Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
Good news for clean air today. The Environmental Protection Agency announced that it is reconsidering the Bush administration's heavily criticized 2008 air quality standards for ground-level ozone pollution (smog). This step followed a lawsuit and reconsideration petition filed by the Natural...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
Kudos to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson for announcing today that EPA would abandon a change imposed by the Bush administration that politicized the agency's responsibility to define clean air based solely on the best understanding of science and health information. Jackson...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
"Surely you must be joking." -- Ted Striker, Airplane I knew the Bush administration's midnight environmental regulations were bad. Rushed, sloppy, deregulatory favors to polluters, illegal. All of that. But my latest favorite falls into the "Surely you must be joking"...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
"'Wake up, Alice dear!' said her sister; 'Why, what a long sleep you've had!' 'Oh, I've had such a curious dream!' said Alice." Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. When Alice awoke from her phantasmagorical journey to Wonderland, having...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
This morning a coalition of environmental and public health groups issued a report entitled Transition to Green, providing priority environmental recommendations for the Obama administration transition team. I co-chaired the committee responsible for developing priority recommendations for EPA, and also chaired...
Posted by John Walke
It’s that time of the month – for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to issue yet another decision overturning a Bush EPA rule for violating the plain language of the Clean Air Act. Yesterday’s decision in Sierra...
Posted by John Walke
In late May, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied EPA and utility industry requests to rehear the original court panel’s unanimous decision overturning EPA’s so-called Clean Air Mercury Rule (CAMR) for power plants. I said at...
Posted by John Walke
I usually don’t bother responding to utility lobbyists’ air pollution talking points. Much less re-publish their propaganda, thereby adding to the abuse of reason, facts, and good sense in the world today.But I’m making an exception today, because the latest talking...
Posted by John Walke
Imagine that you’re taking your young son or daughter on a weekend camping trip that you both have been planning and looking forward to for the past year. Your car is all packed the night before and you’re planning to...
Posted by John Walke
And now the story can be told of the Bush administration's 8 year long agenda for air pollution from power plants.Once upon a time, to be exact in the year 2000, then-Governor Bush ran for the office of the Presidency...
Posted by John Walke
I testified this morning before the clean air subcommittee of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee at a hearing about the D.C. Circuit's July 11th decision overturning EPA's "Clean Air Interstate Rule."This is the second in a series...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , The Media and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
“The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”– Hamlet Act 3, scene 2, 230. On Friday July 11th, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down the Bush administration’s signature air quality accomplishment, the “Clean Air Interstate Rule.” CAIR...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
This week a state court judge in Georgia issued the first court ruling in the country concluding that power plant developers and state regulators must establish permit limits for CO2 pollution from new coal-fired power plants, based upon "best available control...
Posted by John Walke in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
The Clean Air Act reserves to "the judgment of the [EPA] Administrator" alone, as a matter of law, the revision of the secondary “public welfare” standard for ozone and other air pollution. This legal standard must be based on what...
Posted by John Walke
The AP's Joe Hebert has written a powerful article on a scandal emerging from EPA in the wake of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit unanimously overturning EPA's mercury rules for power plants. The AP article appeared...
