Sec. 204. Facility-specific agreements relating to pollution fees
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The United States Trade Representative may negotiate, in coordination with the Secretary of the Treasury and the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, an agreement with a facility located in a foreign country that allows products produced at the facility to be treated at a pollution intensity specific to the facility. To be eligible for an agreement under subsection (a), a facility is required to— consistently operate according to the standards a United States facility is statutorily required to abide by, for existing operations and any future expansion of operations, including such standards set forth under— the Clean Air Act ( 42 U.S.C. 7401 et seq. ); the Federal Water Pollution Control Act ( 33 U.S.C. 1251 et seq. ) (commonly known as the Clean Water Act ); the Safe Drinking Water Act ( 42 U.S.C. 300f et seq. ); and the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 ( 42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq. ); deploy pollution monitoring equipment able to report in real time the levels of pollution emitted by the facility; provide real-time access to physical pollution monitoring by United States officials or their designees; allow for spot inspections by United States officials or their designees to ensure compliance with the requirements of the agreement; if the pollution intensity of the facility is higher than the pollution intensity of the United States or the least pollution intense foreign country that is a party to an international partnership agreement entered into under this title with the United States— provide actionable benchmarks to decrease the pollution intensity of the facility so that pollution intensity is equal to or less than the pollution intensity of the United States or such other country not later than 10 years after entering into an agreement under subsection (a); achieve the benchmarks described in subparagraph
(A)during the 10-year period described in that subparagraph; provide actionable benchmarks to decrease, by not later than 20 years after entering into an agreement under subsection (a), the pollution intensity of the facility to an intensity not less than 50 percent lower than the pollution intensity of the United States at the time of entry into the agreement; achieve the benchmarks described in subparagraph
(C)during the 20-year period described in that subparagraph; and ensure that any pollution reduction technology used in achieving the benchmarks described in subparagraph
(A)or
(C)contains not less than 50 percent of components of United States origin; account for any upstream pollution— at the level associated with the pollution intensity of the country in which the contributing part or transforming part is produced, unless the part is covered by an agreement entered into under subsection (a); or if determined appropriate by the United States Trade Representative and provided for in the agreement, based on an applicable standard of the International Organization for Standardization; identify the covered entity with respect to covered products produced at the facility if the covered entity is not the owner of the facility; and ensure the agreement may be terminated at the sole discretion of the United States if the facility is not in compliance with any requirement under this subsection. The Trade Representative may not conclude an agreement under subsection
(a)with a facility unless— the Trade Representative— informs the appropriate congressional committees of the intention of the Trade Representative to pursue negotiations with the facility not less than 2 business days after commencing negotiations; shares the text of the proposed agreement with the appropriate congressional committees for not less than the lesser of— 12 days on which both Houses of Congress are in session; or 60 calendar days; and responds to all inquiries regarding the terms of the agreement from the chairperson or ranking member of one of the appropriate congressional committees before concluding the agreement; and a resolution of disapproval is not enacted during the period described in paragraph (1)(B). Any agreement entered into under this section with a facility shall allow a product produced by the facility and imported into the United States to be assigned to the tier (as established under section 4692(b) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as added by title I) aligned with the pollution intensity difference of a product produced by the facility and the baseline pollution intensity. Under no circumstances may an agreement entered into under this section require the United States to alter the implementation of this Act. A facility in a nonmarket economy country is not eligible for an agreement under this section if the facility— is owned, partially owned, or operated by the government of the country or an entity owned or controlled by that government; or has received financing, including in the form of a tax credit or a limit on tax liability, to operate the facility by the government of the country or an entity owned or controlled by that government. The Trade Representative shall promptly publish a description of the proposed agreement under this section in the Federal Register.
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Sec. 204
Facility-specific agreements relating to pollution fees
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