Rules Committee hears sharply divided views on bills to speed projects, reinstate coal council and streamline cross‑border permits

The House Rules Committee on [date not specified] heard competing testimony on three energy bills that would affect grid reliability, coal policy and permitting for cross‑border energy projects.

Representative Latta, testifying for the Committee on Energy and Commerce, told the Rules Committee that HR 1047 (the Bridal Power Act), HR 3015 (the National Coal Council Reestablishment Act) and HR 3062 (the Promoting Cross‑Border Energy Infrastructure Act) would speed delivery of dispatchable generation and create clearer permitting paths. “All 3 bills are aimed at unleashing our nation's abundant natural abundant natural resources and establishing more efficient and modern processes for the delivery of affordable energy and grid reliability,” Representative Latta said.

The bills, Latta said, would: give grid operators new tools to prioritize resources that provide “essential reliability services”; codify an advisory National Coal Council as statutory policy; and create a statutory review process — replacing the current patchwork that relies on presidential permits and multiple agency reviews — for international oil, gas and transmission facilities. “As energy demand grows, it is important that a consistent statutorily directed process is in place to allow the efficient permitting of infrastructure and to lower prices for consumers,” he testified.

Representative Menendez, appearing as the panel’s Democratic witness, strongly criticized the package and tied it to wider Republican energy policies. “These next few years, if your lights flicker, if your air conditioning goes out in the summer, or heating goes out in the winter, that's Republicans' fault, madam chair,” he said. Menendez said rolling back clean‑energy policies and reinstating fossil‑fuel preferences would increase costs and emissions, citing a forecast that families could pay about $300 more per year and an estimate of $52 billion more on energy over a decade in one cited analysis. He also said recent administration actions have canceled offshore wind projects that New England’s grid operator had counted on.

Committee members questioned witnesses about specific claims and policy mechanics. Representative Neguse pressed on the need for statutory codification of the National Coal Council, noting that the Trump administration had issued an executive action reestablishing a coal council in June but, he said, “They have not named any members. They have not named a chair.” Latta responded that statutory authorization would provide greater permanence and assurance of the council’s work.

Testimony included several quantitative claims and contextual figures (attributed below to the speakers who made them): Latta said coal makes “approximately 16% of our nation's electric generation”; he also cited a 2024 figure that U.S. energy trade with North American partners exceeded $1,000,000,000,000. Menendez described a forecast that the reconciliation bill would “prevent over 300 gigawatts of power from coming on the grid” and cited studies projecting higher household bills and higher national emissions if clean‑energy incentives are removed.

The witnesses also differed on how HR 1047 would interact with existing interconnection processes: Latta described the bill as “fuel neutral” and focused on prioritizing resources that provide reliability services, while Menendez argued it could allow operators to favor fossil‑fuel plants and remove “just and reasonable” review standards from certain queue changes.

No formal committee votes on the energy measures occurred during the witness testimony; the panel concluded the energy portion after questions and yielded to the next panel.

Why it matters: These bills address core federal roles — how the grid is managed, how advisory bodies are chartered, and how cross‑border infrastructure is permitted — and the committee hearing highlighted a partisan split over whether the measures would shore up reliability or favor fossil fuels at the expense of cleaner, lower‑cost resources.

Speakers quoted in this article spoke during the Rules Committee hearing and are listed in the speakers section below. No facts are asserted here beyond what those witnesses and members said at the hearing.