September 02, 2011 11:19 PM UTC

Obama Caves on New Smog Rules

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• by: ClubTwitty

(Not only capitulating on smog regulations, but stealing Cory Gardner’s definition of “job creation?” If political messaging were software, Obama would be slapped with a patent suit tomorrow. – promoted by ProgressiveCowgirl)

After a high level meeting between the Chamber of Commerce and William Daley, the White House has decided to throw its EPA administrator under the bus to hand the GOP another talking point victory and alienate yet more of what should be Obama’s core supporters.

From The Hill:

Frank O’Donnell of Clean Air Watch called Obama’s decision an “abject act of political cowardice.”

The backlash underscores President Obama’s delicate position as he tries to show that he’s seeking to boost jobs in the sour economy, while fending off relentless GOP claims that his environmental agenda is a brake on growth.

Since last year’s disastrous election for Democrats, the president has tried to move to the political center and repair frayed relations with the business community. That effort – epitomized by the selection of William Daley as chief of staff – has already stirred up tension with labor unions, which were among the president’s strongest backers in 2008.

Now, with the business-friendly move on the ozone rules, Obama risks alienating another group of key supporters as he embarks on a grueling reelection campaign.

The president’s capitulation is generating some positive comments, of course, from Eric Cantor, the American Petroleum Institute and the U.S. Chamber of Corporations Commerce.  Smelling blood, they all pledge to take their efforts to the next regulation and the next and the next.  

While those who are most united to defeat Obama sing his (temporary) praise, (as they sharpen their knives for the next round) some who were once among his base feel betrayed.

After Obama got elected, however, the new EPA said it basically agreed with the critics and would issue stronger rules by August 2010. At that point, the [American Lung Association] agreed to hold off on its lawsuit. “We said, that sounds reasonable to us,” says Paul Billings, the ALA’s vice-president for policy and advocacy. “We basically trusted their intentions.”

This matters to Colorado.  Ground level ozone has been increasing rapidly in the West’s gas fields:

“Rapid production of wintertime ozone is probably occurring in other regions of the western United States, in Canada, and around the world,” said Russell Schnell, lead author of a paper on the study published Sunday in the journal Nature Geosciences.

Schnell said the wintertime ozone levels in the Wyoming gas fields can quickly reach levels more than twice the 75 parts per billion the Environmental Protection Agency has set as a health threshold, leaping from 30 parts per billion to as high as 160 parts per billion in just four hours. That’s far higher than typical levels in metro Denver on a high-ozone summer day.

“It’s unbelievable,” Schnell said. “It just goes straight up as the sun comes up.”

The NOAA study found that ozone formed in the cold when emissions from gas drilling combined with a temperature inversion that trapped air – and the chemicals – close to the ground. Snow reflected enough sunlight to start the chemical reactions needed to form ozone.

While the study looked at Wyoming, similar increases have been noted in Colorado and Utah, according to the Grand Junction Sentinel (not behind pay wall):

Put together the wide-open spaces, low population and light traffic of a place like Rio Blanco County, and it wouldn’t seem like a recipe for an ozone pollution problem.

But combine ingredients such as snow cover, air-trapping temperature inversions and pollutants from sources including oil and gas development, and the western part of the county including Rangely has been the site this winter of its first-ever high-ozone alert by state health officials.

“I wish it wasn’t my county,” said county Commissioner Ken Parsons. “I live on the western end here, and I very much value having a good environment and clean air to breathe.”

… While high ozone levels in rural areas come as something of a surprise to science, especially because they are occurring in the winter, there is increasing precedence for the problem where drilling occurs in the West.

High readings have beset the western Wyoming gas development region around Pinedale. The same goes for northeastern Utah’s Uinta Basin; in fact, the Environmental Protection Agency thinks the Rangely area’s problems may be related to that basin’s because it basically sits on the basin’s eastern end, said Carl Daly, an air-quality specialist for the agency in Denver.

Early last year, ozone in the basin reached levels considerably above the EPA’s standards. The agency has raised ozone as an issue of concern when the Bureau of Land Management has considered new gas development there. But Daly said the agency can’t say with certainty whether energy development is causing the problem, or possibly something such as pollution from the Salt Lake City area. Utah State University is currently studying possible causes.

Smog, obviously, has been linked to numerous health issues, costing American consumers billions each year, more than the cost of lowering the standards as recommended by scientists. The EPA found that the new standards could have prevented 12,000 premature deaths and over 50,000 asthma attacks a year. Lisa Jackson, EPA Administrator, committed to implementing standards that followed the science, as Ezra Klein reports in the Washington Post:

But August 2010 rolled around. Still no rules. The EPA asked for a further extension. Then October. Then December. Still nothing. Then the EPA said it wanted to go back and look at the science again, just to double-check. Sure enough, EPA’s scientific review board said that a standard of 60 to 70 parts per billion was the most cost-effective way to protect public health. And EPA administrator Lisa Jackson announced that the final rules would be in line with the science.

Industry groups, obviously, weren’t pleased with this. They noted that complying with a stricter standard could cost them anywhere from $19 billion to $90 billion per year by 2020. (The EPA did, however, note that a tougher standard would yield benefits of $13 billion to $100 billion, and that the benefits would outweigh the costs.)

Because when it comes down to it, protecting private profits is more important than public health, and imposing standards that actually reflect what the science is indicating would, well, hamper those private profits.  The American Petroleum Institute doesn’t like that, so out go the standards! As E&E reports:

The revised health standard, if finalized later this year, could cause petroleum-rich sections of Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico and Utah to become so-called “nonattainment areas” for ozone, forcing state governments to revise or adopt new federally approved plans to reduce ozone precursor pollutants in the affected counties.

Better to pretend there is no problem and simply let industry regulate itself.