3):
- The costs and benefits of the rule; and
- The positive and negative impacts of the rule on economic indicators.
- Prohibits the Administrator of the EPA from establishing the energy-related rule if the Secretary of the DOE determines that the rule will cause “significant” adverse effects to the economy (Sec. 2).
- Requires the Administrator of the EPA to submit a report to Congress of any energy-rule estimated to cost more than $1 billion that includes certain information including, but not limited to, the following information (Sec. 3):
- An estimate of the total direct and indirect costs associated with the rule;
- An estimate of the increases in energy, gasoline, or electricity prices associated with the rule; and
- A description of the effects on employment, potential job losses, and employment shifts associated with the rule.
- Prohibits the Administrator of the EPA from using the “social cost of carbon” in any cost-benefit analysis relating to an energy-related rule that is estimated to cost more than $1 billion (Sec. 5).
- Defines “social cost of carbon” as an estimate of the cost of damages associated with an incremental increase in carbon dioxide emissions in a given year (Sec. 5).