INHOFE'S IDIOCY

[foot_soldier]

This deserves its own space:

February 22, 2005
Inhofe's Idiocy
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2281&ncid=742&e=5&u=/thenation/20050222/cm_thenation/132211

Labeling global warming "the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people" and comparing the Environmental Protection Agency to the Gestapo apparently wasn't enough for Senator James Inhofe.

Unable to ram Bush's polluter-friendly Clear Skies Act through the Senate, the Chairman of the Environmental and Public Works Committee (EPW) ordered two national organizations opposing Bush's plan to turn over their financial and tax records.

he two groups attacked by Inhofe collectively represent 48 state and 165 local air pollution control agencies. Executive Director William Becker denounced Inhofe's order as "retaliation against some very legitimate criticism of 'Clear Skies,'" and said his groups have not accepted money from environmental activists or other private interests.

The same purity can't be applied to Inhofe, a long-time magnet for pro-polluter special interests. Since joining the Congress in 1994, Inhofe has accepted over a million dollars from the energy and natural resource sector, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. In the 2002 election, Inhofe received more money from big oil and gas companies than any other senator except Texas' John Cornyn. In return, big energy received a senator who's earned a zero rating from the League of Conservation Voters on six different occasions.

"Our door is open," Inhofe assured energy lobbyists upset over the Clean Air Act in 1998. "I'll sit down with you personally." He's kept his word. "Energy lobbyists are coming and going like a revolving door through the staff offices of EPW," Frank O'Donnell of Clean Air Watch told Grist magazine.

In spite of the feeding frenzy, the Senate committee remains divided 9-9 on Clear Skies, with moderate Republican Lincoln Chafee supporting the Democrats. In fact, some of the harshest opposition to Bush and Inhofe comes from Republican quarters. John Paul, an Ohio environmental regulator who voted for Bush twice, testified that Clear Skies "fails on every one of our associations' core principals" and is "far too lenient" on polluters. High-profile Governors George Pataki and Arnold Schwarzenegger criticize provisions reducing states' abilities to enforce existing regulations or create tougher ones. Environmental groups say the law will exempt carbon-dioxide emissions and sextuple levels of mercury pollution.

In making the case for Bush and against sensible regulation, Inhofe has relied on esteemed environmental experts like Michael Crichton, Jerry Falwell and lobbyists for ExxonMobil. Talk about a hoax!

There are several links embedded in this article, so be sure to go to the original and check them out.

[Boomer Chick]

Great article and I did explore the link on retaliation. Funny how the news media glosses over these things. I had no idea this wrangling and back biting was going on. Of course it's not surprising, but it does underline our system's weak areas..... money and lobbying... tempting the weak in power to ignore the important issues of human welfare in lieu of "payoffs" of one kind or another. The mafia mentality then takes over and retaliation, which we've also seen in the Plume case..... raises its ugly head!

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-clear19feb19,0,5649063.story?coll=la-home-headlines


Rep. Henry A. Waxman of Los Angeles, the senior Democrat on the House Government Reform Committee, said: "There is not even any subtlety about this. This is a blatant attempt at intimidation and bullying so that experts will be afraid to speak out about a bill that rolls back air pollution protections for all Americans."

Right now I'm listening to a town meeting held by Democrats on Social Security.

What isn't seemingly falling apart at the seams?

My prayer: Oh Lord, please help the citizens to awake and kick those sons of bitches out of our White House !

Whoops! Got a bit carried away, heh? Do you get any of the following in your inbox?

Truthout (good environmental section)
Corpwatch
InformationClearingHouse
Solari.com
Septembereleventh.org
Arianna's columns
Greg Palast
MediaChannel.org
Buzzflash
Citizens for Legit Gov
Alternet
Veterans for Peace


I'm curious to know your most important news links!

Of course I have a terribly long list of favorites, but not all on automatic inbox service.

Thanks for this. Let's continue on this thread to post our enivironmentally related political articles. Glad you posted this here.

BC ;)

[foot_soldier]

.....I had no idea this wrangling and back biting was going on.....
It sure is. And it's likely to continue for quite some time. The above-posted article doesn't even scratch the surface...

It isn't only Inhofe who subscribes to the idea that the anthropogenic component of climatic destabilization is a hoax, but here, among other things, is the speech he delivered to the Senate on January 4, 2005 - just six weeks ago:

Climate Change Update
Senate Floor Statement by Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla)
January 4, 2005
http://inhofe.senate.gov/pressreleases/climateupdate.htm

Excerpt:

.....As I said on the Senate floor on July 28, 2003, "much of the debate over global warming is predicated on fear, rather than science." I called the threat of catastrophic global warming the "greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people," a statement that, to put it mildly, was not viewed kindly by environmental extremists and their elitist organizations. I also pointed out, in a lengthy committee report, that those same environmental extremists exploit the issue for fundraising purposes, raking in millions of dollars, even using federal taxpayer dollars to finance their campaigns.

For these groups, the issue of catastrophic global warming is not just a favored fundraising tool. In truth, it's more fundamental than that. Put simply, man-induced global warming is an article of religious faith..... END excerpt.

No comment.

[foot_soldier]

Re: news links, reference sources, etc.

I run a pretty tight ship where "incoming" is concerned, so I don't have stuff automatically sent to my Inbox. :wink:

I enjoy the research process and so I don't mind going and getting the desired venues. I've got my basic rounds down to about an hour a day total.

Environmental Media Service
http://www.ems.org/news.html

Society of Environmental Journalists
http://www.sej.org/news/index2.htm

Climateark
http://www.climateark.org/

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility
http://www.peer.org/

CorpWatch
http://www.corpwatch.org/

Union of Concerned Scientists
http://www.ucsusa.org/

truthout
http://www.truthout.org

Common Dreams
http://www.commondreams.org/

I use "Ref Desk" for rapid access to major US and world newspapers:

Ref Desk
http://www.refdesk.com/

When I see a news article on any of the issues I'm specifically following (for example, ozone depletion, acidification of the oceans, Arctic warming, etc.) I go from there directly to the research literature to update myself on current findings. I generally print the actual studies so I can mark them up for further research as I'm reading them.

I try to keep up with the major news venues every day and regional news venues, certain columnists, etc. at least twice a week.

Outside of the aforementioned there are dozens of other resources I use on a regular basis depending on what I'm looking at that day/week.

[foot_soldier]

February 25, 2005

'Clear Skies' plan: the battle heats up
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0225/p02s02-uspo.html

The congressional fight over the Bush administration's clean air plan has turned into a political knock-down, drag out at several levels.

Ten state attorneys general are publicly opposing it. Environmental activists and labor unions are at odds over the measure, illustrating the classic split over jobs versus the environment. State and local air-pollution control officials and agencies have weighed in, prompting the chairman of the Senate environment committee to question their motives and investigate their possible connection to activists.

Two prominent Republican governors - George Pataki of New York and Arnold Schwarzenegger of California - have urged Washington to make sure that states be allowed "to have stronger pollution controls than those set for the nation as a whole," as is the case under current law. Their recent letter to congressional leaders was polite, but it made an important point: That heavily populated areas like New York City and Los Angeles may need stronger laws than those favored by the Bush administration and polluting industries.

Meanwhile, speakers at the annual meeting of the American Association for Advancement of Science this week complained that the administration "has distanced itself from scientific information" on such issues as environmental protection.

President Bush and his supporters in Congress say the "Clear Skies" legislation will reduce emissions of nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide, and mercury 70 percent below current levels by 2018, with "major reductions" in the next five years. What's more, they say, a new approach is needed, since attempts to regulate such emissions under the 1970 Clean Air Act typically have been tied up in legal battles.

The model here is the "cap and trade" method of reducing pollution, successfully, used for acid rain that's been relatively litigation-free. "The Clear Skies legislation will clean up the air by reducing utility emissions faster, more cheaply, and more efficiently than the Clean Air Act," says James Inhofe (R) of Oklahoma, who chairs the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. "Anyone who doubts this either does not understand the legislation or has not paid attention to the endless litigation over the last 15 years."

Republican-turned-Independent Sen. James Jeffords of Vermont, one of the authors of major Clean Air Act amendments 15 years ago, takes a decidedly different view.

The president's proposal "is rife with loopholes for polluters and litigation," says Mr. Jeffords, the senior minority member of the Senate committee. It "rewrites major portions of the Clean Air Act to delay attainment of the health-based standards - leaving millions of Americans to breathe dirty air longer."

Meanwhile, a long list of outside interests has been weighing in as well..... (continued)

[jayreynolds]

Outside of the aforementioned there are dozens of other resources I use on a regular basis depending on what I'm looking at that day/week.

You would do well to add this one to your reading list. Real scientists answer questions. Direct links to research papers otherwise unavailable without a subscription. You'd also benefit from following the 'opposition' rebuttals on sites like junkscience.com and elsewhere(you didn't think I'd tell you where the real debunkers hang out did you?).

It pays to know what the other side is saying, without the spin your own people give you.

http://www.realclimate.org/

[foot_soldier]

I've been following RealClimate since its inception.

Thanks anyway.

[jayreynolds]

I've been following RealClimate since its inception.

Thanks anyway.
Well, you must be witholding much of the criticism they give to each other.
Figures.

BTW, ever get ready to blow the lid on A.C. Griffith yet?
I've been calling him but he doesn't anwer his phone.

[foot_soldier]

More resources:

Carbon Dioxide Analysis Center
http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/pns/top10.html

UNFCCC Links to external sources of data on greenhouse gas emissions and to socio-economic data and tools
http://unfccc.int/methods_and_science/other_methodological_issues/items/3170.php

The following is a regional resource (New England) but similar data sets are now available for other regions:

AIRMAP
http://airmap.unh.edu/data/data.html?site=AIRMAPTF

[foot_soldier]

February 27, 2005
Air Quality Officials' Group Protests Senator's Actions
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0227-05.htm

WASHINGTON - At the end of his testimony on the Clear Skies Act of 2005 last month, an Ohio official representing two national groups of state and local air quality regulators told a Senate subcommittee on the environment that he would be happy to respond in writing to any additional questions.

Three days later, the questions arrived, eight from Senator James M. Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, the chairman of the full committee and a co-sponsor of the bill.

But only one of Mr. Inhofe's written questions to the witness, John A. Paul, had anything to do with Clear Skies, the first major change to the Clean Air Act in 15 years, which the committee is scheduled to finalize on Wednesday. The rest of Mr. Inhofe's interest focused on how the two groups conducted their business, including a request for the groups' tax filings for the last six years.

While Mr. Inhofe was within his right to seek financial information from groups that receive grants from the Environmental Protection Agency, as Mr. Paul's organizations do, the groups' executive director said he viewed the requests as a bullying tactic because the groups oppose the bill.

"I thought it was intimidation," said S. William Becker, who leads the groups, the State and Territorial Air Pollution Program Administrators and its sister organization, the Association of Local Air Pollution Control Officials. "They said they have been investigating us since last May. So perhaps this is a continuation of a pattern of intimidation."

