HR 3147119th CongressIn Committee

Transparency and Honesty in Energy Regulations Act

Introduced: May 1, 2025

Standard Summary

Comprehensive overview in 1-2 paragraphs

The Transparency and Honesty in Energy Regulations Act would bar federal agencies from using the social cost of carbon, the social cost of methane, the social cost of nitrous oxide, or the social cost of any greenhouse gas in any action. This includes cost-benefit analyses, rulemakings, guidance, or any other agency action, and it would prevent these monetized estimates from being used as a justification for policies or rules. The bill also requires the heads of federal agencies to report within 120 days on how often these monetized estimates have been used in proposed or final rulemakings, guidance, or actions since 2009. The short title, definitions, and the list of specific documents that would be used to define these costs are laid out in the bill. Sponsors are listed as Reps. Hudson (with Rep. Pfluger and Rep. Balderson) and the measure was introduced May 1, 2025. It would direct consideration and reporting to specific congressional committees, and would apply to actions governed by major regulatory planning statutes and executive orders referenced in the bill.

Key Points

1Prohibition on use: Federal agencies may not consider the social cost of carbon, methane, nitrous oxide, or any greenhouse gas in cost-benefit analyses, cost-effectiveness analyses, rulemaking, issuance of guidance, or any other agency action, nor as a justification for such actions.
2Definitions tied to specific documents: The bill defines each social cost metric by citing several named technical support documents and related analyses, including older and newer interagency estimates produced by IWG/Now IWG-GHG and EPA regulatory analyses, plus any successor documents.
3Scope of prohibition: The ban covers analyses required under law, under Executive Order 12866, and under Executive Order 13563, as well as rulemaking, guidance, and other agency actions.
4Reporting requirement: Within 120 days of enactment, the head of each federal agency must report to specified Senate and House committees on how often these monetized costs were used in proposed or final rulemakings, guidance, or actions since January 2009.
5Short title: The act is titled the “Transparency and Honesty in Energy Regulations Act.”

Impact Areas

Primary group/area affected- Federal agencies and regulatory programs: The core impact is on how agencies conduct regulatory analyses, prepare rules, guidance, and other actions, effectively removing the social cost estimates from consideration.Secondary group/area affected- Energy, environmental, and public health regulation landscape: Agencies such as EPA, DOE, and others would adjust how they justify and defend regulatory actions, potentially reducing consideration of climate-related monetized damages in regulatory decisions.Additional impacts- Economic and policy implications: By excluding monetized damages from greenhouse gas emissions, the bill could influence the stringency and design of environmental and energy regulations and could affect cost-benefit tradeoffs used to justify or reject rules.- Legislative and oversight effects: The reporting requirement increases congressional oversight of past reliance on social cost estimates and creates a formal record of their use since 2009.- Legal/administrative considerations: The prohibition could raise questions about consistency with existing laws, executive orders, and judicial review standards that rely on or reference monetized environmental harm in regulatory analyses.

Generated by gpt-5-nano on Nov 19, 2025