Committee Hearings – Week of 2-26-23

This week, with the House and Senate back in Washington (House just for three days), we are starting to see a ‘normal’ committee schedule with fewer ‘organizational’ hearings. This includes a markup hearing and an oversight planning hearing in the House of potential interest here.

Energy Markup

On Tuesday, the Subcommittee on Energy, Climate, and Grid Security of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will hold a markup hearing. There is one bill of potential interest here:

• HR 1160, Critical Electric Infrastructure Cybersecurity Incident Reporting Act

This bill was introduced last week and the GPO has not yet published an official copy of the bill’s language. The Committee does have a committee print available. The bill would make DOE the “designated agency within the Federal Government to receive notifications regarding cyber26 security incidents and potential cybersecurity incidents with respect to critical electric infrastructure from other Federal agencies and owners, operators, and users of critical electric infrastructure” {new 16 USC 824o–1(e)(1)}. It would also require DOE to “promulgate regulations to facilitate the submission of timely, secure, and confidential notifications regarding cybersecurity incidents and potential cybersecurity incidents” {new 16 USC 824o–1(e)(2)(A)} in support of that requirement.

I will try to have a more complete assessment of this bill completed before the hearing.

Homeland Security Oversight

On Tuesday, the House Homeland Security Committee will hold a business meeting to “Consider the Committee's Oversight Plan for the 118th Congress”. A draft of their oversight plan is available. It includes specific references to both cybersecurity and the CFATS program. The cybersecurity provisions are complex (as is to be expected), but the CFATS comments are contained in a single paragraph on page 9:

“During the 118th Congress the Committee will continue to oversee the Department’s implementation of the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standard (CFATS) program, which requires high risk chemical facility owners and operators to report chemical holdings, perform vulnerability assessments, and adopt risk-based security measures to protect against the threat of a terrorist attack. An act to extend the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards Program of the Department of Homeland Security, and for other purposes, (Pub. L. 116-150), conveys CFATS statutory authority until July 27, 2023, at which point the Committee will rely on these oversight activities and findings to consider improvements or modifications to the CFATS program which can be achieved through reauthorization.”

I’ll discuss both topics in more depth in a subsequent post.