Small provision in Energy Bill guts Clear Air Act

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Fri, 15 Apr 2005 20:12:42 -0700

[Zepps_News] Small provision in Energy Bill guts Clear Air Act

 

 

 

 

Clean Air Change Is Built Into Bill

By MICHAEL JANOFSKY

 

Published: April 16, 2005

 

ASHINGTON, April 15 - Deep in the energy bill that was approved by a

House committee this week, under a section titled " Miscellaneous, " is a

brief provision that could have major consequences for communities

struggling to clean up their dirty air.

 

If it becomes law, it would make one of the most significant changes to

the Clean Air Act in 15 years, allowing communities whose air pollution

comes from hundreds of miles away to delay meeting national air quality

standards until their offending neighbors clean up their own air.

 

The provision could especially affect states like New York, which has

some of the nation's dirtiest air, and other Northeastern states that

have always had difficulty meeting federal standards for ozone, a

leading cause of smog, because much of any state's pollution originates

in states to the south and west.

 

Under the new provision, the " downwind " states would not be required to

meet clean air standards until the " upwind " states that were

contributing to the problem had done so. Currently, states can get more

time but only if they agree to added cleanup measures.

 

Proponents of the measure in Congress, as well as a spectrum of industry

groups, say that the change would give state and local governments the

flexibility and discretion they urgently need to deal with air pollution

from distant sources. Otherwise, they would have to impose much stricter

limits on pollution from local sources, including power plants,

factories and automobiles.

 

But House members who fought against the measure, and other opponents,

say flexibility and discretion are just other words for delay, saving

money for industry and posing risks for millions of people living where

the air does not meet health-based standards.

 

Opponents also say that the new provision would undermine a muscular

rule announced last month by the Environmental Protection Agency, the

Clean Air Interstate Rule, which sets new power-plant emissions for

three major pollutants for the eastern half of the United States. One of

those pollutants, nitrogen oxide, is cooked by sunlight into ozone, or

smog.

 

Representative Joe L. Barton, Republican of Texas, chairman of the House

Energy and Commerce Committee and author of the provision, added the

same provision to the House energy bill in 2003 when House and Senate

leaders began negotiations on a final bill. The effort failed over other

issues, and it remains unclear whether the provision would remain in a

final bill this time.

 

Mr. Barton said in an interview it was not his intent to weaken the

Clean Air Act, which sets national pollution standards, nor to undermine

the interstate rule, which addresses windblown issues by requiring

states to meet the same emission standards for power plants as an aid to

reducing overall emissions.

 

Rather, he said, he wanted to restore the E.P.A.'s ability to grant

extensions to areas that could demonstrate that they could not control

their own pollution - a right the agency assumed it had, and acted on,

during the Clinton administration until three federal courts ruled that

such discretion violated the Clean Air Act.

 

" I'm trying to make the law more implementable, more common sense, " said

Mr. Barton, who represents a district south of Dallas. " I live in the

real world, where it's a lot tougher to meet arbitrary standards in an

area that's growing and where more people are driving cars and trucks. "

 

" Even my adversaries would admit that I'm not trying to abolish

standards or gut the Clean Air Act, " he added. " I'm just trying to find

a more realistic solution to a real-world situation. "

 

It is a solution that has been warmly embraced by the National

Association of Manufacturers, the Electric Reliability Coordinating

Council and other trade groups. " We're clearly in support of any kind of

flexibility, " said Bryan Brendle, an official with the manufacturers

organization.

 

But Mr. Barton's adversaries argue that his approach poses unintended

consequences, including an invitation for local communities that have

not met air quality standards to use the extra time to put off reducing

emissions from sources inside their own borders. They say Mr. Barton's

provision could delay improvements by 10 years as one area waits for

another, which waits for another - a prospect that Mr. Barton disputed.

 

" Bottom line, no longer will there be any incentive for states or

municipalities to clean up more air pollution, and the E.P.A. has no

ability to force them to do it, " said Representative Tom Allen, a Maine

Democrat whose motion to kill the Barton provision failed by a 29-to-19

committee vote, largely along party lines.

 

Mr. Allen said that tougher air quality standards announced by the

environmental agency since the failure of the 2003 energy bill and the

new interstate rule made Mr. Barton's provision unnecessary and " would

lead to a lot more asthma than is needed. "

 

John Millett, an E.P.A. spokesman, said the agency had taken no position

on Mr. Barton's provision, but a high-ranking agency official, who spoke

on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for

the agency, said " a real debate " was under way among agency officials

about its potential effectiveness and its effect on the Clean Air Act.

 

Mr. Millett said: " Some people think it's a good idea. Most don't. "

--

 

Election 2004

The Triumph of the Swill

" The National Government will regard it as its first and foremost

duty to revive in the nation the spirit of unity and cooperation.

It will preserve and defend those basic principles on which our

nation has been built. It regards Christianity as the foundation

of our national morality, and the family as the basis of national

life. "

Adolph Hitler, My New World Order,

Proclamation to the German Nation

at Berlin, February 1, 1933

 

 

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