Nothing could be further from the truth, say aides to Mr. Inhofe, who said that his request for tax information was part of a broader review of organizations that received grant money from the environmental agency. Will Hart, a spokesman for the committee, said Mr. Inhofe was examining records from 200 such groups, though he declined to name any of them.

"This is an ongoing investigation," Mr. Hart said. "With grant oversight capacity, the committee is authorized to look into questions raised over the years."

Mr. Inhofe appears to be the only member of the 18-member committee raising the questions during the difficult negotiations over Clear Skies. An aide to another Republican member of the committee, who insisted on anonymity because of uncertainties over prospects for the bill's passage, said no other senator felt as strongly about grant oversight as did Mr. Inhofe.

But Senator James M. Jeffords, a Vermont independent and the ranking member of the committee, who has battled Mr. Inhofe on a number of issues including Clear Skies, expressed strong misgivings over the request for tax filings, saying he was deeply concerned over its timing and appropriateness.

"This organization has testified numerous times before Congress on Clean Air Act matters; their expertise, who they are, and who they represent is well known," Mr. Jeffords said. "I am troubled by this precedent for the Senate."

Representative Henry A. Waxman, a California Democrat and the ranking member of the Government Reform Committee, also had harsh words for Mr. Inhofe, calling his request for tax information "a blatant attempt at intimidation and bullying" to scare off opponents of a bill that has strong White House support.

"Congressional hearings should be an attempt at honest fact-finding, not thuggery," Mr. Waxman said. "A committee has no right to try to intimidate witnesses."

Mr. Becker's organizations, which receive a combined $1 million a year from the environmental agency, provided answers to the senators' questions as well as the tax forms. But the conflict arising from Mr. Inhofe's request in the final stages of negotiations over Clear Skies served as another reminder of how controversial the legislation is.

Mr. Inhofe had scheduled a session to finalize the bill two weeks ago, only to cancel the session after it became apparent the bill lacked the votes for committee approval. Since then, members of the committee have met amongst themselves, and their staffs have met. But the apparent deadlock that forced the postponement may still be in place, setting up potential embarrassment for Mr. Inhofe and disappointment for the Bush administration.

Mr. Inhofe and eight other Republicans support the measure, but Mr. Jeffords, seven Democrats and one Republican, Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, oppose it. Late last week, however, Mr. Chafee told Congressional Quarterly that he might be willing to change his position on mandatory caps for carbon dioxide, a heat-trapping gas that scientists say contributes to global warming. Clear Skies includes caps only for the air pollutants sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury.

The inclusion of carbon caps has been a major obstacle in negotiations over the bill.

Mr. Becker, meanwhile, said he remained mystified as to why Mr. Inhofe waited so long to bring his investigation to the doorstep of his organizations. But a clue, he said, might be found in the last of Mr. Inhofe's written questions to Mr. Paul, when he asked if the two organizations had a position on regulating carbon dioxide.

[Boomer Chick]

IN THE HOT SEAT: OBAMA TO CAST KEY VOTE ON FUTURE OF COAL




BY NICOLE SACK

THE SOUTHERN
SOUTHERN ILLINOIS -- Storm clouds are gathering as The Clear Skies act of 2005 heads back to the Environment and Public Works Senate Committee for a vote Wednesday. Action on the bill, supported by President Bush and the coal industry, has been on hold for two weeks.

One of the 18 members who will decide whether the bill passes to the full senate or dies in committee is U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

When the bill first came before the committee for a vote on Feb. 16, early predictions suggested there would be a 9-9 deadlock.

Such speculation prompted the chairman of the environmental panel, U.S. Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., to delay action on the measure for two weeks. During the two-week delay, Inhofe wanted to meet with members of the committee in hopes of crafting a compromise that nets additional support for the act.

However, Obama has also been pegged as a potential swing vote, since Southern Illinois had a once thriving coal industry that was later crippled by regulations put into place by the Clean Air Act.

A vote against the bill would put him in the company of fellow committee members Hillary Clinton of New York and Barbara Boxer of California. A vote in favor of Clear Skies would put him in the company of Missouri Republican Kit Bond and the committee's chairman.

In an earlier interview Obama's staff said the senator would oppose the Clear Skies measure as it is written.

But since Inhofe delayed the initial vote the bill has been modified in an effort to move it to the senate floor.

State Rep. Dan Reitz, D-Steeleville said he has not seen the final markup on the bill, but said there is one thing that would benefit the Illinois coal industry.

"What we need more than anything else is certainty that will allow utilities to make an investment in retrofitting," Reitz said.

Reitz's legislative district encompasses the Baldwin Power Plant and the proposed site of the Peabody Energy facility in Marissa. He points out that the Baldwin plant had to switch from burning Southern Illinois coal to low-sulfur coal brought in from western states due to government regulation.

"Senator Obama is in a precarious situation," Reitz said. "He is a freshman senator of a state with a diverse makeup and this is a complicated issue. I'm sure he will make the right decision and then we'll have some sort of certainty in the process."

State Sen. Dave Luechtefeld, R-Okawville, said he has been hesitant to take a side on the issue. However, he mirrors Reitz's argument that there is a need for certainly to boost investments in the regions coal resources.

"I am concerned about any more regulations," Luechtefeld said. "Investors are constantly afraid to invest in the coal industry. One of the biggest concerns I hear from investors is 'What is coming down the road?'"

Clear Skies would set new emission standards for three major pollutants and introduce a market-based approach favored by industry. While proponents of the act contend it would reduce sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and mercury emissions by 70 percent, there would be no limit on carbon emissions.

However, opponents say reductions could be achieved faster through tighter restrictions, which include the current Clean Air Act regulations. Those plants unable to meet the required standards would be able to buy emission allowances from other plants.

The United Mine Workers Union has endorsed and testified in favor of the bill since its introduction.

However, environmental groups in the state, such as Illinois Public Interest Research Group and the Sierra Club, claim Clear Skies would hurt the state's coal industry.

Objections lodged by these groups have delayed the proposed Peabody Energy plant near Marissa. The plant could provide hundreds of well-paying jobs in the region. Gov. Rod Blagojevich visited the region earlier this year to tout the plans for the new Peabody plant.

nicole.sack@thesouthern.com (618) 351-5816

_________________________________

[foot_soldier]

Re: Obama to cast key vote...

Thanks so much for posting this article. I wasn't aware that Sen. Obama was in such a sensitive position here. Obviously it is hoped that the outcome on Wednesday will be in favor of what is best for public health.

***
Statement of James M. Jeffords
Clean Air, Climate Change and Nuclear Safety Subcommittee
Hearing on S.485, the Clear Skies Act of 2003
May 8, 2003
http://epw.senate.gov/108th/Jeffords_050803.htm

[jayreynolds]

You know, reading the title of this thread, "INHOFE'S IDIOCY" got me thinking.
He's the four-term congressman and the three-term senator from Oklahoma, right?
And you people post anonymously on an obscure messageboard to complain about him?

Who's the idiot?

[Boomer Chick]

Jaybo, quit your flirting with the girls! We wanted to keep a thread of politics off the main thread of climate change, contrails, and weather mitigation projects. This keeps politics separate.

Understand, dumpling?

BC :rolleyes:

[jayreynolds]

Jaybo, quit your flirting with the girls! We wanted to keep a thread of politics off the main thread of climate change, contrails, and weather mitigation projects. This keeps politics separate.

Understand, dumpling?

BC :rolleyes:
Um, was that the answer to my question?

[Boomer Chick]

You know it was, schweetie! ;)

[Boomer Chick]

White House Budget Slashes Clean Energy
By Ken Bossong
Renewable Energy Access

Monday 28 February 2005

In his most recent State of the Union address, President Bush stated that the United States needed "reliable supplies of affordable, environmentally responsible energy," and urged Congress to "pass legislation that makes America more secure and less dependent on foreign energy." However, there is a marked disconnect between the President's words and the funding priorities he laid out in the Fiscal Year 2006 (FY06) budget request he recently submitted to the U.S. Congress.

The President's proposed budget calls for significant cuts in renewable energy, energy efficiency, clean air, and climate change related-programs at the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Department of Transportation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and other agencies.

Swinging the Budget Axe

The FY06 budget request for the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) energy efficiency and renewable energy (EE/RE) programs envisions reductions totaling nearly $50 million - an overall cut of roughly 4 percent. This includes a 6 percent cut in Distributed Energy programs ($60,416 to $56,629); an 8 percent cut in the Geothermal Energy program ($25,270 to $23,299); an 18 percent cut in the Biomass/Biofuels program ($88,099 to $72,164); and a 90 percent cut in the Hydropower program ($4,862 to $500).

In fact, the Bush budget proposes to phase out DOE's hydropower program altogether and all support for the Advanced Hydropower Turbine, a joint program between DOE and the hydropower industry exploring fish-friendlier turbines, just at the time when full scale testing is about to begin at multiple locales.

Adding insult to injury for at least some of these programs, the cuts come on top of earlier reductions. The geothermal program, for example, had been funded at $28.4 million in FY03 and steadily reduced since then.

Less severely impacted is DOE's solar R&D budget which faces a reduction of only 1.3 percent, from $85.07 million in FY 05 to $83.95 million in FY 06. The solar industry has sought to put a positive spin on its reduction calling the budget request "essentially status quo funding" while applauding a "promising new initiative to advance the development of crystalline silicon solar power."

Overall, among DOE's core renewable energy programs, only wind energy is proposed for an increase - 3.4 million (from $40.8 million to $44.2 million), a relatively large expansion of nearly 9 percent.

In addition, funding for the Renewable Energy Production Incentive (REPI) program (which provides public power systems and rural electric cooperatives with a counterpart to the tax incentives that are available to for-profit utilities for renewable generation) would be just $5 million - an increase of $1 million but well below the cumulative $70+ million estimated as needed to fully fund past obligations under the program.

On the energy efficiency side of the ledger, DOE's funding would be cut back by nearly $21 million. Moreover, this decrease comes on top of earlier reductions. Since FY02, DOE research and development spending on efficiency has fallen by $50 million. Corrected for inflation, this represents a 15 percent drop in federal support for energy efficiency even though studies suggest that every dollar invested in DOE-administered energy-efficiency R&D returns $20 to the nation's economy.

The bottom-line reduction in DOE's EE/RE programs appears less drastic primarily because of significant increases for the hydrogen program (5%: $94,066 to 99,094) and the fuel cells program (12%: $74,944 to $83,600). And the hydrogen program, which has grown from $38,113 in FY03, is not a truly renewable energy program inasmuch as a portion of the budget supports hydrogen production from fossil fuel and nuclear sources.

