In defense of the PROVE IT Act
By Mike Bogle
Did you know, the bipartisan Clean Air Act (CAA), signed into law by President Nixon in 1970, and its major amendments in 1977 (signed into law by President Carter) and 1990 (signed into law by President G.H.W. Bush) have had an enormous positive impact on our quality of life and the U. S. economy?
One side benefit of the CAA is that air pollution regulations have encouraged U.S. industry to produce energy-intensive materials, such as steel and aluminum, with a lower carbon emission intensity (carbon footprint) than competing industries in many other countries. Some of the reduced carbon emission intensity in these products is certainly also due to the ingenuity of American industry to reduce production costs by making industrial processes more and more energy efficient.
The Climate Leadership Council (a conservative think tank) has shown that the United States manufactures goods that are 40% lower in carbon emissions intensity than the world average.
Regardless of whether or not you are personally concerned about global carbon emissions and their impact on global temperatures, it is a fact that many large companies in the U.S and around the world are actively trying to reduce the carbon emission intensities of their supply chains in order to reduce their own carbon footprints. To do that effectively, these companies need reliable data on the relative carbon emission intensity of products from different supplier companies and countries.
To provide that data, the U.S. Senate is considering a new bipartisan bill, the PROVE IT Act (Providing Reliable, Objective, Verifiable Emissions Intensity and Transparency Act), which authorizes the U.S. Department of Energy to collect and publish the carbon emissions intensity data for a variety of materials produced by the U. S. and our competitors.
Having this data available will allow lower carbon emission intensity U.S. companies to be preferred suppliers to the global market. For example, the European Union and the United Kingdom are planning to impose tariffs on imports of high carbon emission-intensity products that compete unfairly against their own lower carbon emission-intensity domestic manufacturers. We cannot be passive as our trading partners move forward with policies that could disadvantage our exports.
The PROVE IT Act will provide the data that proves our industrial products are among the lowest in carbon emissions intensity in the world. The preference for U.S. products will be good for U.S. jobs and the U.S. economy. And the last time I checked, we all agreed that increased U.S. exports, greater U.S. economic activity, and more U.S. jobs are good things.
As Senators Cramer (R-N.D.) and Coons (D-Del.), who introduced the bill, have stated, the PROVE IT Act is a common-sense effort to “bridge the gap between what we know and what we can prove.” It’s vital we quantify how U.S. domestic manufacturing is among the cleanest in the world.
In January, the PROVE IT Act passed through the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee with a bipartisan majority vote of 15-4 and the support of our U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham. We should thank Graham for his support of a policy that amplifies our outstanding domestic products and better environmental standards.
Not surprisingly, lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry are against the PROVE IT Act because they do not want to see more efficient and less carbon-intensive production methods (that consume less fossil fuel) have any advantage. But they didn’t like the Clean Air Act either.
Mike Bogle has lived in Beaufort since 2018 and is currently the Beaufort Chapter Lead for Citizens’
Climate Lobby. He is an avid outdoorsman, and passionate about protecting what makes Beaufort such a special place to live.
