White House Refused to Open EPA Email on Pollutants; Tougher Mileage Rules, Billions in Benefits Disregarded
By Scott Doggett June 26, 2008
Storm, what storm? As long as the email's closed, we're good. Right?
By Scott Doggett, Contributor
The White House didn't like the conclusions the Environmental Protection Agency reached in a Supreme Court-mandated report on pollutants, so it simply refused to open the email containing those conclusions, according to The New York Times.
Instead, the Bush administration has pressured the agency into releasing a watered-down report that does not contain recommendations. Among the omissions: an analysis showing that tougher automotive emissions regulations could produce $500 billion to $2 trillion in economic benefits.
White House spokesman Tony Fratto refused to comment on discussions between the White House and the EPA. "It's the EPA that determines what analysis it wants to make available" in its documents, he said in denying White House meddling, the Times reported Wednesday.
But senior EPA officials reportedly said White House officials explicitly told them the document would not be opened. As it sat unread in at least one White House inbox, Congress passed a law mandating a 35 miles-per-gallon standard by 2020. The report urged a stricter 37.7 mpg by 2018. The document was the EPA's answer to a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that required the agency to determine whether greenhouse gases represent a danger to health or the environment, the EPA officials reportedly told the Times last week.
This week, more than six months later, the EPA is set to respond to that order by releasing a watered-down version of the original proposal that offers no conclusion. Instead, the document reviews the legal and economic issues presented by declaring greenhouse gases a pollutant.
Economic Benefits Nixed
Over the past five days, the officials reportedly said, the White House successfully put pressure on the EPA to eliminate large sections of the original analysis that supported regulation, including the finding that regulation would bring a big economic benefit over the next three decades.
Both documents, as prepared by the EPA, "showed that the Clean Air Act can work for certain sectors of the economy, to reduce greenhouse gases," one of the senior EPA officials reportedly said. "That's not what the administration wants to show. They want to show that the Clean Air Act can't work."
Not a single administration decision has supported the regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act or other environmental laws.
The new document, a road map laying out the issues involved in regulation, is to be signed by EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson and published as early as this week. Johnson has repeatedly denied a White House role in his decision to reject California's waiver request.
Email Is News
The derailment of the original EPA report was first made known in March by Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman of California, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The refusal to open the email had not been made public.
In early December, the EPA's draft finding that greenhouse gases endanger the environment used Energy Department data from 2007 to conclude that it would be cost effective to require the nation's motor vehicle fleet to average 37.7 miles per gallon in 2018, the Times reported, citing government officials familiar with the document.
About 10 days after the finding was left unopened by officials at the Office of Management and Budget, Congress passed and President Bush signed a new energy bill mandating an increase in average fuel-economy standards to 35 mpg by 2020.
The day the law was signed, Johnson rejected the unanimous recommendation of his staff and denied California a waiver it needed to regulate the greenhouse-gas emissions of vehicles sold in the state, saying climate change required global, not regional, solutions.
A Special State
California's regulations would have imposed tougher standards. Under federal law, it is the only state allowed to develop its own air regulations, but others can adopt California's rules if they don't like the federal rules set by the EPA.
So far, 13 states representing some of the nation's most populous regions – and largest new car markets – have opted to follow California's rules if, or when, the EPA finally grants its blessing.
Both presumptive presidential nominees – the GOP's John McCain and the Democrats' Barack Obama – have said their administrations would let the state proceed
.
On Tuesday, a judge denied an automotive industry request for a court order giving it extra time to comply with California's state-imposed limits on greenhouse gas emissions if the state ever wins federal approval to do so.
The House Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming, led by Democratic Rep. Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, has been seeking the discarded EPA finding on the dangers of climate change.
Simultaneously, Waxman's committee is weighing its response to the White House's refusal to turn over subpoenaed documents relating to the EPA's handling of recent climate-change and air-pollution decisions. The White House last week asserted a claim of executive privilege over the documents.
In an interview Sunday, Fratto said the committee chairmen did not understand the legal precedent underlying executive privilege. "There is a long legal history supporting the principle that the president should have the candid advice of his advisers," he said.
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Photo illustration by Scott Doggett
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