On the tax side, the Bush Administration budget proposal for 2006 calls for extending the wind energy production tax credit (PTC) for two years, through the end of 2007. The two-year PTC for wind, biomass (other than agricultural livestock waste nutrients), and landfill gas would continue at 1.8 cents/kWh and would be adjusted annually for inflation. However, the proposal appears to not include geothermal energy in the extension even though it was incorporated into the program last year - arguably one of the few advances made in federal support for renewables in 2004.

Even if broadened to include geothermal and other renewables, a mere two-year extension would continue the stop-and-go unpredictability of the PTC which has hampered renewable energy development over the past decade - a problem not faced by fossil fuel technologies which are granted long-term incentives.

Widening the Swath

Elsewhere the pattern is the same. At the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), funding for the Federal Procurement of Biobased Products program and the Biodiesel Fuel Education program held steady at $1 million each. However, the RBS Renewable and Energy Efficiency Grant/Loan Guarantee Program would be scaled back to $10 million from $23 million in FY05, the NRCS Biomass Research and Development Program would be cut by $2 million to $12 million, and the CCC Bioenergy Program would be slashed $40 million from $100 million in FY05 to $60 million in FY06 - and down from $150 million in FY04.

For the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the President's budget calls for an overall cut of $517 million (a 6.4 percent reduction from FY05 appropriations). The cut includes a $42 million cut in the Clean Air and Global Climate Change Program (a 4.2% cut from the FY 05 President's budget). Funding for EPA's Energy Star program would be essentially level with FY05 but even this may be considered penny-wise and pound-foolish inasmuch as every dollar invested in the program cuts energy costs by $75 and sparks $15 of investment in new efficiency technologies, according to the Alliance to Save Energy.

[Boomer Chick]

At the U.S. Department of Transportation, the Urbanized Area Formula Program and the Fixed Guideway Modernization Program will see a $300 million cut in funding from $5.3 billion in FY _05 to $5.0 billion. These programs help promote clean bus deployment through the funding of innovative technologies and, capital projects to replace, rehabilitate, and purchase buses and related equipment. These cuts would be on top of the elimination of $1.2 billion in subsidies for Amtrak which would essentially eliminate the rail service.

Policy of Slowly Bleeding Support

Taken together, the cuts or anemic funding levels proposed for many federal sustainable energy programs reflect a continuation of the policy of slowly bleeding support for renewable energy and energy efficiency. - a policy correctly characterized by the Alliance to Save Energy as being the 'wrong approach at the wrong time.'

The United States is now facing rising oil and natural gas prices and imports with negative consequences for the economy, the national trade deficit and national security, rapidly worsening climate change plus other energy-related environmental problems, and increasing evidence of the public health impacts of fossil energy use.

For all of these reasons, the White House's policy of steadily chipping away at the cross-section of federal sustainable energy programs reflects misplaced priorities and is bad for jobs, the economy, national security, and the environment.

Recognizing this, the member groups of the Sustainable Energy Coalition more than a year ago called for reversing the downward spiral of federal support for renewable energy and energy efficiency programs and instead doubling funding levels for them over the next five years.

However, given the size of the federal budget deficit, which is placing ever-greater stresses on all discretionary funding programs, the likelihood of seeing significant budget increases in the near future appear remote - even if the political environment becomes more friendly.

More likely, sustainable energy advocates will be forced to compete with supporters of many other social programs for a piece of an ever-diminishing pie. But no matter how many different ways one tries to divide and reallocate crumbs, one still ends up with crumbs.

Some Budgetary Solutions

Other than hoping that the economy will somehow rebound or that the nation's tax policies or military expenditures will be revised, the only likely long-term prospect for expanding the fiscal resources available for renewable energy and energy efficiency programs may be through developing a new, independent revenue stream.

One option is to revisit proposals that have been considered but set aside due to strong political opposition. These would include some form of a carbon and/or other pollution-based tax or oil import fee. Similarly, higher royalty fees on federal lands leased for oil and natural gas drilling might be an option. Another would be a revolving fund that reinvests savings from federal energy efficiency programs (e.g., the Federal Energy Management Program) back into sustainable energy R&D programs. And yet another is to reprogram back into renewable energy and energy efficiency a portion of the nearly $6 billion from a variety of programs such as "clean coal," advanced nuclear power generation, non-renewable hydrogen, and carbon sequestration that the White House has cobbled together and euphemistically labeled as its "Climate Change Initiative."

Barring some such policy change, however, the prospects for sustaining, if not expanding, the funding levels for federal energy efficiency and renewable energy programs in FY06 and beyond appear daunting.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ken Bossong is the coordinator of the Sustainable Energy Coalition, a coalition of more than 80 national and state business, environmental, and energy policy organizations advocating increased support for energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies. The views expressed in this article, however, are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Sustainable Energy Coalition or its member groups.
-------
_____________________________________________

It seems in order to finance their wars and their complicit and corrupt corporations, these jokers are ruining our country on every front. Take from here, take from there, fill their contracted corporate coffers and private offshore banking accounts with millions and billions, give nods and winks to this and that corporation who then fund the campaigns, take from the elderly, take from the children, and generally run roughshod over our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, and continue to degrade our society and our biosphere and our ability to work and live. It's maddening!

BC :mad:

[Boomer Chick]

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/030105EA.shtml

Bush Plans Further Cuts in Forest Protections
BushGreenwatch

Tuesday 01 March 2005

Next Monday marks the final day for public comment on a proposed new Bush Administration rule that will restrict public input and environmental review of forest management plans under the National Forest Management Act (NFMA). It will also rescind wildlife protections that were established decades ago under President Reagan.

Under the Bush Administration's proposed forest plan rules, it would no longer be necessary to complete an environmental impact statement, a basic requirement of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

This is not the first move by the Bush Administration to reduce the role of NEPA in forest policy. Its "Healthy Forest Initiative" eliminated nearly all environmental reviews for logging in the public's forests. (1)

Environmental impact statements ensure that forest decisions are based on the best available science. By removing this step, an important tool for forest managers to evaluate plans for potential harm to water, wildlife, old-growth and roadless areas is eliminated.

Wildlife viability requirements will also be negated, meaning that viable levels of native fish and wildlife populations will no longer need to be maintained. The Forest Service will also be relieved of duties to monitor wildlife populations. Instead, forest plans need only a "framework to provide the characteristics of ecosystem diversity in the plan area." (2) Disclosure, and even studying, cumulative impacts of management activities across the national forests will be unnecessary under the new regulations.

The proposed changes also ignore the role of science in the decision-making process. Under the new rules, agency officials are actually given the discretion to ignore scientific evidence and recommendations. (3)

Environmentalists point out that lack of reliable public information regarding environmental consequences of forest plans - combined with increased discretionary power over the level of scientific involvement in forest planning - will mean an open door for corporate incursions into timber, mining and oil resources in our nation's forests.

"This is yet another example of the Bush administration putting industry profits ahead of the interests of Americans," Randi Spivak, executive director of the American Lands Alliance, told BushGreenwatch. "The new rules reject science and demonstrate blatant disregard for public input. Americans care deeply about the places where they hike, fish and relax, and want to protect these places for future generations. With Bush¹s allegiance to the timber, oil and gas industries, what is now a forest heritage could soon be history."



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sources:
(1) Sierra Club alert.
(2) WildLaw white paper.
(3) Ibid.

[foot_soldier]

Update: Senate panel vote on "Clear Skies" legislation:

March 2, 2005
US Senate Panel Delays Emissions Vote Again
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/29785/story.htm

WASHINGTON - Sen. James Inhofe, chairman of the US Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, again delayed a panel vote on a Bush administration plan to cut utility air pollution on Tuesday after four panel members asked for more data.

After abruptly delaying a vote on Feb. 16 because of a deadlocked panel, Inhofe postponed a vote planned on Wednesday on a version of the Bush administration's "Clear Skies" plan. Inhofe moved the vote to March 3.

Four panel members seen as possible swing votes asked the Bush administration and Inhofe for more data on how the plan compares with competing legislation and current law.

"It is imperative that we have the most up-to-date information available in order to effectively negotiate a bipartisan compromise," said a letter to Inhofe signed by Democrats Max Baucus of Montana, Tom Carper of Delaware and Barack Obama of Illinois and Republican Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island.

Lawmakers met with Inhofe late on Tuesday and "realized they were closer than they thought on many issues" but needed more time, an Inhofe spokesman said.

Inhofe says time is running short to advance the plan, which would cut three major pollutants spewed by coal-burning power plants by 2016 through a cap-and-trade system.

A delayed panel vote could dampen the bill's prospects for passage this year.

Inhofe says he faces a March 15 deadline to get the legislation passed by his panel because of a consent decree the Bush administration signed with the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group challenging the rules.

"The point at which we couldn't move further in the committee is March 15," Inhofe's spokesman said.

Panel Democrats and Chafee oppose the bill because it lacks a limit on carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas linked to climate warming.

They also say the legislation's targeted emission cuts are too weak and give utilities too much time to install expensive pollution-reduction equipment.

Inhofe has modified his bill in a bid to lure votes moving up the deadline by two years and offering $650 million for utilities to voluntarily install equipment to reduce carbon emissions.

REUTERS NEWS SERVICE

[foot_soldier]

Re: White House Budget Slashes Clean Energy:

Excerpt from the above-posted article:

.....Other than hoping that the economy will somehow rebound or that the nation's tax policies or military expenditures will be revised, the only likely long-term prospect for expanding the fiscal resources available for renewable energy and energy efficiency programs may be through developing a new, independent revenue stream.

One option is to revisit proposals that have been considered but set aside due to strong political opposition. These would include some form of a carbon and/or other pollution-based tax or oil import fee. Similarly, higher royalty fees on federal lands leased for oil and natural gas drilling might be an option. Another would be a revolving fund that reinvests savings from federal energy efficiency programs (e.g., the Federal Energy Management Program) back into sustainable energy R&D programs. And yet another is to reprogram back into renewable energy and energy efficiency a portion of the nearly $6 billion from a variety of programs such as "clean coal," advanced nuclear power generation, non-renewable hydrogen, and carbon sequestration that the White House has cobbled together and euphemistically labeled as its "Climate Change Initiative.".....END excerpt.

I've been following the development (sic) of the Bush administration's "clean coal cum CO2 sequestration" plan for over two years now. It looks to me like this (plan) is about it in the "Climate Change Initiative" and "Energy Policy" departments. Note that after over four years this country still does not have a cohesive energy policy. In my strong opinion, US "energy policy", such as it is, has been crafted behind closed doors and is primarily the handiwork of Dick Cheney and his fossil fuel industry buddies.

Cheney, Energy Connections, Kleen Koal
http://www.ariannaonline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13797

***
Boomer Chick wrote:
.....It seems in order to finance their wars and their complicit and corrupt corporations, these jokers are ruining our country on every front. Take from here, take from there, fill their contracted corporate coffers and private offshore banking accounts with millions and billions, give nods and winks to this and that corporation who then fund the campaigns, take from the elderly, take from the children, and generally run roughshod over our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, and continue to degrade our society and our biosphere and our ability to work and live. It's maddening!
I couldn't agree more. There is not one superfluous word here.

