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H.R. 1430, Honest and Open New EPA Science Treatment (HONEST) Act of 2017 1 (March 29, 2017)

handle is hein.congrec/cbo3383 and id is 1 raw text is: 




                  CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE
                             COST ESTIMATE

                                                                   March 29, 2017



                                  H.R.   1430
 Honest   and  Open  New   EPA   Science  Treatment   (HONEST) Act of 2017

          As passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on March 29, 2017


SUMMARY

H.R. 1430 would amend  the Environmental Research, Development, and Demonstration
Authorization Act of 1978 to prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from
proposing, finalizing, or disseminating a covered action unless all scientific and
technical information relied on to support that action is publicly available online in a
manner that is sufficient for independent analysis and substantial reproduction of research
results. Covered actions would include assessments of risks, exposure, or hazards;
documents specifying criteria, guidance, standards, or limitations; and regulations and
regulatory impact statements.

Although H.R. 1430 would not require the EPA to disseminate any scientific or technical
information that it relies on to support covered actions, the act would not prohibit the
agency from doing so. Whether the EPA would choose to disseminate such information
would determine the cost of implementing H.R. 1430.

Based on information from the EPA and other federal agencies, as well as organizations
and researchers in the scientific community that publish in peer-reviewed journals, CBO
estimates that the agency could spend between a few million dollars per year to more than
one hundred million dollars per year over the 2018-2022 period to ensure that data and
other information underlying studies are publicly available in a format sufficient to allow
others to substantially reproduce the results of studies. That range reflects the uncertainty
about the number of studies the EPA would choose to rely on to support covered actions,
the extent to which the agency would invest in data infrastructure to make researchers' data
and models available to others, and in the number of covered actions the agency would
issue in future years. The range also reflects the uncertainty in the extent to which the
research community would tailor their data management activities to comply with the
requirements of the act and how quickly those changes might occur.

EPA  officials have explained to CBO that the agency would implement H.R. 1430 with
minimal funding and generally would not disseminate information for the scientific studies
that it uses to support covered actions. That approach to implementing the legislation

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