By DAVE BLOWER JR.
Farm World Editor

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Other opinions were mixed on the outcome of the vote to limit the EPA’s powers to regulate agriculture and other industries that are considered polluters.

The American Farm Bureau Federation found support for the resolution offered by Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) from non-farm entities such as Americans for Limited Government (ALG). “The Senate has just voted to affirm that the EPA should be able to arbitrarily set the nation’s energy policy by imposing unilateral restrictions on carbon emissions without any vote at all in Congress,” said ALG President Bill Wilson last week.

“This is a vote that will assuredly lead to higher energy prices, lost jobs, lost business, and the tyrannical imposition of a radical, environmentalist agenda upon the American people.”

Some farm groups, however, opposed the Farm Bureau’s support for the plan.

Jon Scholl, president of American Farmland Trust (AFT) said agriculture is the single largest user of land and water resources in the United States, and has a major impact on the environment. “The failure of the Murkowski Amendment to pass in the Senate (June 10) makes clear that efforts to delay (EPA) regulation of greenhouse gasses (GHG) under the Clean Air Act, through similar legislation or lawsuits are not likely to succeed,” he said.

“Agriculture also is one of the most cost effective ways to improve two of our nation’s most pressing environmental challenges - water quality and climate change, and it is possible for agriculture to remain profitable while addressing these challenges.”

Scholl said the farm and conservation communities and Congress are aware that the Supreme Court has mandated that, in the absence of a legislative solution to address GHG, EPA must enact regulations under the Clean Air Act - even though most acknowledge that regulation is not the ideal solution.

AFT cited an analysis by Informa Economics and the National Assoc. of Wheat Growers that concluded a large segment of U.S. farmers and rural America can benefit from properly structured clean energy legislation - in particular wheat farmers. The study concluded that if no climate change legislation is passed, direct regulation by the EPA would harm agriculture and farmers more than a bill.

Informa Economics recommended four policy points that farmers should seek in any climate and energy legislation:

•Carbon allowances distributed to the fertilizer industry are critical to keeping cost impacts down - and those allowances must be maintained and passed on to the farmer.

•Carbon offsetting opportunities must be maximized.
•Continued enrollment in offset programs must be ensured for as long as possible.

•Involvement in setting methodologies used to calculate sequestration rates for various carbon offsetting activities must include agriculture.

The Informa Economics study points to billions of dollars of benefits flowing to agriculture by a Renewable Energy Standard, which is also part of a clean energy and climate legislative solution.