I think it's time we realized that there's no persuading "these jokers" and their supporters of the feasibility of alternative and affordable options to what they are apparently determined to ram down our throats. They don't care what we think.

THEY__DON'T__CARE.

Those who do care about what our children and their children are going to end up dealing with down the road are going to have to work around "these jokers" and stop wasting precious time and energy "debating" with them. Way too much time has already been wasted. Like about 30 years in my opinion.

[Boomer Chick]

SAD BUT TRUE!

http://www.bartcop.com/dean-unchained.jpg

Might be hope? Don't know! But we have to keep the faith! Many seers and prophets are saying that scandal will bring them down before the year is over!

BC ;)

[foot_soldier]

Re: Clear Skies...

March 3, 2005
'Clear Skies' Bill Decried in N.C.
Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=7243

March 03, 2005 — By Wade Rawlins, The News & Observer

Federal legislation would undermine North Carolina's efforts to reduce pollution blowing across the mountains from other states, businesspeople and lawmakers from Western North Carolina said Tuesday. They urged the state's congressional delegation to oppose it.

Appalachian Voices, a Boone-based regional conservation group, delivered letters signed by 300 business owners to congressional offices on the eve of a possible committee vote in Washington on the bill, representatives said at a news conference in Raleigh.

The Bush administration says the legislation, known as Clear Skies, would reduce emissions of sulfur dioxides and nitrogen oxides from power plants over the next 13 years and cap emissions of mercury. Proponents say the system would make the air cleaner at less cost to utilities.

Opponents say the legislation threatens North Carolina's emissions caps. They say it could hamper states' ability to seek pollution cuts from utilities in upwind states.

Mack Pearsall, a lawyer and real estate developer in Asheville, said North Carolina has taken steps to protect its environment because North Carolinians recognize that prosperity depends on a healthy environment.

"The very thought of having our hard-fought efforts in North Carolina gutted ... is repugnantly disheartening to me," he said.

The state's 2002 Clean Smokestacks Act requires coal-fired power plants to reduce smog- and haze-forming pollutants by three-fourths by 2013. Coal-fired plants are among the largest producers of pollutants that obscure mountain views and make breathing more difficult for people with asthma. Roughly one-third of North Carolina's 100 counties do not meet federal standards for ozone or fine particle pollution.

Sen. John Garwood, a Wilkes County Republican, said that he doesn't consider himself an environmentalist but that he supports the state's efforts to reduce air pollution because it is the right thing to do.

"It just doesn't make sense for North Carolina to support relaxing standards for other states, particularly those upwind, when our own utilities are taking the initiative and leading the nation in reducing their pollution," Garwood said.

Sen. Martin Nesbitt, a Democrat from Buncombe County, said the federal government needs to put more pressure on utilities to reduce pollution, not less. He said North Carolina desperately needs federal officials' help to get its neighbors to reduce pollution that blows into the state.

North Carolina has petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to require upwind states, such as Tennessee and Georgia, to reduce pollution that blankets North Carolina mountains in haze. In a letter to Congress, state Attorney General Roy Cooper said the proposed federal changes would weaken states' ability to file such petitions and would delay any action required on them until 2014.

In a statement, Hugh Morton, owner of Grandfather Mountain, a scenic attraction in the Blue Ridge Mountains, urged North Carolina's congressional delegation not to undercut state law.

"As I have witnessed firsthand from the vantage of Grandfather Mountain over the recent decades, air quality has gotten nothing but worse," he said.

[foot_soldier]

Re: Clear Skies:

March 4, 2005
New pollution rules would preempt 'Clear Skies'
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=AIRPOLLUTION-03-04-05&cat=WW

With President Bush's air pollution plan stalled in Congress, administration officials are preparing to impose new reductions on emissions from power plants that would undercut much of the impetus for the legislation.

As early as Tuesday, the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to finish up regulations to reduce soot and smog pollution. The EPA is also required under legal settlements with environmentalists to complete regulations to curb mercury pollution by March 15 and to finalize new rules for reducing haze and improving visibility in national parks by April 15.

The soot and smog rule is aimed in part at a long-standing battle between downwind states that are on the receiving end of pollution and upwind states that rely on aging, coal-fired plants.

The rule would cut emissions that contribute to soot by 71 percent and emissions of a key smog-forming pollutant by 65 percent in 29 Eastern states by 2015.

The EPA estimates the soot and smog rule would annually prevent 13,000 deaths and 240,000 asthma attacks. States expected to see the greatest reduction in emissions include Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

Similar soot and smog reductions were the centerpiece of Bush's air pollution plan, known as "Clear Skies." Both the regulations and the Bush plan would allow plants that cut pollution more speedily to sell "pollution credits" to plants that have a harder time meeting the reductions.

"We're still optimistic that Clear Skies can get through Congress and onto the president's desk, but we are on track to finalize the clean air interstate (soot and smog) rule by March 15," EPA spokeswoman Cynthia Bergman said. "We don't think implementing the clean air interstate rules precludes further progress on Clear Skies."

However, the smog and soot rule "can be subject to litigation and delay," Bergman said. "That's why we need ... national legislation."

A vote on the bill has been delayed three times by the Senate Environment and Works Committee for lack of support.

Opponents of Clear Skies said the soot and smog reductions were being used to divert attention from other provisions favorable to industry.

"Clear Skies is really a smokescreen to slide in rollbacks to the Clean Air Act," said Michael Shore, an air pollution expert with Environmental Defense.

The mercury rule is expected to closely resemble the mercury provisions in the initial version of Clear Skies, which called for a 70 percent reduction in emissions by 2018. However, those reductions wouldn't be achieved until 2025 because of the trading of emissions credits permitted under the bill, according to EPA estimates.

The bill's chief sponsor, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., offered to shorten the mercury deadline to 2016, but has been unable to pick up additional support for the bill.

Power companies say the equipment to reduce mercury emissions isn't commercially available and an early deadline would lead to rate increases for consumers. However, EPA officials privately told the power industry that plants could reduce emissions by as much as 90 percent in three years if ordered to do so..... (continued)

[foot_soldier]

Re: Clear Skies:

March 8, 2005
Originally published in the New York Times Editorial section
Clearing America's Skies
http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/03/07/opinion/edskies.html

President George W. Bush's Clear Skies initiative appears dead for this session of Congress. This is no great loss. Clear Skies is a bad bill, which in the name of streamling current law would offer considerably more relief to the industries that pollute the air than to the citizens who breathe it..... (continued)

[foot_soldier]

Re: Clear Skies:

March 8, 2005
EPA Distorted Mercury Analysis, GAO Says
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15244-2005Mar7.html?sub=AR

The Environmental Protection Agency distorted the analysis of its controversial proposal to regulate mercury pollution from power plants, making it appear that the Bush administration's market-based approach was superior to a competing scheme supported by environmentalists, the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office said yesterday.

Rebuking the agency for a lack of "transparency," the report said the EPA had failed to fully document the toxic impact of mercury on brain development, learning, and neurological functioning. The GAO urged that these problems be rectified before the EPA takes final action on the rule.

The analysis follows a critical report by the EPA's inspector general that suggested that agency scientists had been pressured to back the approach preferred by industry.

"The administration is showing a blatant disregard for the health of children, the health of women of childbearing age, but they are also showing a blatant disregard for the law," said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), who had asked for the analysis. "To not change would be the height of arrogant disregard."

Cynthia Bergman, an EPA spokeswoman, said the agency is on track to issue the mercury rule by March 15. She said the final rule would provide comparisons between the competing options that the GAO said were missing.

"GAO has characterized the process as incomplete before the process has even finished," she said. She defended the EPA's development of the rule as "an open and inclusive" process.

The administration has publicly endorsed a cap-and-trade approach that would allow trading in pollution credits among power plants, rather than imposing limits on every plant. Environmental groups are so disenchanted with the trading proposal that they have stopped fighting it -- they want the agency to issue the rule in order to fight it in court.

"Their cap-and-trade system for mercury involves trading in toxic chemicals, which has never been done before," said Angela Ledford, director of the umbrella advocacy group Clear the Air. "The agency's mercury rule first failed the public health test. It then failed the science test. Now, it's clear that EPA cooked the books."

At issue is a proposal that the EPA issued in January last year to reduce the 48 tons of mercury emitted annually by U.S. power plants. The contentious issue has drawn 680,000 written public comments.

The proposal offered two options, but the administration made clear it preferred the trading system, which would achieve a 29 percent reduction in mercury emissions by 2010 and a 70 percent reduction by 2018. This plan allowed companies to trade pollution credits -- creating financial incentives that would prompt companies first to focus attention on reducing pollution in the dirtiest plants.

The alternative was what the GAO called the "technology-based" approach -- to cap pollution at every plant.

The administration said the cap-and-trade plan would reduce more pollution, in part because it would invite less litigation, and blend nicely with a cap-and-trade proposal to control sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, called the Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR).

But the GAO report said the EPA had tipped the scales to favor the market-based plan. For example, the EPA found that capping pollution at every plant would result in savings of $13 billion -- the difference between the estimated savings in health costs and the pollution control costs.

The EPA said the cap-and-trade approach provided a much larger benefit of $55 billion to $68 billion, but the GAO said yesterday that this analysis included the benefits from implementing the CAIR rule.

The report also suggested that the EPA had used dubious methods to assess the monetary value of mercury reductions. Although the approach was "quick and low-cost," the GAO said the method was characterized by great uncertainty and should have been treated "as a last-resort option."

Environmentalists and some agency staff have charged that the EPA strategy was ultimately designed to make President Bush's signature air pollution bill, dubbed "Clear Skies," palatable to Congress. The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee has been deadlocked for weeks over that bill, which essentially combines the cap-and-trade proposals of the mercury and CAIR rules.

Had the EPA properly compared the cap-and-trade approach with the technology-based approach, it would have been obvious that "Clear Skies" is deeply flawed, environmentalists said.

Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, an industry group, said the cap-and-trade approach to mercury pollution is a historic advance that is being undersold by environmentalists.

"Only in Washington would someone have the temerity to tell you a mandated 70 percent reduction constitutes a rollback," he said. "It takes a unique brand of moxie to say the next generation of air pollution controls reduces air pollution controls."

Mercury is a toxic metal linked to a broad range of health problems, especially in children and pregnant women. Mercury contamination of fish has led health authorities to warn women of childbearing age to reduce consumption of certain types of fish, and to stop eating fish such as shark and swordfish. In the short term, environmentalists and industry advocates agree that controlling individual exposure to mercury is the only way to limit health risks.

[jayreynolds]

The state's 2002 Clean Smokestacks Act requires coal-fired power plants to reduce smog- and haze-forming pollutants by three-fourths by 2013. Coal-fired plants are among the largest producers of pollutants that obscure mountain views and make breathing more difficult for people with asthma. Roughly one-third of North Carolina's 100 counties do not meet federal standards for ozone or fine particle pollution..

