New Limit for Smog-Causing Emissions Isn’t as Strict as Many Had Expected

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration on Thursday unveiled a major new regulation on smog-causing emissions that spew from smokestacks and tailpipes, significantly tightening the current Bush-era standards but falling short of more stringent regulations that public health advocates and environmentalists had urged.

The Environmental Protection Agency set the new national standard for ozone, a smog-causing gas that often forms on hot, sunny days when chemical emissions from power plants, factories and vehicles mix in the air, at 70 parts per billion, tightening the standard of 75 parts per billion set in 2008. Smog has been linked to asthma, heart and lung disease, and premature death.

The smog rule is the latest in a string of major new Clean Air Act pollution regulations that have become a hallmark of the Obama administration. Republicans and the coal industry have attacked the rules as job-killing regulatory overreach. In August, the E.P.A. proposed climate change regulations aimed at greenhouse gas pollution, which could shutter hundreds of coal-fired power plants. But with the new ozone rule, the Obama administration appears to have tempered its environmental ambitions and sought a politically pragmatic outcome that would sit better with business.

Even so, the E.P.A. estimated that the annual cost to the economy would be $1.4 billion, making it one of the most expensive regulations in history. But it said those costs would be vastly outweighed by annual economic benefits of $2.9 billion to $5.9 billion because of fewer premature deaths, missed days of school and work, asthma attacks and emergency room visits. Depending on the severity of their ozone problem, states and counties will have from 2020 to 2037 to meet the standards. Business opponents of the regulations will almost certainly sue to delay or stop them.

The agency’s scientific panel had recommended a new standard of 60 to 70 parts per billion, and last year, the administration released a draft proposal that would have lowered the standard to a range of 65 to 70 parts per billion. Administration officials had sought public comment on a 60-parts-per-billion plan, keeping open the possibility that the final rule could be even stricter. In President Obama’s first term, the E.P.A. administrator, Lisa P. Jackson, recommended a rule of 65 parts per billion.

Over the past year, the nation’s business and manufacturing lobbies, including the Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, Business Roundtable and American Petroleum Institute, have waged an all-fronts campaign to persuade the Obama administration to make the new standard as weak as possible. The groups were joined by dozens of mayors and local lawmakers, including many Democrats, who, in letters to the E.P.A. and the White House, said that a strict new ozone rule could lead to the closing of factories and power plants across the country.

Some Democratic governors had also urged the administration to put forth a weaker rule. Gov. Terry McAuliffe of Virginia told the White House that he would like to see the looser 70-parts-per-billion standard. Labor groups such as the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers asked the White House to keep the standard at the 75-parts-per-billion level.

The new rule, set at the weakest standard in the range recommended by the E.P.A.’s scientists, suggests that the industry groups were influential. The current E.P.A. administrator, Gina McCarthy, who served as Ms. Jackson’s assistant administrator when she drafted a standard of 65 parts per million, said that lobbying and political concerns had no impact on her decision.

“Our job is to set science-backed standards that protect the health of the American people,” she said in a statement. “Today’s action is one of the most important measures we can take for improving public health, reducing the costs of illness and protecting our children’s health.” Asked why she had settled on a significantly weaker standard than the one recommended by her former boss, Ms. McCarthy replied, “With apologies to Lisa Jackson, there’s a lot more health data available today than she had available.”

“We have 1,000 more studies that were not available to her,” she said. “Some of those studies gave us a lot more information. And we decided 70 was the standard based on the science that was available. To me, this is a significant step forward, and it’s one that’s not based on anything except science and the law.” In preparing the standard, E.P.A. officials said, the agency examined nearly 2,300 scientific studies, considered more than 430,000 public comments and held three public hearings. The industry lobbies said they were disappointed that the standard had been tightened at all, but pleased that the new rule was the least stringent of the options on the table.

“Today, the Obama administration finalized a rule that is overly burdensome, costly and misguided,” said Jay Timmons, president of the National Association of Manufacturers. “For months, the administration threatened to impose on manufacturers an even harsher rule, with even more devastating consequences. After an unprecedented level of outreach by manufacturers and other stakeholders, the worst-case scenario was avoided.”

The new rules will still require the owners of factories and power plants to install costly “scrubber” technology on their smokestacks, designed to clean out the polluting chemicals. Each scrubber can cost tens of millions of dollars. The weaker rule did not appease Mr. Obama’s Republican critics.

“Nationwide, it could lead to massive job loss and cost tens of billions annually in lost economic growth,” said Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader. “No wonder we’ve seen even the Obama administration’s traditional union allies fret publicly about ‘the detrimental impact’ these ‘extreme requirements’ would have on American jobs and the American economy.” But environmental advocates still saw the new rule as a blow.

“Disappointing is too mild a term,” said Frank O’Donnell, president of the advocacy group Clean Air Watch. “The big polluters won this time, for the most part,” he added. “This decision will tarnish the president’s environmental legacy. The national clean air standards are the heart of the Clean Air Act. This decision is heart failure.” Although environmentalists have praised Mr. Obama for many of his environmental policies, the efforts to control smog have long been a sore spot for them.

The E.P.A. had planned to release the new ozone rule in August 2011, when Ms. Jackson intended to issue the stringent rule of 65 parts per billion. Ms. Jackson, whose son has asthma, saw the smog rule as a centerpiece of her own environmental legacy. But as Republicans and powerful industry groups prepared to go on attack against the plan, Mr. Obama decided to delay its release, fearing that opposition to the regulation would hurt his re-election chances in 2012. At the time, Mr. Obama said the regulation would impose too severe a burden on industry and local governments at a time of economic distress. Ms. Jackson nearly resigned over the issue.

Posted by admin on Oct 4 2015. Filed under News Worldwide. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry