REP. RUSH PUSHES FOR COOPERATION ON AIR QUALITY BILLS AFTER COURT RULING

Tamar Hallerman
GHG Monitor
07/06/12

Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) expressed hope late last week that a recent federal appeals court ruling upholding various Environmental Protection Agency regulations related to emissions from stationary sources and the transportation sector will prompt Republicans to work more with Democrats on clean air issues. “I hope that [the court’s] decision will spur the majority party to work with our side to find constructive ways to strengthen the provisions of the Clean Air Act and to find collaborative ways to address legitimate concerns where they may exist,” Rush said during a June 29 hearing before the House Energy and Power Subcommittee, of which he is Ranking Member.

Last week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that EPA’s interpretation of the Clean Air Act is “unambiguously correct” and that the agency was correct in promulgating rulemakings to limit greenhouse gas emissions from stationary sources and automobiles. It upheld the agency’s 2009 ‘endangerment finding,’ which determined that greenhouse gases are a danger to public health, its Tailpipe Rule, Prevention of Significant Deterioration permitting program for stationary sources and its so-called ‘Tailoring Rule,’ which shields smaller point sources of emissions from being required to acquire emissions permits. During the hearing, Rush called the ruling a “resounding and unequivocal victory” for the EPA.

‘Denial and Obstructionism’

Rush said the ruling effectively refuted much of the Republican Party’s recent rhetoric surrounding climate change. “Despite the talking points that we’ve heard countless times from industry representatives appearing before this subcommittee, hopefully, prayerfully, [the] federal appeals court ruling to uphold EPA’s basis for regulating greenhouse gas emissions has deprived the majority party and their industry allies of any of their most-often repeated arguments against EPA climate regulations,” he said. Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) called the ruling a “refreshing dose of reality” and a “huge victory for science.” “All this committee tries to do is throw sand in the gears [of EPA and its climate rulemakings],” he said. “Our record is a deplorable one of denial and obstructionism. The question we should be asking is not what we can do to stop reasonable regulation, but how we can help the families whose homes are being burned in Colorado Springs and flooded in St. Petersburg and how we can help the families who are losing jobs in the coal industry because that industry is refusing to recognize reality.”

Whitfield Expresses Concern over Tailoring Rule

Republicans at the hearing, though, offered no indication that they would be willing to change their views on climate regulations or work with Democrats on any types of air quality-related legislation. Subcommittee Chairman Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) indicated that Republicans may aim to focus on EPA’s Tailoring Rule in the coming months, highlighting what he said were gray areas and raising concerns that EPA would eventually go back and lower the threshold for eligible units, creating a regulatory burden for smaller sources of emissions. Whitfield said that while the court dismissed petitioners’ arguments surrounding the rulemaking, the court did not rule on the substance of the Tailoring Rule itself. He said he was concerned that EPA would alter the permitting thresholds for the rule, eventually including smaller stationary sources of emissions such as schools or bakeries and leading to a regulatory burden that could hurt job creation. He referred to testimony from industry witnesses who spoke about the greenhouse gas regulations in a recent hearing from the American Farm Bureau Federation and the American Bakers Association who he said that the rules would harm them if thresholds are lowered. “The bottom line is that the cost of any new overly broad rules that regulate greenhouse gas in baking ovens will ultimately force American families to pay much more for baking goods and that some expansions planned by the bakers will not take place, thus reducing jobs that might have been available at this time when our economy needs them most,” he said.

EPA: Thresholds Will Not Be Revised

In her remarks to the subcommittee, EPA Assistant Administrator Gina McCarthy defended the agency’s regulatory strategy, saying that EPA is not looking to regulate smaller point sources and that it is solely focused on larger stationary sources of emissions. “EPA has designed a strategy which continues to be a deliberate common-sense approach to regulating carbon pollution, which is necessary to protect public health and welfare,” she said. “But we have found a way to do that and a way that, again, just focuses on the largest sources, and I think we have shown that time and time again not only in how we’re issuing permits in a timely way under the Tailoring Rule and how we have moved forward with the greenhouse gas new source performance standard that just addresses new power plants and in a way that we can make it consistent with the direction of the energy market and with the movement towards clean energy.” In the days following the hearing, EPA officially said it will not be revising its permitting thresholds for its greenhouse gas regulations and that it will only focus on the country’s largest stationary sources that emit at least 100,000 tons of greenhouse gases per year of CO2 equivalent. “After consulting with the states and evaluating the phase-in process, EPA believes that current conditions do not suggest that EPA should lower the permitting thresholds. Therefore, EPA will not include additional, smaller sources in the permitting program at this time,” an EPA release said.