WASHINGTON — In the waning hours before Congress broke for its July 4 recess, House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-West Chester, stepped onto the House floor and spent an hour decrying a cap and trade bill that he had taken to calling “Nancy Pelosi’s energy tax.”

His staff cleverly called Boehner’s speech a “Fili-Boehner,” but ultimately the speech didn’t appear to reverse the Democrats’ will: The bill passed 219-212.

Boehner may have to spend July 4 preserving his voice. The political scrapping has just begun.

While the climate change bill now goes to the U.S. Senate, where the sparks are expected to really fly, Congress also is wrangling with a handful of controversial topics with a huge impact on Ohio.

Here’s a look at the two biggies:

Climate change

Ohio opponents of this bill have all but predicted an apocalypse for the state if Congress adopts this measure, which would require utility plants to have an emission permit for every ton of carbon dioxide it produced. Plants that reduced emissions could sell their extra permits to others.

Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, is among the most vocal opponents. He helped kill a similar measure last year that he predicted would hike Ohioans’ energy costs by as much as 50 percent.

Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, meanwhile, has slowly become a supporter. He said the plan provides opportunities for the state’s burgeoning clean energy industry, and cites Toledo as an example of an Ohio city that has become a center for so-called green jobs.

Brown, too, has expressed concern about higher energy costs. But he said he’s excited about the job opportunities the bill could create. He heralded the passage of the House bill, which included a Brown provision to create a revolving loan fund for small and medium size manufacturers.

The bill has yet to pass a Senate committee, and Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid has signaled he wants committees to finish their work by September so it can clear Congress by the end of the year. One of those committees the bill must pass through is the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where Voinovich is a senior member. He says the measure will bleed already struggling households with higher energy costs, particularly in Ohio, where coal accounts for 86 percent of the state’s energy resources.

Opinions of the bill’s impact also differ among Ohio think tanks.

Wendy Patton, a senior associate and federal policy liaison with Policy Matters Ohio, testified in late June that the bill could help generate jobs in Ohio.

She cited a recent study by the Pew Charitable Trust that found more than 2,000 firms with more than 32,000 workers serving in green markets in Ohio. She said if demand for clean energy continues to skyrocket, Ohio could take advantage of even more opportunity. She also called for provisions in the legislation to help mitigate the price impact.

But Marc Kilmer of the conservative Buckeye Institute predicted something closer to catastrophe.

He’s reluctant to forecast how much Ohioans’ energy bills would increase if the House measure passed but, “I would say it will be a significant increase.” He said energy producers will need to pass on costs to consumers to stay afloat as the new regulation is put in place.

Health Care

Just as Voinovich sits on a committee with key jurisdiction over the climate change bill, Brown sits on the Senate Health, Environment, Labor and Pensions Committee, which spent the July 4 recess hammering out details of comprehensive health care reform. On July 2, Brown and two other senators — Chris Dodd of Connecticut and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island — announced that committee Democrats had ironed out a deal. It would include both a public option as well as employer responsibility provisions. Those provisions would require employers who couldn’t provide health insurance to at least foot part of the bill for employees to use the public option.

Brown touted the measure as competition that would spur both the public and private insurance options to succeed. In some cases, he said, the public option would be available where a private option has not been.

The plan, he said, “will reward quality, and it will reward best practices.”

The committee hopes to vote on their bill as soon as late this week. The Senate Finance Committee also must pass a bill as well.

According to Policy Matters Ohio, more than 1 million Ohioans, or 11 percent of those under the age of 65, do not have health insurance.

Kilmer, of the Buckeye Institute, said he expects the results to be pricey. The high cost of the estimated $1 trillion-over-10-years plan, he said will mean “higher taxes to pay for the bill at the end of the day.”

“I don’t see much in these proposals that will help the average Ohioan,” he said. “People will be paying more in taxes and probably paying more for health insurance.”

Nancy Martorano, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Dayton, however, is more optimistic. She said properly implemented, health care legislation could give Ohioans without health care new opportunities in a struggling economy.

“For some Ohioans, it might actually help them get coverage when they’re not able normally to afford coverage,” she said. “It’s sort of unclear. It depends on what kind of health care package gets passed.”

Brian Rothenberg of ProgressOhio, a progressive Ohio organization that supports Democratic health care reform proposals, said southwest Ohio has much to gain from health care reform. He said Anthem, Wellpoint and United dominate the market in this corner of the state, and a new government option might drive down costs.

The plan “would actually tend to benefit southwest Ohio by creating a level of competition among an industry that’s dominated by two or three insurance companies,” he said. “This is one area where a government plan would actually create competition.”