This week, all 3 of Chairman Geymann’s CCUS bills that we’ve been supporting passed on the house floor.

- HB 492 (Provides relative to eminent domain)
- HB 937 (Geymann) (Provides relative to landowner liability for carbon dioxide sequestration)
- HB 966 (Geymann) (Authorizes unitization for carbon dioxide sequestration)

We were at House Natural Resources Wednesday to testify against Rep. Carter’s 3 anti-CCUS bills.

We were able to kill two of them:

- HB 276 (Requires that carbon dioxide sequestration activity comply with local land use planning)
- HB 729 (Removes eminent domain authority for carbon dioxide sequestration)

Unfortunately, one of them did make it through, HB 169 (removes the caps on damages recovered from noneconomic losses) was reported favorably, but we were happy that it at least was amended to reinstate the cap on civil liability at $500,000.

Elsewhere, we were happy to see two of Senator Cathey’s bills pass the Senate:

- SB 247 (Provides for the Motor Fuels Underground Storage Tank Trust Dedicated Fund Account)
- SB 268 (Creates a state sales tax rebate for the purchase of equipment, machinery, and other items used in lithium recovery activities)

We also were happy to see three resolutions that we’re supporting make it out of committee this week:

- HCR 18 (Beaullieu) - Urges and requests the administration of President Biden to end its pause on pending approvals of liquefied natural gas exports
- HR 2 (Echols) -Urges and requests the United States Congress to enact reforms to federal permitting policies to accelerate deployment of new energy infrastructure
- SCR 14 (Hensgens) -Requests the United States Department of Energy to carefully consider the benefits of liquid natural gas exports.

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