EPA uses Clean Air Act to declare CO2 a pollutant

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The EPA continues to move forward toward establishing a domestic carbon market, entering a proposition to the White House that finds CO2 a danger to public health.  In 2007, “the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA must review whether greenhouse gas emissions pose a threat to public health or welfare, and this is simply the next step in what will be a long process that engages stakeholders and the public”, said White House spokesman Ben LaBolt.

When the Supreme Court first instructed the Bush Administration in 2007 to determine which GHGs would be regulated under the Clean Air Act, White House officials at the time opened up months of public comments on the alleged threats to public health and the unintended consequences regulating emissions would have on business.  Under the Bush Administration, the EPA sought to protect business interests more than the environment.  This proposal by the EPA under the Obama Administration can be seen as a complete shift back toward the organization’s primary responsibility; that is, the EPA will now be working more toward protecting the environment.

The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) received the EPA’s finding last Friday and did not give any indication of when it will make a decision on the issue. Most likely, a decision of this magnitude will be made slowly with plenty of signals and signs for businesses allowing them to adjust without cutting the rug out from under them.  Interest groups and environmentalists called the recent move by the EPA groundbreaking and historic.  Critics called it catastrophic and devastating.

The issue of regulating GHGs is a complex one, especially in today’s fragile economic market scene.  Critics of the move claim that regulating emissions will prevent a substantial economic recovery from happening.  These critics worry that “once the finding is made, no matter how limited, some environmental groups will sue to make sure it is applied to all aspects of the Clean Air Act”.  William L. Kovacs, vice president of environment, technology and regulatory affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, went on to definitively state that regulating GHGs “will be devastating to the economy”.

Obviously, if the White House moves on this measure, it will create a significant amount of pressure on Congress to enact a market for businesses to buy and sell emission permits.  If CO2 is ruled a pollutant, it will have to be regulated.  This move is the logical next step that comes after the EPA’s recent proposal to have the largest GHG emitters report their yearly emissions; declaring CO2 a pollutant that is dangerous to the public health under the Clean Air Act would pave the way to have Congress enact legislation that limited the amount each business can release into the atmosphere.  President Obama has voiced vigorous support for a cap-and-trade system.

It is apparent that the Obama Administration and Congress are trying to move swiftly in order to put regulatory measures in place ahead of December’s climate conference in Copenhagen.  In order to be in a position to agree to internationally binding decisions regarding energy and climate, the U.S. must have a series of domestic policies already enacted.  However, even if these policies are put in place, the U.S. may not sign an internationally binding treaty because of the ‘developing nation’ exemptions given to countries like China and India.  To allow China to essentially pollute for free would create an unfair international marketplace.

China is currently the largest emitter of GHGs; the U.S. is second.  The U.N. will begin asking China along with dozens of other ‘developing nations’ to “consider accepting their first binding targets for reducing global-warming pollution”.  This request will be officially filed in Bonn, Germany beginning March 29 and running through April 8.  This session is the first of a three part negotiating schedule to take place before the main conference in December.

China and India have rejected adopting emission regulations until industrialized nations like the U.S. start making reductions of their own. “They argue that countries in North America and Europe were responsible for most of the buildup of heat-trapping emissions in the atmosphere blamed for warming the planet, dating to the beginning of the industrial age.”  Up until now, the Bush Administration chose to use this conflict to further stalemate an international climate treaty.  The Obama Administration seems determined to enact domestic measures, showing a move within the U.S. toward limiting GHGs as a negotiating tool to encourage countries like China and India to begin doing the same.

The recent move by the EPA “is likely to have a profound effect across the economic spectrum, affecting transportation, power plants, oil refineries, cement plants and other manufacturers.  It sets the agency on a collision course with carmakers, coal plants, and other businesses that rely on fossil fuels”.  Many of these businesses fear that enforcing measures stipulated in the 40 year old Clean Air Act will be too costly.  For this exact reason, the Clean Air Act (although active for almost 40 years) has sat gathering dust on the shelf.  President Obama’s EPA has taken the initiative to pull it down, dust it off, and begin enforcing those measures that apply to today’s situation.

There is no doubt that this move by the EPA will fall under intense criticism; the entire ‘skeptics-for-hire’ industry will undoubtedly receive a huge influx of payments in order to decry global warming, declare CO2 a vegetation godsend, state the economy is not equipped to handle emission regulations, call environmentalists socialists, or all of the above.

The White House is in a difficult position; the Supreme Court has ruled GHGs pollutants, and CO2 is a GHG.  There really is no wiggle room, unless, of course, we disregard the Supreme Court’s ruling.  The Obama Administration is caught between upholding the law and being sensitive to business interests.  The most forward thinking companies have already...

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