White House rejected EPA climate findings: Congress
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - White House officials refused to open e-mail from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that said global warming threatens public welfare and urged more fuel-efficient cars, congressional staff said on Monday.
The e-mailed documents were sent to the White House Office of Management and Budget in December, staff on the House of Representatives Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming said.
This was part of the environment agency's response to a landmark 2007 Supreme Court ruling that for the first time found that greenhouse gases can be regulated as a pollutant under the U.S. Clean Air Act.
The documents included two key findings, the staff members said in a telephone interview, speaking on condition of anonymity: first, that climate change is a threat to public welfare and second, that boosting fuel-efficiency in motor vehicles would help address the problem.
The idea that climate-warming greenhouse emissions threaten public welfare or public health is an essential part of the Clean Air Act; policymakers must find that a substance poses this kind of threat to be designated as a pollutant, and EPA said in its documents that greenhouse gases do this.
But Bush administration officials at the Office of Management and Budget said they would not accept the e-mailed documents, the congressional staff members said, after reviewing the documents and interviewing EPA workers.
'ZERO' FOR BUSH
"The EPA's conclusion and analysis in December would have received a passing grade, falling in line with both the environmental science and the law, but it is clear the enemy of progress is in the White House," said Rep. Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat who heads the committee.
"Their decision to ignore and redirect the EPA ensures the Bush administration will achieve a perfect record on global warming: a zero," Markey said in a statement.
An administration official said EPA cannot conclude that greenhouse gases are pollutants that must be controlled without giving public notice and seeking public comment. Beyond that, the official said, EPA's "informal e-mail" did not follow long-standing procedures for submitting regulations.
Three months after the EPA's e-mailed documents were rebuffed by the White House, the agency's chief, Stephen Johnson, offered an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on the subject of greenhouse pollution. This is an early and tentative step in the policy process that will likely push any action into the next U.S. presidential administration.
The Bush administration has opposed economy-wide steps to curb greenhouse gas emissions, notably carbon dioxide, which is emitted by fossil-fueled vehicles and coal-fired power plants among other sources.
Both major presidential candidates, Republican Sen. John McCain and Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, have vowed to tackle the problem if elected.
The EPA is also in a long-running tussle with the Defense Department over cleaning up toxic pollution at three military bases, and on Monday, members of Congress questioned why the Pentagon is defying orders from the environment agency.
Members of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce called on the EPA to offer a full accounting of actions taken to ensure the Defense Department cleans up Fort Meade in Maryland, McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey and Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida.
