Dirty Air Act - Bad for businesses, consumers, your health, etc.b

The Dirty Air Act is bad for business. If you’re unfamiliar with the Dirty Air Act, here is a Cliffs Notes version: Senators Murkowski (recently defeated in Republican primary) and Rockefeller have been pushing for legislation what would prevent the EPA from regulating emission of carbon dioxide for the foreseeable future. The EPA has the authority to enact such regulations from the Clean Air Act. These legislative efforts by Murkowski and Rockefeller have been called the Dirty Air Act.

To repeat: The Dirty Air Act is bad for business. In a letter to Congress, a group of over 270 business leaders expressed opposition to the “Dirty Air Act,” noting “the growing clean energy sector represents our greatest opportunity to restore a robust economy and create new jobs. Investors and entrepreneurs in this sector are seeking to commercialize the innovations and technologies that will secure America’s competitive position in the global economy.”

Here’s a specific example of how the Dirty Air Act would harm a business industry – in this example, the recovering auto industry. Without the national standards enacted under the Clean Air Act, automakers would have to meet the state-level standards adopted by California and at least 13 other states. The national standards are a win-win, providing more emission reductions for the environment and national uniformity for the industry—benefits that would be lost if these bills succeed. That is why the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers and the United Auto Workers support the new auto standards and why they oppose efforts to tamper with the Clean Air Act in the Senate last September. 

But it’s not just the auto industry that has a major interest in this issue. A recent report by Roger Bezdek, president of Management Information Services, Inc.  (a Washington, D.C.-based economic and energy research firm), on economic growth potential of the renewable energy and energy efficiency industry suggests that effectively tackling climate change will create up to 4.5 million new U.S. jobs by 2030 and provide the greenhouse gas emission reductions necessary to tackle climate change. Industries that will benefit from job creation span the economy from construction, manufacturing, electrical equipment, and truck transportation to farming, professional services, and even retail. Preventing regulation of carbon halts, perhaps permanently, the benefits American businesses could realize in the green economy.  

Just recently, the New York Times’ Dot.Earth blog posted an interview with Bill Gates in which he stated that “a 1 or 2 percent tax on carbon-emitting fuels could generate a large, steady stream of money for invigorating the innovation pipeline.” The Dirty Air Act legislation would function as a clog to this innovation pipeline.

While domestic businesses are awaiting a clear signal as to where the energy legislation is going to come from, other nations are capitalizing. The U.S. market is currently the largest single market for environmental technologies. But foreign markets, like China, continue to grow at a higher rate leaving the U.S. vulnerable to losing jobs overseas. Over the past decade, America's green trade balance has deteriorated significantly; moving from a surplus of $14.4 billion in 1997 to a deficit of nearly -$8.9 billion in 2008. If the U.S. is going to maintain a competitive edge, industry needs a clear signal from the government to encourage domestic production as well as domestic consumption. 

The Dirty Air Act would also harm an industry that already employs 1.6 million Americans. The Commerce Department estimates that the environmental products industry, including clean air technologies, employs 1.6 million Americans and generates approximately $282 billion in revenues and $40 billion in exports. 

The Dirty Air Act is bad for business – but the Dirty Air Act is also bad for consumers. America would use at least 450 million more barrels of oil as a result of blocking the new clean cars standards alone through this Big Oil Bailout, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. That’s more than $33.3 billion in lost savings for Americans at the gas pump (assuming current oil prices). The George W. Bush White House found that the benefits of Clean Air Act programs from 1997-2007 outweighed the costs by a range of 3 to 1 to as much as 22 to 1. The Murkowski/Rockefeller resolutions would cost consumers in individual states from $2 million in Alaska in 2016 to as much as $187 million in California, assuming gas costs the same as it does today.  On average, the resolution would cost individual states $25 million in 2016.

 The Dirty Air Act is bad for your health. Literally. The American Nurses Association (ANA) urges you to oppose Senator Lisa Murkowski’s “Resolution of Disapproval”: “Nurses recognize the major health and safety implications of climate change, including:  severe weather events and injuries from these events, increased heat-related illnesses and vector-transmitted diseases, and threatened food and water supplies.  Nurses support and advocate for public policies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the recognition of the novel, global challenges expected as climate change evolves.” http://www.usclimatenetwork.org/resource-database/american-nurses-association-opposes-murkowski-resolution

Who would write a bill that’s bad for businesses, bad for consumers and bad for your health? Fossil fuel industry lobbyists would! And they did. Two prominent industry lobbyists, Jeffrey Holmstead and Roger Martella, have been closely tied to Senator Murkowski’s effort. Holmstead, a coal and electric utility industry lobbyist, admitted to the Washington Post that he worked on the “exact phrasing” of Murkowski’s original amendment on the issue in the fall of 2009. Senator Murkowski is the # 3 recipient in Congress of money from Big Oil and the #2 recipient of money from electric utilities so far this election cycle. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has raised ethical questions about the extraordinary access that Senator Murkowski granted to top campaign contributors in the drafting of her legislation. 

Some Internet pundits argue that the EPA is “overstepping its bounds” by regulating carbon emissions. But not only does the EPA have the authority to regulate greenhouse gasses they are, in fact, compelled to regulate greenhouse gasses under the Clean Air Act.

The Endangerment Finding (the finding that greenhouse gasses are harmful) was not a form of bureaucratic over-reach by EPA but, rather, was the fulfillment of a United States Supreme Court decision, Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497 (2007). Moreover the EPA has specifically-delegated authority granted by Congress to make determinations as to which emissions are harmful. The EPA was required to evaluate, under Section 202 of the Clean Air Act, whether emissions of carbon dioxide endangered public health or welfare.  The EPA did what the Supreme Court and Clean Air Act required it do. 

Some persist in claiming that the science on greenhouse gases is inconclusive. In mid May of 2010, the National Academy of Sciences released its most comprehensive review of climate science. Its conclusions are as definitive as science gets: “Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for—and in many cases is already affecting—a broad range of human and natural systems.” The NAS went so far as to say the following: “Some scientific conclusions or theories have been so thoroughly examined and tested, and supported by so many independent observations and results, that their likelihood of subsequently being found to be wrong is vanishingly small. Such conclusions and theories are then regarded as settled facts. This is the case for the conclusions that the Earth system is warming and that much of this warming is very likely due to human activities.” 

Additionally, it is worth noting that the Clean Air Act has a successful and proven track record dating back to 1970. In 1990, the Act was revised with overwhelming bipartisan support and signed into law by President Bush.  Here are some impressive Clean Air Act successes:

Better air quality, better health protection

• Since 1990, emissions of six common pollutants are down 41%, while gross domestic product has grown 64%.  Emissions of volatile organic compounds have dropped 31%, carbon monoxide dropped 46% and sulfur dioxide dropped 50%.  
• The air in our nation’s cities is substantially cleaner than in 1990.  Data from 2005-2007 show ozone air quality improved in 99 of the 104 areas designated to be in non-attainment for the ozone NAAQS.  
• Nearly the entire country is meeting air quality targets set years ago for carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide.
• Lead levels in ambient air are 91% lower than in 1980, greatly reducing the number of children with IQs below 70 as a result of dirty air.   

Cleaner cars, trucks and transportation

• Today's new cars, light trucks, and heavy-duty diesel engines are up to 95 percent cleaner than past models, and new non-road engines such as those used in construction and agriculture have 90 percent less particulate matter and nitrogen oxide emissions.  These significant reductions have been achieved through recent CAA rules for cleaner fuels and cleaner engines.  
• Cumulatively, these standards will prevent more than 26,000 premature deaths, 19,000 hospitalizations, and 3.2 million work days lost.  The benefits of these emissions reductions have far exceeded the costs, although at the time of the 1990 amendments some had claimed that reductions of this magnitude would be infeasible.  For example, when fully implemented in 2030, EPA's vehicle and fuel rules will produce $186 billion in air quality and health benefits, with only $11 billion in costs, a nearly 16-to-1 benefit/cost ratio.  Certain rules have been found to be even more cost-effective, including EPA's Nonroad Diesel Tier 4 rule, which boasts a 40-to-1 benefit ratio.

 Combating acid rain

• Acid deposition has decreased by more than 30 percent in much of the Midwest and Northeast since 1990 under a cap-and-trade program for power plants.   This has dramatically reduced fine particle levels with benefits including about 19,000 incidences of premature mortality avoided (lives saved) annually in the US, and 1,000 in Canada .  Reducing acid rain has significantly reduced damage to water quality in lakes and streams, and healthier ecosystems and forests. The benefits of the acid rain program outweigh the costs by 40-to-1.

Reducing skin cancers by protecting the ozone layer

• The phaseout of the most harmful ozone-depleting chemicals, including CFC and halons will reduce U.S. incidences of non-melanoma skin cancer by 295 million during the period 1989 through 2075, as well as protect people from immune system suppression and eye damage leading to cataracts.

Reducing industrial toxic air pollution

• Rules issued since 1990 are expected to reduce toxic emissions from industry by 1.5 million tons a year -- many times the reductions achieved in the previous 20 years.  These air toxics rules for chemical plants, oil refineries, aerospace manufacturing and other industries also are achieving large reductions in smog-forming VOCs and particulates. Monitoring networks are extensive enough to determine that outdoor air concentrations of benzene, a carcinogen, decreased 55 percent between 1994 and 2007.

Lastly, it should be pointed out that these successes are cost-effective. The EPA valued the total health benefits through 1990 at $22.2 trillion dollars and the total compliance costs over the same years at $0.5 trillion. That’s a savings of $21.7 billion dollars over the first 20 years of the Act’s existence.