The Carolina Journal has done an interesting series of articles on North Carolina's air quality:
http://www.carolinajournal.com/exclusives/series.html?id=12

[foot_soldier]

September/October 1998
Think Tank Monitor

Heritage Clones in the Heartland
Local think tanks' "research" comes pre-digested

By Lawrence Soley
http://www.lightrailnow.org/facts/fa_00023.htm

Also at FAIR.org (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting)
http://www.fair.org/extra/9809/local-think-tanks.html

Conservative think tanks patterned after the highly successful Washington, D.C.-based American Enterprise Institute (1996 revenues: $16.5 million) and Heritage Foundation (1996 revenues: $28.7 million) opened up around the United States during the 1980s and early 1990s almost as quickly as Scholotzky's Delis. Like Scholotzky's, they have now reached saturation. Most states have one, some have several. For example, Colorado has the Center for the New West and the Independence Institute; Illinois has the Rockford Institute and the Heartland Institute; and New York has the Manhattan Institute and the Empire Foundation for Policy Research.

Similar think tanks can be found in the South (e.g., Georgia Public Policy Foundation and John Locke Foundation in North Carolina), Northeast (e.g., Yankee Institute for Public Policy Studies in Connecticut and the Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research in Massachusetts), Northwest (e.g., Seattle's Washington Institute for Policy Studies and Portland's Cascade Policy Research Institute), Great Lakes Region (e.g., Wisconsin Policy Research Institute and Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, Michigan), and Southwest (e.g., New Mexico Foundation for Economic Research and Arizona's Goldwater Institute for Public Policy Research).

( ... )

For example, between 1994 and 1996, the Washington Institute released State Government Privatization, the Mackinaw Center released Privatization Opportunities for States and an annual Michigan Privatization Report, the Georgia Public Policy Foundation released Privatization: Dispelling the Myths, the Commonwealth Foundation for Public Policy Alternatives in Pennsylvania released Privatization of Government Services in Pennsylvania, and the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute released The Privatization of Milwaukee County's Airport, Private Tollways for Wisconsin, as well as Privatizing Welfare in Brown County, Wisconsin. Each describes the advantages of replacing government-provided services with private enterprise.

These reports are released and promoted as though they are social scientific research, even though they have about as much in common with real research as Scholotzky's Delis have in common with real delicatessens--which is very little. Real research is systematic, blind reviewed, and employs a replicable methodology; these think tank "studies" are none of these. In contrast with research, think tank reports are produced to shift public policy and public opinion to the political right.

As the John Locke Foundation reports (Our First Five Years), it "uses a variety of methods to affect public policy debate in North Carolina. First, the Foundation issues comprehensive 'policy reports'...and their findings are publicized throughout the state in print, broadcast and public appearances.... In addition, the Foundation distributes a weekly op-ed, 'Carolina Beat,' to daily and weekly newspapers." The purpose of local think tanks is to influence policy using city, regional and state media, whereas their D.C.-based colleagues try to influence policy using national media.

The well-funded local think tanks are able to wield influence out of proportion to their significance. The John Locke Foundation spends nearly a half-million a year producing and promoting its policy positions using money donated by Martin Marrietta Corp., RJR Nabisco and other well-heeled patrons. The Wisconsin Policy Research Institute received more than $4.4 million from the conservative Bradley Foundation through 1995 (Journal Sentinel, 10/4/95). The money is spent on research reports and a glossy magazine, Wisconsin Interest, that are distributed free to the media and to public libraries..... (continued)

***
The John Locke Foundation - John Hood, President
http://www.johnlocke.org/about/staff.html

[foot_soldier]

March 18, 2004
North Carolina moves to shield its air from pollution by 13 other states
http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/apnews/stories/031804/D81D0EBO0.shtml

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - North Carolina's attorney general moved Thursday to shield his state's air from pollution by coal-burning power plants in 13 other states, asking the federal government to force those states to cut emissions.

Roy Cooper said the out-of-state polluters are interfering with North Carolina's ability to meet national air quality standards, despite the state's success at cleaning up its own pollution under its Clean Smokestacks law.

"We in North Carolina are cleaning up our air, but we believe our neighboring states need to do it too," Cooper said at a news conference held at Reedy Creek Nature Park north of Charlotte.

Cooper's petition to the federal Environmental Protection Agency targets coal-fired plants located in Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.

"The time has come for EPA to level the playing field and make other states take responsibility for their contributions to this problem," North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley said in a statement.

Several states targeted in the petition criticized it as unnecessary. Illinois environmental officials questioned why their state was included at all.

"Much of it is based on outdated information," Dave Kolaz, the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency's air pollution bureau chief, said Thursday. "In the end, when better information is used they will conclude Illinois doesn't impact North Carolina in the manner they conveyed."..... (continued)

***
November 19, 2004
Southern Environmental Law Center
EPA Fails to Protect North Carolina Air; Faces Legal Action
http://www.ems.org/nws/2004/11/19/epa_fails_to_pro

Raleigh, NC – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has failed to act on a petition from North Carolina that the agency enforce the Clean Air Act and force 13 other states to clean up dirty power plants that are polluting North Carolina’s air, the Southern Environmental Law Center said today. SELC sent EPA a 60-day notice of its intent to file a citizen suit against the agency on behalf of Environmental Defense.

“EPA has dragged its feet for eight months while the health of 8 million North Carolinians is threatened every day by air pollution that doesn’t recognize state lines,” said Marily Nixon, SELC Air Quality attorney. “Cleaning up power plants in the upwind 13 states will go a long way toward reducing this health threat.”

SELC’s action coincides with action taken by North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper, who is expected to file a similar notice with EPA today.

Both notices stem from the petition filed in March by North Carolina that asked EPA to force 13 upwind states to reduce sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides emissions from power plants, the single largest source of air pollution in the region. North Carolina is the first southern state to file a “126 petition,” a seldom used tool under Section 126 of the Clean Air Act that has been successfully used in the past by northeastern states to force midwestern and southern states to curb ozone-forming emissions. Under the law, the EPA was required to act on North Carolina’s petition by November 18 and has yet to take action.

“Through both recent legislation and the filing of this petition, North Carolina has taken innovative steps to protect its citizens from dangerous power plant pollution. Unfortunately, EPA has refused to do its part by requiring upwind states to quit polluting North Carolina’s air, forcing us to take legal action,” said Michael Shore, senior air policy analyst for Environmental Defense..... (continued)

***
March 8, 2005
Utility to Spend $500 Million on Cleanup
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/08/politics/08enviro.html?oref=login

WASHINGTON, March 7 - The Justice Department said on Monday that it had reached a settlement with Illinois Power over Clean Air Act violations that would require the utility to spend $500 million on new pollution controls and to pay $9 million in fines, the largest penalty imposed on a power company for excessive emissions.

The installation of control devices at five plants is intended to reduce overall levels of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides by 54,000 tons a year. In addition, the company agreed to spend $15 million to work on the harmful effects of past emissions.

"The citizens of Illinois could not have asked for a better result," said Thomas L. Sansonetti, assistant attorney general for the Environment and Natural Resources Division at the Justice Department.

The settlement was the eighth since 1999 in cases in which the government has sued utilities, saying they violated the "new source review" provisions of the Clean Air Act. Seven other cases are in litigation involving a requirement to install pollution-reducing equipment any time plants undergo major renovations or expansions.

The agreement was announced two days before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is scheduled to try, for the fourth time, to complete a bill, the Clear Skies Act of 2005, that would set new limits on pollutants and dates to meet them. Backers of the measure say it would eliminate the need for suits that use new source review rules to bring plants into compliance.

The Clear Skies Act, a major overhaul of the Clean Air Act, is scheduled for a vote on Wednesday. But new source review remains a major point of disagreement.

Republicans on the committee, as well as industry officials, argue that the Clear Skies bill, by setting specific targets for pollutants, would let producers know precisely when their plants needed to reach compliance, eliminating the need for suits.

The proponents say settlements like the one with Illinois Power illustrate how complicated and costly litigating emission standards can become. After the suit was filed, Illinois Power became Dynegy Midwest Generation. It has since been acquired by the Ameren Corporation and operates under the name AmerenIP.

"The results today took over six years to achieve and came at significant cost," said Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, a trade group. "By contrast, adopting a Clear Skies proposal sets predictable standards and ensures compliance in a cost-effective and relatively litigation-free manner."

Democrats on the committee and environmental groups say the standards would be too low and take too long to go into effect, making suits on new source review an effective tool against violators.

"This proves that the government saves lives by enforcing the Clean Air Act, not by wasting resources trying to weaken it," David McIntosh, a lawyer with the Natural Resources Defense Council, said..... (continued)

[foot_soldier]

No surprise here.

Another "Climate Change As Religious Belief" proponent:

December 30, 2004
Carolina Journal Online
Why They Cling to Their Faith
John Hood
http://www.carolinajournal.com/articles/display_story.html?id=2068

RALEIGH – Earlier this week, I wrote about the futility of the Kyoto Protocols, and more generally of proposals to instigate dramatic reductions in the global emissions of carbon dioxide in an attempt to forestall climate change. In my discussion, I used the term “ecological theology” to describe the position of those who believe, on the basis of rather weak and questionable" evidence, that human-induced global warming poses a major threat to human health and safety.

I used the term for a reason. Those who embrace the global-warming hypothesis do so on faith, not because it truly fits the available data and has the potential of being proven wrong by subsequent data (two elements usually associated with the scientific method). Why would so many people – activists, politicians, journalists, and others – feel such a deep-seated need to believe this?

I don’t think I am mischaracterizing their sentiment. For example, I don’t feel any deep-seated need to disbelieve the existence of dangerous global warming. Provide me with credible analysis suggesting the possibility, and I’ll consider it. That doesn’t mean I’ll automatically agree with draconian measures to head it off – it could still be that the cost of remedying the problem will exceed the cost of adjusting to a somewhat-warmer climate – but I’d be willing to weigh the costs and benefits.

There appears to be no parallel willingness of global-warming apostles to doubt their creed. I think the explanation lies with The God that Failed..... (continued)

The erudite Mr. Hood apparently doesn't put much stock in people's direct experience of their environment, either, and instead, cavalierly attributes their responses to the below-referenced poll to what the poor, deluded things are hearing on the news:

February 10, 2005
Wrong on Pollution Facts -- Again
http://www.carolinajournal.com/jhdailyjournal/display_jhdailyjournal.html?id=2189

Excerpt:

.....As I wrote in a previous column, the John Locke Foundation commissioned a statewide poll last year in which one of the questions probed whether voters thought North Carolina’s air quality had gotten better or worse during the past few decades. The correct answer, irrefutably, is "better." But only 18 percent of North Carolinians knew that, while 63 percent said that air quality had worsened. One of the reasons for this gap between reality and perception is that North Carolinians read, hear, or see stories such as the one from Wednesday..... END excerpt.

