Advocates push White House to nominate energy regulator

The White House is under increasing pressure to nominate a new energy regulator, weeks after it has been able to do so.

President Biden has been able to nominate a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission since June when former Commissioner Neil Chatterjee’s (R) term expired; however, he has yet to name a nominee for the five-member commission that has jurisdiction over interstate electricity transmission and natural gas infrastructure like pipelines.

Industry advocates say they want someone on the commission quickly. 

“We really just cannot express enough the urgency to getting a fifth commissioner. There’s so many important decisions pending before FERC and we really would like to see a full complement,” said Amy Andryszak, president and CEO of the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America — a trade group that represents pipeline companies.

Andryszak added that she hopes to see a commissioner who will consider each individual project based on its merits and who will weigh established commission precedent when making decisions. 

“These are things that lead to a clear and consistent process,” she said. 

Andryszak, alongside Laborers’ International Union of North America general president Terry O’Sullivan, recently wrote to Biden urging him to “swiftly” nominate a commissioner who will “promote a clear, consistent, and timely regulatory process that enables needed natural gas infrastructure investment,”

Rep. Sean Casten (D-Ill.), also stressed the importance of quickly appointing a FERC commissioner, arguing that it should have been done before Chatterjee, who had been serving under a grace period, stepped down at the end of August.

“It is really, really, really important that they nominate someone to FERC a month before Mr. Chatterjee steps down so that we can have a functioning FERC,” he told The Hill.  “We have missed that window.”

Casten made headlines in July by declaring it “hot FERC summer” and singing “FERC-alicious,” parodies of songs by artists Megan Thee Stallion and Fergie, on the House floor.

He said that if he were in the White House’s place, ”I would’ve had this teed up and ready to go from day one.”

“As long as we have at least two senators who think it’s more important to preserve the filibuster than to act on climate, the only real agency that can make a difference in figuring out how to get our electric sector clean … the only agency that’s really going to be able to do even a fraction of what’s necessary is FERC,” he said. 

He also said that it’s important to put up a FERC commissioner quickly because the agency has important decisions to make, which remain pending in the case of tie votes. 

“We have far too much to do on climate to count it as a victory that we’re going to do nothing,” he said. 

The commission — which cannot have more than three members of the same political party — currently has two Democrats and two Republicans. 

A White House spokesperson declined to say when a nominee might be named or who was being considered. 

Some environmental advocates see this as an opportunity for the White House to put a climate champion on the commission. 

“It’s absolutely vital and it should be president Biden’s legacy to put on somebody who is progressive both from the lens of resolving the climate emergency and from the lens of racial justice,” said Jean Su, the energy justice program director at the Center for Biological Diversity. 

She said she’s looking for a commissioner who “won’t rubber stamp pipelines.” 

The commission has historically backed the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure.  A rHouse probe last year found that over the last 20 years, FERC approved 99 percent of pipeline certificate requests. 

The Center was one of more than 450 advocacy organizations specifically calling for a commissioner who will oppose new and support phasing out existing fossil fuels, championing getting renewable energy onto the electric grid and making sure that environmental justice is incorporated into commission decisions. 

But the person who this commissioner will be replacing, Chatterjee himself, pushed back on the idea that there’s a need to nominate someone for partisan reasons.  

“I actually think my four colleagues that are there right now will be able to get together and come to compromises and move things forward,” Chatterjee told The Hill. 

“I don’t like the narrative that’s out there that the commission will be divided 2-2 on political grounds and that the Biden administration needs to put someone in to give the commission Democratic control to push a partisan agenda. That’s not what FERC is about. FERC is an independent, bipartisan, regulatory agency governed by statute,” he said.