Senate Republicans attack EPA on carbon cuts at coal plantsJan 17 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Carolyn Lochhead San Francisco Chronicle
Senate Republicans attacked the Environmental Protection Agency's plan to slash carbon pollution from coal-fired power plants Thursday, saying it would damage the economy, as newly energized Democrats retorted that climate change is costing jobs in industries such as Northwest oyster beds and Utah ski resorts. Agency chief Gina McCarthy defended the EPA's proposed rules at a hearing of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, chaired by Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif. She said power plants are the largest single U.S. source of carbon pollution, and that the agency is under a Supreme Court ruling to regulate emissions under the Clean Air Act. Unchecked climate change "will have devastating impacts on the United States and the planet," McCarthy said. Climate action plan The EPA rules are the centerpiece of President Obama's climate action plan, which the administration unveiled in June after the collapse of legislation in his first term to make fossil fuels more expensive through a cap-and-trade mechanism like California's. The rules would set the first-ever limits on carbon dioxide emissions on power plants and other greenhouse gases, at levels that could discourage coal as an energy source. The plan carries out Obama's promise in his second inaugural address to move against global warming. This week Obama threatened to bypass Congress to advance his agenda, saying, "I have a pen and a phone." Committee Republicans are among the Senate's most conservative and hail largely from states with big fossil fuel industries. Committee Democrats such as Boxer are concentrated in more liberal coastal states. Republicans attack Republicans repeatedly questioned the science of global warming. Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., emphasizing his scientific credentials as an optometrist, said he would not undertake a "risky procedure ... to treat a possible problem we don't understand." Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., warned that the EPA could confiscate backyard barbecue grills and lawnmowers. Kathleen Hartnett White, former chair of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality who was called as a witness by Republicans, said the administration is trying to force unproven carbon-reduction technology on coal plants, jeopardizing the "mainstay" fuel of the U.S. economy. The hearing followed an announcement Tuesday by Boxer and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., of the creation of a Senate task force to attack climate change denial and enlist support from corporations outside the fossil fuel industry, such as soda makers Coca-Cola and Pepsi, that are worried about the future of their operations. Many jobs affected Whitehouse said jobs in coal and oil are not the only jobs that should be considered. Fishermen are no longer finding winter flounder off the coast of Rhode Island, he said. Pine bark beetles, thriving in warmer winters, have infested millions of acres of Western forests. Ocean acidification caused by carbon pollution is preventing oysters from forming shells in the Northwest, and droughts are damaging Klamath Basin farms, said Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, a rising Democratic star and the former mayor of Newark, made his committee hearing debut Thursday, declaring his belief in markets, but denouncing corporations for causing pollution and leaving taxpayers to clean up the mess. "I am all for the power of markets," Booker said, "but this idea that corporations should be allowed to privatize their profits and socialize their costs has got to stop." Carolyn Lochhead is The San Francisco Chronicle's Washington correspondent. E-mail: clochhead@sfchronicle.com http://www.energycentral.com/functional/news/news_detail.cfm?did=31236001& |