Talk about Perception Management. This guy's a professional.

[jayreynolds]

Talk about Perception Management. This guy's a professional.

I see you weren't able to criticize his facts. Hey, tough luck, he's a citizen with just as much right to say what he wants as you. The big difference between 'footsoldier and the Jhn Locke Foundation is that they didn't hide behind a pseudonym, haven't claimed to have been working with NSA/CIA associated people to create a hoax claiming that contrails are military jets spraying barium titanate. 'footsoldier', however, is guilty of all of those things................

Ask yourself why she has failed to clean up her act.................???

[halva]

This Hood also shares a characteristic with another hood called Raynolds. He builds his arguments on assumptions stolen from others. Without acknowledgement. He steals the anti-religious vocabulary of the Left in order to attach pejorative connotations to the word "theology" and so as to make insinuations against "ecological theology" on the basis of assumptions that are not his own.

Probably the guy is a churchgoing Christian, and would not feel that there is anything wicked about "theology" as such.

In other words he is yet another FRAUD, a fake, a hypocrite, a swine, a person to whom I do not acknowledge the right of free speech, for reasons I have many times explained.

[halva]

In the legal regime of the citizen's democracy of the future this misappropriation of the assumptions of others will be a felony, recognized as a form of theft and subject to penal sanctions as slander and libel is today.

[jayreynolds]

This Hood also shares a characteristic with another hood called Raynolds. He builds his arguments on assumptions stolen from others. Without acknowledgement. He steals the anti-religious vocabulary of the Left in order to attach pejorative connotations to the word "theology" and so as to make insinuations against "ecological theology" on the basis of assumptions that are not his own.

Probably the guy is a churchgoing Christian, and would not feel that there is anything wicked about "theology" as such.

In other words he is yet another FRAUD, a fake, a hypocrite, a swine, a person to whom I do not acknowledge the right of free speech, for reasons I have many times explained.

Hold on, there, Hoss. What in the world are you talking about? I know you better than your mother, but even I can't understand your vituperously abstruse stuff.

For starters, what is this supposed to mean-
"He builds his arguments on assumptions stolen from others. Without acknowledgement."

Which assumptions, which arguments, and from whom?
You are NOT making much sense here, Wayne. Maybe that's your intent, or maybe you're just having an 'episode'?

[foot_soldier]

Re: Clear Skies:

March 10, 2005
Senate Impasse Stops 'Blue Skies' Measure
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20314-2005Mar9.html

President Bush's bid to rewrite federal air pollution laws ground to a halt in Congress yesterday when Republicans were unable to overcome objections in the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that the bill would weaken the central pillars of the nation's environmental protection framework.

The setback is a body blow to the White House's prized plan and a victory for environmentalists who have long said that the "Clear Skies" bill is a euphemism for rolling back safeguards at the behest of industry.

The Environmental Protection Agency will issue new regulations today and next week to set limits on air pollutants, but the rules will not change the provisions in the Clean Air Act that would have been revised by Clear Skies.

The panel deadlocked over fundamental differences on how to balance the desire for cleaner air with the cost to industry and jobs.

Republicans accused Democrats of obstructing effective and common-sense legislation to deny Bush an important environmental victory. Democrats, joined by Sen. James M. Jeffords (I-Vt.) and Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee (R-R.I.), said the negotiations were conducted in bad faith, that the pollution-control targets were too low and that the bill contained irresponsible loopholes.


The 9 to 9 vote that blocked the bill from going to the Senate floor followed weeks of postponements marked by lowball tactics and high drama. Although neither side said the bill is doomed, they remain far apart, and future negotiations will have to bridge deep mistrust and radical disagreements.

"This bill has been killed by the environmental extremists, who care more about continuing the litigation-friendly status quo and making a political statement about carbon dioxide than they do about reducing air pollution," said Chairman James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.).

Jeffords retorted: "This legislation denies plain scientific evidence of human health damage from toxic air pollution and of global warming from greenhouse gas emissions."

A central disagreement was whether the bill -- originally aimed at reducing the emissions of acid-rain-causing sulfur dioxide, smog-forming nitrogen oxides, and toxic mercury from coal-fired power plants and other industries -- should also address carbon dioxide emissions linked to global warming. That issue cost the Republican majority Chafee's crucial vote, said Sen. George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio).

"Chafee thinks this is the biggest problem facing the world, and the chairman [Inhofe] has a sign in his office saying this is a hoax," Voinovich said as he threw up his hands. With other Senate business piling up, Democrats demanding new analyses that could take months and next year's elections looming, Voinovich and Inhofe indicated the odds are long that Clear Skies would return to the agenda anytime soon. "There is a limited window here," Voinovich said..... (continued)

[halva]

Hold on, there, Hoss. What in the world are you talking about? I know you better than your mother, but even I can't understand your vituperously abstruse stuff.

For starters, what is this supposed to mean-
"He builds his arguments on assumptions stolen from others. Without acknowledgement."

Which assumptions, which arguments, and from whom?
You are NOT making much sense here, Wayne. Maybe that's your intent, or maybe you're just having an 'episode'?

Raynolds, just as you steal assumptions of the Left that association with the CIA is something disreputable, and on that ground attack Footsoldier (inaccurately and slanderously, from what I gather) from the starting point of the views of others, as if you were a Commie, so this other hood Hood attaches pejorative connotations to 'theology' (as something inimical to science or some such conception) as if he were not a religious person himself and on that basis, again deploying the assumptions of others - 'ironically' - as if he were an anti-religious rationalist, deplores 'ecological theology'.

My aim is not to get you to change habits of mind which you doubtless cannot change. It is merely to attract attention to them, so that they can be suitably analysed and legal measures prepared to make them an offense like slander or libel.

[foot_soldier]

March 11, 2005
E.P.A. Sets Rules to Cut Pollution
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/11/politics/11enviro.html

WASHINGTON, March 10 - The Environmental Protection Agency announced new rules on Thursday to cut air pollution in the eastern half of the United States, in one of its most ambitious efforts to control soot and ground-level ozone.

The new regulations, the Clean Air Interstate Rule, aim at emissions from power plants, which account for much of the nation's air pollution. The goal, when the regulations go fully into effect in 2015, is to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides, which create ground-level ozone, by more than 60 percent from 2003 levels and to reduce sulfur dioxide, which forms soot, by more than 70 percent.

Regulations for a third pollutant, mercury, are scheduled to be announced next week.

( ... )

As a regional program that applies to 28 Eastern states and the District of Columbia, the interstate rule is directed at helping states develop their own solutions, subject to approval by the environmental agency.

In the East, dirty air in one state is often produced by a plant in another. That does not generally happen in the West..... (continued)

The last paragraph copied above is worth thinking about for reasons which should be obvious.

[foot_soldier]

Re: Clear Skies:

March 10, 2005
‘Clear Skies’ Deadlock Good News for Public Health, Environment
http://www.ems.org/nws/2005/03/10/clear_skies_dead

The tie vote that kept the Clear Skies bill bottled up in the Senate Environment Committee was good news for public health and the environment, REP America, the national grassroots organization of Republicans for environmental protection, said today.

“The Clear Skies bill is seriously deficient. While we strongly support harnessing market forces to improve environmental performance, Clear Skies takes an unbalanced approach that would take too many risks with the health of millions of Americans,” said Jim DiPeso, REP America policy director.

“The bill fails to address global warming, which poses serious economic, security, and environmental risks to America and the world. We cannot continue standing on the sidelines either pretending that the problem does not exist or making up weak excuses that reducing heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions is economically impossible,” DiPeso said.

The Clear Skies bill’s other serious defects include:

* Elimination of “New Source Review,” an important tool for cleaning up aging power plants. While application of New Source Review could be simplified, Clear Skies throws the baby out with the bath water.
* Weakening of the Clean Air Act’s “good neighbor” provision, which enhances the ability of states to protect their citizens from upwind pollution blowing in from other states.
* Weakening of Clean Air Act provisions to protect national parks from pollution that mars scenic vistas and harms park plant life.
* Excessively lax deadlines for power plants to comply with pollution reduction standards.

“We’ve come a long way cleaning up the nation’s air in the past 35 years, but there is still more work to do. We cannot afford to slack off with a weak bill that takes too many chances with public health and the environment. We are relieved that the bill failed to clear the committee, and we especially wish to thank Senator Lincoln Chafee, R-RI, for casting the deciding vote against it.”

[foot_soldier]

A few words from Rhode Island. By the way, the New England region is commonly known as "the tailpipe of the US" since, prevailing winds being what they are, a great deal of airborne pollution is transported into this region from the midwest and near-southwest. Something to consider at any rate:

March 24, 2005

Where is the 'morality' in Clear Skies Act? - Editorial
http://www.eastbayri.com/story/286447642880003.php

For those voters with "moral values" in mind, if the public health and well-being is not also considered a "moral value," it should be.

Where is the moral value in provisions of the Bush administration's "Clear Skies Act" whose provisions are directly harmful to the people of our country and our state. For example, in Rhode Island, the poorly named "Clear Skies Act" will negatively impact our public health, environmental well being and our economy. The provisions include the following:

* Stripping states of their authority to take action against pollution blowing in from upwind sources. In Rhode Island, much of our air pollution is generated out-of-state by our neighbors. Prevailing winds bring pollution from coal-fired power plants in other New England states and the Midwest to Rhode Island. It is crucial that Rhode Island retain the ability to take action against states with dirty power plants. It is a critical tool for the Ocean State as it strives to makes its air clean and safe.

* Repealing Clean Air Act protections that require every power plant to reduce mercury and other toxic air pollutants to the maximum extent (90 percent) by 2008. Coal-fired power plants are a major source of mercury pollution. Mercury is a dangerous neurotoxin. Even exposure to low levels can permanently damage the brain and nervous system and cause behavior changes. Children and developing fetuses are most at risk. Despite the fact that Rhode Island has no coal-fired power plants, we still have a severe mercury contamination problem. The mercury levels for fish in Rhode Island waters are so high that the state has issued an advisory warning that pregnant women, women of childbearing age and children avoid consuming any fish caught in our waters.

* Repealing the Clean Air Act's New Source Performance Standards, which require new plants to install state-of-the-art pollution controls. Rhode Island is currently a serious nonattainment area for the one-hour National Ambient Air Quality Standard for ozone and has until 2007 to change that. As stated by the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, our ability to come back into attainment with the federal air standards is contingent upon the full enforcement of the New Source Performance Standards as currently structured. Modifications to this program could very well impair the state's ability to meet federal air quality standards as required by law.

* Ignoring carbon dioxide as a pollutant that contributes to global warming, Global warming pollution threatens to erode Rhode Island's coast, put our shoreline residents at risk, and disrupt our $3 billion beach tourist industry. From sea level rise, increasing temperatures and shifting rain patterns to a greater occurrence of insect-borne diseases, heat related deaths and greater extremes in weather, Rhode Island has a great deal to lose from an economic, public health and environmental perspective.

