EPA Distorted Mercury Analysis, GAO Says

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Fri, 11 Mar 2005 19:16:26 -0800 (PST)

EPA Distorted Mercury Analysis, GAO Says

 

 

 

 

 

EPA Distorted Mercury Analysis, GAO Says

 

By Shankar Vedantam

Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, March 8, 2005; Page A09

 

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.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A15244-2005Mar7?language=printer