The Pay Less at the Pump Act of 2026 would repeal the Superfund tax on crude oil and imported petroleum products.
Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo, and Rep. Mike Carey, R-Ohio, authored the legislation, which intends to lower gas prices and supply chain costs.
The tax had been reinstated in 2022 under the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) to help remediate the country’s Superfund sites. It was expected to add $11.7 billion to the existing program over 10 years, according to law firm Babst Calland. It’s one of several infusions from the Biden era.
Lankford is a cosponsor of the bill and introduced a similar measure in 2023. At the time, the lawmaker called the IRA a “front for progressives to slip through Congress many of their Green New Deal priorities.…”
StateImpact reached out to Lankford’s office for a comment on how the repeal could affect Oklahoma’s Superfund sites but did not receive a reply.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund program’s work started decades ago to clean up sites contaminated by hazardous waste from mining operations, landfills and factories.
But funding for the program declined starting in fiscal year 1999, according to a report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, limiting the agency’s resources.
The Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality works with the federal government to address the state’s Superfund sites. The EPA lists 18 Oklahoma locations to date as current or former national priorities.
The DEQ calls Tar Creek in Ottawa County the “largest and most challenging” of its Superfund sites, a label earned by the presence of heavy metals in the area’s water sources and soil. Work on the former mining operation started in the 1980s, but it still has 30 million tons of waste, a DEQ report states.
The bill was referred to the Senate Committee on Finance on Feb. 12.
StateImpact Oklahoma is a partnership of Oklahoma’s public radio stations which relies on contributions from readers and listeners to fulfill its mission of public service to Oklahoma and beyond. Donate online.