The solution is to strongly enforce the Clean Air Act rules that require each and every power plant to meet modern pollution standards, implement real pollution caps on SO2, NOx, mercury, and CO2, and shift toward cleaner renewable energy sources.

We can stop the Bush administration's dirty air bill right now if we can secure Senator Chafee's vote in opposition to "Clear Skies," but we need to raise the visibility of the public health and environmental impacts of the President's bill in the media.

For the sake of "morality" and our future, we must reduce power plant pollution and protect the beauty of our country and the health of its people.

Jeff Toste

Providence

[foot_soldier]

April 1, 2005

Northeast battles its status as US 'tailpipe'

Concerned about mercury levels, states sue the EPA and consider creating tough new standards of their own.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0401/p02s01-usju.html

A slew of Northeastern states, claiming that the Bush administration's new rules on mercury pollution do too little, too late, have initiated challenges demanding tougher restrictions.

Long considered one of the most contaminated regions, as pollutants travel "downwind" from the industrial Midwest and beyond and settle in New England, many of these states already have tough regulations in place but say much more needs to be done.

In the most recent move, New Jersey and eight other states - five of them in New England - filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the federal government, contending that the new rule fails to protect children and pregnant women from toxins released into the air.

The suit is the latest example of states joining forces to take on the Bush administration over standards that they claim favor business and undercut environmental protections.

In New Hampshire last week, a bill passed in the Senate that would reduce emissions from state plants more aggressively than the Environmental Protection Agency mandates - following similar moves in at least three other states, including Massachusetts and Connecticut. In Maine, politicians are harshly criticizing the rule and demanding more information; a coalition there has called for a congressional inquiry.

High regional standards

New England has traditionally charted its own course in environmental policies and has played a key role in implementing and demanding stricter regulations. "The region is unfortunate enough to be called the end of the tailpipe in the US," says John Walke, director of the clean air program at the Natural Resources Defense Council. "[Tuesday's] lawsuit is just a continuation of that leadership."

Mercury, released into the air as a byproduct of coal-fired power plants, is considered highly toxic. Nearly every state in the US has issued advisories warning of mercury levels in recreationally caught fish. Some scientists estimate that over 600,000 children are born each year with neurological problems because of mercury exposure.

The March 15 regulations - which aim to reduce current mercury emissions of 48 tons a year by 70 percent in the year 2018 - does not cut emissions across the board but gives companies the option of buying pollution credits from other plants that have not reached their maximum emission allotment.

In the lawsuit, attorneys general in New Jersey, California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, and Vermont claim the EPA fails to fulfill its obligations under the Clean Air Act, in part because it exempts power plants from the strictest controls for emissions - allowing companies to participate in such cap and trade. Many environmentalists say the scheme could cause "hot spots" of mercury deposits, and claim the EPA has ignored technology that could reduce emissions by up to 90 percent.

Opponents refute the idea that such technology could currently be implemented and say a well-planned cap-and-trade program is the best way to reduce overall emissions, because the biggest polluters have the greatest financial incentive to sell credits. "They are the low hanging fruit," says Frank Maisano a spokesperson of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, a coalition of coal-fired utility companies. He points to a program, based on the same model, that has successfully reduced the emissions that cause acid rain.

A spokesperson at the EPA wrote in a statement that the US is the first country to regulate mercury emissions from coal- fired power plants, and that even if all emissions were eliminated here, the problem would remain unsolved, since some 80 percent of the fish Americans consume comes from overseas.

Still, many expect the most recent lawsuit by nine attorneys general to be just the beginning of a flurry of litigation. "States are going to sue because there is a final rule that is woefully inadequate, that won't protect anyone or anything," says Brownie Carson, the executive director of the Natural Resources Council of Maine.

Tradition of environmental battles

New England is versed in such battles already. Mr. Walke says the region acted to tackle acid rain before the federal government did and has formed coalitions to address the spread of global warming.

That is fine, says Mr. Maisano, who notes that under the new rules states have the control to set their own restrictions on emissions or forbid companies to participate in the cap and trade program.

But others say that argument misses the point. In Massachusetts, which requires that emissions be reduced by 85 percent by 2008, up to 75 percent of the pollution comes from out-of-state, says Ed Coletta, a spokesperson at the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection. "We are doing our part," he says, but the state still isn't protected from the winds that carry airborne mercury from the West and elsewhere.

***
AIRMAP New England
http://airmap.unh.edu/data/data.html?site=AIRMAPTF

[Boomer Chick]

Basic Home Page of NRDC:

http://www.nrdc.org/globalWarming/default.asp

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 28, 2005
Press contact: Jon Coifman, 212-727-4535 or 917-575-1885 (cell)
If you are not a member of the press, please write to us at nrdcinfo@nrdc.org or see our contact page.

NORTHEAST STATES LEAD REGIONAL GLOBAL WARMING INITIATIVE


A healthy economy, healthy people and a healthy environment go together. And today nine northeast states are the cutting edge with a groundbreaking new initiative to ensure a healthy future for us all.

The plan offers a new, market-based strategy that will modernize the electric power system using clean, efficient technology to reduce the heat-trapping pollution responsible for global warming. Their approach will reward innovative business performance, create new jobs, and help solve one of our most challenging economic and environmental challenges.

Participating states are Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont. Maryland, the District of Columbia, Pennsylvania, and five Canadian provinces are close observers in the process.

Known among insiders as the "Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative," the plan will establish limits on carbon dioxide emissions and create a trading system allowing companies that beat the standards to sell their extra credits to other firms, opening up a win-win opportunity and lowering overall compliance costs.

The initiative will help consumers and businesses operate more efficiently and cost effectively, stimulate regional economic development and drive investment in new, clean energy technologies. It will also help companies in the region earn a competitive advantage as federal global warming pollution limits come closer to reality.

Each participating state will have its own emissions limit, and will regulate only the power plants located within its boundaries. The coalition will likely first agree on an overall regional pollution limit, and then assign a portion of that amount to each state. Interstate trading will occur when a state agrees to recognize allowances issued by other states.

The program would allow states outside of the Northeast to participate as well, and could be extended to cover not just power plants but all stationary global warming pollution sources, and additional greenhouse gases such as methane and sulfur dioxide.

The states involved in the initiative expect to jointly develop a "model rule" by June 2005, which could then be implemented by each state. So far, their work has focused on:

identifying modeling tools to determine the potential impacts of an emissions cap on electricity prices and the economy generally;


launching a broad stakeholder working group;


collecting data on emissions;


launching a website (http://www.rggi.org);


and identifying and discussing key policy issues.

NRDC is working with participating states to ensure the effectiveness of the rule, which will serve as an important model for future federal programs and will lay the groundwork for a federal initiative.

The Natural Resources Defense Council is a national, nonprofit organization of scientists, lawyers and environmental specialists dedicated to protecting public health and the environment. Founded in 1970, NRDC has more than 1 million members and online activists nationwide, served from offices in New York, Washington, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

***

:)

[foot_soldier]

April 9, 2005

2 Sides Do Battle in Court on Whether E.P.A. Should Regulate Carbon Dioxide
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/09/politics/09emissions.html?oref=login

WASHINGTON, April 8 - A federal appeals court heard arguments on Friday in a five-year battle over whether the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from motor vehicles.

In arguments on a suit that consolidates a number of legal actions, opposing lawyers cited the same words of the Clean Air Act and drew entirely different conclusions.

The plaintiffs are 12 states, a territory, 3 cities and 13 nongovernment organizations, most of them environmental groups.

They have been seeking to have the E.P.A. explain why the Clean Air Act does not empower the agency to regulate carbon dioxide emissions for global climate considerations. That position of the Bush administration is a reversal of Clinton administration policy.

Joining the government's side in the case are 11 states that oppose carbon dioxide regulation and 19 industry groups, including those representing car makers, refiners and chemical companies.

The arguments Friday, before a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, reflected a major fault line in current environmental battles: the extent to which carbon dioxide can be linked to global warming.

The Bush administration has taken a skeptical view of global warming and its effect. It has resisted international treaties, like Kyoto, that govern some polluting countries and not others, and has worked to protect industries that would be adversely affected if carbon dioxide were regulated.

Exchanges between the judges and the lawyers focused on whether Congress intended for the agency to regulate carbon dioxide even if its link to global warming is uncertain and adverse effects on humans cannot be accurately predicted.

In effect, the arguments came down to Congress's meaning when it wrote into Section 202 of the act that the E.P.A. administrator "shall" regulate any air pollutant from any new vehicles that "may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare."

"You don't have to look far to find the authority that the E.P.A. says is missing," said the plaintiffs' lead lawyer, James R. Milkey, an assistant attorney general of Massachusetts. Ignoring a broad reading of the act, Mr. Milkey said, "is like saying a stop sign is not specific enough."..... (continued)

[Boomer Chick]

California leads the way in fuel cell development:

http://www.cafcp.org/

More later....

[Boomer Chick]

April 9, 2005

2 Sides Do Battle in Court on Whether E.P.A. Should Regulate Carbon Dioxide
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/09/politics/09emissions.html?oref=login

WASHINGTON, April 8 - A federal appeals court heard arguments on Friday in a five-year battle over whether the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from motor vehicles.

In arguments on a suit that consolidates a number of legal actions, opposing lawyers cited the same words of the Clean Air Act and drew entirely different conclusions.

The plaintiffs are 12 states, a territory, 3 cities and 13 nongovernment organizations, most of them environmental groups.

They have been seeking to have the E.P.A. explain why the Clean Air Act does not empower the agency to regulate carbon dioxide emissions for global climate considerations. That position of the Bush administration is a reversal of Clinton administration policy.

Joining the government's side in the case are 11 states that oppose carbon dioxide regulation and 19 industry groups, including those representing car makers, refiners and chemical companies.

The arguments Friday, before a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, reflected a major fault line in current environmental battles: the extent to which carbon dioxide can be linked to global warming.

The Bush administration has taken a skeptical view of global warming and its effect. It has resisted international treaties, like Kyoto, that govern some polluting countries and not others, and has worked to protect industries that would be adversely affected if carbon dioxide were regulated.

Exchanges between the judges and the lawyers focused on whether Congress intended for the agency to regulate carbon dioxide even if its link to global warming is uncertain and adverse effects on humans cannot be accurately predicted.

In effect, the arguments came down to Congress's meaning when it wrote into Section 202 of the act that the E.P.A. administrator "shall" regulate any air pollutant from any new vehicles that "may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare."

"You don't have to look far to find the authority that the E.P.A. says is missing," said the plaintiffs' lead lawyer, James R. Milkey, an assistant attorney general of Massachusetts. Ignoring a broad reading of the act, Mr. Milkey said, "is like saying a stop sign is not specific enough."..... (continued)

I don't have a subscription to the New York Times.... could you post the rest of it, please, FS?

Thanks!

