Congressional Hearings Next Week

The congressional web sites that I routinely check only show one hearing of possible interest to the chemical community next week. I have heard that the Energy and Environment Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will be holding a meeting on HR 2868 next Thursday. This confirms the Twitter report that I mentioned yesterday. The listed hearing includes the mark-up of S 1274 in the Senate Energy and Commerce Committee. You might remember that Sen. Rockefeller introduced this bill to prevent another Bayer-SSI fiasco from occurring. Why is his committee is marking up this bill when he inserted the same provisions in the DHS Budget Bill (HR 2892) that passed in the Senate? Perhaps they are going to go back and put some teeth in the bill by adding some sort of sanctions for using the SSI markings to cover-up safety concerns. Or, perhaps they are going to go back and add CVI coverage. Or perhaps the good Senator does not believe the provision in the DHS bill will survive conference.