Sen. Yaw urges DEP leadership to testify at Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee hearing

State Sen. Gene Yaw (R-Bradford County) recently sent a letter to Patrick McDonnell, Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) secretary, urging him to reconsider testifying at the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee’s Jan. 18 hearing.

The hearing will discuss clearing prices set during a Dec. 1 Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) auctions. Auction clearing prices are the price energy producers pay to buy credits to offset emissions.

Last year, when Gov. Tom Wolf signed an executive order to enter Pennsylvania into the regional carbon tax consortium in 2022, clearing prices were less than $3 per short ton. December’s auction set prices of more than $13 per short ton.

This figure is 40 percent higher than the Sept. 8 clearing price and four times higher than modeling ICF International conducted on DEP’s behalf.

DEP authorized more than $400,000 to pay for the modeling, which is already outdated, Yaw said.

“At present, we are looking at the following outcomes: much higher electric rates for all residents, especially our most vulnerable; far more premature retirements of coal and older, less efficient natural gas plants, and related job elimination; a likely insurmountable bar to construct new natural gas plants in the state,” Yaw, committee chairman, said.