[foot_soldier]

April 9, 2005
2 Sides Do Battle in Court on Whether E.P.A. Should Regulate Carbon Dioxide

Continued from above:

But the section makes no specific mention of carbon dioxide as a pollutant. Jeffrey Clark of the Justice Department argued that if Congress had intended for the agency to regulate tailpipe emissions - a quantum shift in policy that would have an enormous economic effect - the lawmakers would have used language more comprehensive.

Judge A. Raymond Randolph, whose questions suggested that he did not believe a clear link had been established between carbon dioxide and global warming, cited another section of the Clean Air Act that says the language referring to effects on public health includes "climate." Judge Randolph told Mr. Clark, "I can't imagine anything turns" on a single word.

"We agree," Mr. Clark responded.

Mr. Clark compared the current case to an effort by the Food and Drug Administration under President Bill Clinton to regulate tobacco as a drug. That effort was resolved when in 1997 the Supreme Court upheld the tobacco industry's opposition, ruling that Congress had never intended for tobacco to be considered a drug.

But Mr. Milkey called the comparison erroneous, declaring that if tobacco came under F.D.A. jurisdiction, "it would be banned, and here nobody is banning anything."

All three judges engaged in aggressive questioning of the lawyers, although it was difficult to determine how the panel might ultimately vote. While Judge Randolph seemed rough on Mr. Milkey, Judge David S. Tatel was equally hard on Mr. Clark. The third judge, David B. Sentelle, was skeptical of assertions from both sides, leading lawyers for the environmental groups to wonder after the arguments if he could be the swing vote.

Regulation of carbon dioxide emissions has been a major national environmental issue since President Bush first won election. Despite a campaign promise in 2000 to include carbon dioxide as an air pollutant that should be regulated, the administration has resisted regulations on such emissions from mobile as well as stationary sources. Conflict over carbon dioxide is one major reason Congress has not passed new antipollution legislation for power plants.

Motor vehicles account for about a quarter of the nation's carbon dioxide emissions. Yet automakers have fought efforts to force them to build more efficient engines, pointing to the extraordinary costs of altering their factories to meet any new standards. The courtroom audience Friday included lobbyists from leading car manufacturers.

The judges are expected to take as long as six months to issue an opinion, after which an appeal is almost certain. END

***
Four years ago:

March 14, 2001

Bush decides against carbon dioxide regulations
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/bush010313.html

WASHINGTON, March 13 -- Backing off a campaign pledge, President Bush told Congress today he will not regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.....

The original ABC News article no longer exists at the original link. I printed a hard copy of the ABC News article on March 14, 2001. I will paste it, in its entirety, into the next post. It is still available online at the Garden State EnviroNet web site.

[foot_soldier]

March 13, 2001

BUSH DECIDES AGAINST CARBON DIOXIDE REGULATIONS

Date: 010313
From: http://www.nj.com/

REVERSING COURSE, BUSH DECIDES AGAINST CARBON DIOXIDE REGULATIONS

By Scott Lindlaw, Associated Press, 3/13/01

Washington (AP) - Backing off a campaign pledge, President Bush told Congress Tuesday he will not regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.

The decision, outlined in a letter sent to a Republican senator, came after furious lobbying from the coal industry. It was a blow to conservationists who see curbing emissions of such "greenhouse gases" as key to reducing global warming.

The letter cited skyrocketing energy costs, particularly in the West, as one reason for Bush's about-face.

Bush said he supports a "comprehensive and balanced energy policy that takes into account the importance of improving air quality."

"I do not believe, however, that the government should impose on power plants mandatory emissions reductions for carbon dioxide, which is not a 'pollutant' under the Clean Air Act," Bush wrote to Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb.

Bush's letter came a week after Hagel and three other GOP senators - Larry Craig of Idaho, Jesse Helms of North Carolina and Pat Roberts of Kansas - raised concerns directly to the president about recent administration comments on climate change and regulating carbon
dioxide.

The decision drew sharp criticism from the Natural Resources Defense Council. "He's turned his back on the weight of all the alarming scientific consensus that global warming is real, and that carbon dioxide is the main cause," said David Doniger, a spokesman for the
environmental group.

Greenhouse gases - primarily carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels like coal and oil - are widely believed to trap heat in the atmosphere, causing the phenomenon known as global warming.

Vice President Dick Cheney told senators of the administration's decision at a weekly policy gathering Tuesday, said an official on Capitol Hill.

Bush promised in the campaign to treat carbon dioxide emissions as pollutants, and Christie Whitman, his Environmental Protection Agency administrator, said last month that the administration was strongly considering such regulations.

Bush pledged last year to require electric utilities to "reduce emissions and significantly improve air quality." The legislation Bush proposed would have established "mandatory reduction targets for emissions of four main pollutants: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, mercury and carbon dioxide."

Explaining the shift, Bush aides said they did not realize there was a contradiction when the president's energy policy was released during the campaign - that the Clean Air Act does not identify carbon dioxide as a pollutant.

In the campaign, Bush said he would move to "phase in the reductions" of all four "pollutants ... over a reasonable time period." Cheney said the campaign position was in error.

He told senators that Whitman was being "a good soldier" in repeating the campaign pledge.

Bush also cited an Energy Department study in December that said regulating carbon dioxide would lead to higher electricity prices, particularly in the hard-hit West. It would "lead to an even more dramatic shift from coal to natural gas for electric power generation and significantly higher electricity prices compared to scenarios in which only sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides were reduced," Bush wrote.

Bush's energy task force, chaired by Cheney, is trying to develop a national energy policy.

Carbon dioxide is emitted whenever fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas are burned. It also is found in everyday products such as cola and is emitted when people breathe.

Bush has argued that the nation's energy woes can largely be addressed by tapping domestic supplies of fossil fuels.

"Coal generates more than half of America's electricity supply," Bush wrote. "At a time when California has already experienced energy shortages, and other Western states are worried about price and availability of energy this summer, we must be very careful not to take actions that could harm consumers," he said.

The Bush administration has been lobbied aggressively by energy industry officials who vehemently oppose regulating carbon dioxide. They question its role in global warming.

Whitman said last month that Bush recognizes the importance of the challenges posed by climate change, a subject she said has been discussed as part of the administration's emerging energy plan.

"There's no question but that global warming is a real phenomenon, that it is occurring," Whitman said after a Senate hearing on other environmental issues.

Bush pledged in the letter to continue seeking ways to reduce global warming through market incentives and other techniques. At the same time, however, he questioned the science behind global warming.

"My administration takes the issue of global climate change very seriously," Bush wrote. But later in the letter, he cited the "incomplete state of scientific knowledge of the causes of, and solutions to, global climate change."

[foot_soldier]

April 10, 2005

Dispute awaits environmental bill
Plan restricts rules stricter than EPA's
http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050410/NEWS02/504100377

INDIANAPOLIS -- Legislation that would prohibit state agencies from enacting environmental rules tougher than federal standards is headed for a face-off in the General Assembly, with a senator calling it "absolutely horrible public policy."

Supporters contend it is needed to prevent excessive industrial regulation that can hamper economic development, but environmentalists strongly oppose it, as does Sen. Beverly Gard, chairwoman of the Senate Energy and Environmental Affairs Committee.

Gard said the bill poses a threat to public health because it would bar the state's air pollution and water pollution control boards from adopting rules or standards more stringent than U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards.

"We don't often do things that are more strict than the federal law, but to say that absolutely under no circumstances you can't do it is absolutely horrible public policy," said Gard, R-Greenfield.

"There may be some situations where you need to do that."

The provisions in the bill, which deals with regulations affecting small businesses, were originally contained in a bill sponsored by state Rep. David Wolkins, R-Winona Lake.

That bill and about 130 House bills died last month when House Democrats staged a walkout in a partisan dispute with majority Republicans over other issues. But the Wolkins provisions were revived by inserting them into a Senate bill..... (continued)

[jayreynolds]

April 10, 2005

Dispute awaits environmental bill
Plan restricts rules stricter than EPA's
http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050410/NEWS02/504100377

INDIANAPOLIS -- Legislation that would prohibit state agencies from enacting environmental rules tougher than federal standards is headed for a face-off in the General Assembly, with a senator calling it "absolutely horrible public policy."

Supporters contend it is needed to prevent excessive industrial regulation that can hamper economic development, but environmentalists strongly oppose it, as does Sen. Beverly Gard, chairwoman of the Senate Energy and Environmental Affairs Committee.

Gard said the bill poses a threat to public health because it would bar the state's air pollution and water pollution control boards from adopting rules or standards more stringent than U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards.

"We don't often do things that are more strict than the federal law, but to say that absolutely under no circumstances you can't do it is absolutely horrible public policy," said Gard, R-Greenfield.

"There may be some situations where you need to do that."

The provisions in the bill, which deals with regulations affecting small businesses, were originally contained in a bill sponsored by state Rep. David Wolkins, R-Winona Lake.

That bill and about 130 House bills died last month when House Democrats staged a walkout in a partisan dispute with majority Republicans over other issues. But the Wolkins provisions were revived by inserting them into a Senate bill..... (continued)

This controversy goes back to "State's rights" which is an inherent conflict of our federal structure dealt with by the Tenth Amendment to the US constitution:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

I suppose it would be the same greens that are wringing their hands who would squall loudly if a State decided to lower their environmental standards compared to that of the federal EPA?

Hopefully, this will go to the supreme court for a judgement. Likely, their opinions will test the case on the interste commerce clause:

Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution empowers the United States Congress "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes."

I predict that since pollution enters the general, uncontrolled environment of the several states and crosses state borders, it would be found that federal regulations trump state, and any stricter state laws in hindrance of interstate commerce are null and void.

[foot_soldier]

April 13, 2005

States take clean-air measures into their own hands

Although the Bush administration has backed off carbon dioxide regulations, others are pushing the issue.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0413/p03s01-uspo.html

Officially, and in contrast to many other countries, the United States remains unconvinced about global warming, reluctant to force steps that would reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse cases suspected of impacting Earth's climate.

Despite Bush administration skepticism, however, climate change is emerging as a major political issue.

Prominent Republicans are among those lawmakers pushing legislation that would start US reduction of greenhouse gases in line with the international Kyoto treaty. In federal court, a dozen states seek to force the Environmental Protection Agency to reduce heat-trapping greenhouse gases. Shareholder groups are pressuring corporations to consider the implications of climate change. And from coast to coast, states and communities - on their own and in groups - are implementing plans to "think globally, act locally" on climate change by regulating transportation, power generation, and energy use.

As a presidential candidate in 2000, George W. Bush promised that he would deal with carbon dioxide as a pollutant related to climate change. Once elected, and after hearing complaints from industry sources involved with crafting the administration's energy policy, he reversed that position and ordered the EPA to interpret the Clean Air Act as if it didn't apply to carbon dioxide.

Mr. Bush's "Clear Skies" proposal, designed to reduce the sulfur dioxide,