Success! EPA Regulates Greenhouse Gas Emissions
posted by: LiAnna D. 89 days ago
Thousands of Care2 members have submitted signatures to the Environmental Protection Agency in the last few years urging the U.S. government to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This week, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson took a critical first step in getting us there when she announced a new requirement that large power plants and industrial plans to get operating permits to cover the emissions, with an annual threshold of 25,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions. In order to get such a permit, the business would have to "demonstrate the use of best available control technologies and energy efficiency measures to minimize GHG emissions when facilities are constructed or significantly modified," according to an EPA press release.
Jackson explains her decision in the press release:
By using the power and authority of the Clean Air Act, we can begin reducing emissions from the nation’s largest greenhouse gas emitting facilities without placing an undue burden on the businesses that make up the vast majority of our economy. This is a common sense rule that is carefully tailored to apply to only the largest sources -- those from sectors responsible for nearly 70 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions sources. This rule allows us to do what the Clean Air Act does best – reduce emissions for better health, drive technology innovation for a better economy, and protect the environment for a better future – all without placing an undue burden on the businesses that make up the better part of our economy.
According to the New York Times, the new regulation could be in effect as early as 2011.
Care2's friends at the nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund break down just what this means:
A 25,000 ton annual carbon dioxide threshold is comparable to the emissions from:
(1) 131 rail cars of coal consumed
(2) 58,000 barrels of oil consumed, or
(3) The emissions from the annual energy use of about 2,200 homes.
It's a good first step toward establishing a strong protection for our climate. Look to the forthcoming Senate debate on the new Boxer-Kerry bill to strengthen these requirements.
Read more: epa, success, global warming, greenhouse gas, greenhouse gases, lisa jackson
comments
Very good step, but much more should be done.
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This is good news but now lets take the next step. We can't stop to celebrate when our environment our children and are at stake.
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Fantastic news - a step in the right direction - but a step none the less...I see that the boloney "science" is alive and well - but I am happy the the EPA is run by REAL scientists and that they are paying attention to the FACTS. Good job everyone who has helped make this happen through your continued hard wrok! We are making a difference :)
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The “greenhouse gas effect is a “fairy Tale”..
Any experiment to proving that the “greenhouse gas effect exist” must show that there is “back radiation “caused by properties of CO2 and other gas molecules. It has been shown by Niels Bohr in 1922 that when a gas molecule absorbs electromagnetic energy as photons from IR it causes the electrons to go to a higher energy shell in the molecule- it does not cause the gas to heat up. The individual molecule can only absorb a specific amount of energy before it is reradiated as “light energy” with the same wavelength as was absorbed. The “light energy” will be radiated in any direction ( a three dimensional model) there is no force that cause it to go back in the direction that it came from. Thus the supposed “back radiation of a very, very tiny part of the total radiation causes any addition to earth warming.
We all know that the greenhouse effect exists. The problem is the explanations of why it happen is not understood by most people. A detailed explanation is found in the work of R.W. Wood and Gerlich& Tscheuschner that explains what happens –not back radiation of IR. see the following:
http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/8430
The next big lie is that CO2 in the atmosphere will cause "acidification of the oceans' The cause of acidification may be underwater volcanos and plant decomposition not CO2 in the air.
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How do you suppose the companies impacted by rules to cap greenhouse gases are going to pay for the refitting of their plants to cap those gases? I'll tell you how. You and I, the consumers, are going to pay for it, that's how. And we're going to pay BIG! My electricity comes from a coal burning power plant. And just last month they received a 43% increase in their rates. And that's BEFORE any new regulations. And once 'cap & trade' or the EPA finish with them they'll get another huge increase. If my electric bill goes much higher I'll be standing in the welfare line for the first time in my life. And I'm a great-grandmother! As for 'global warming', I live in WV and we just experienced what was probably one of our coolest, if not THE coolest, summers on record. We didn't have a single day that reached beyond eighty nine degrees. Now if that's global warming I must say I like it!
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"Great! It's crappy science. The EPA should hang its collective head in shame at being bullied by a bunch of do-gooder dupes into classifying carbon dioxide as a pollutant. "
Bob, dude. Even the most avid, nut-job doubters are not as ignorant of climate change as your statement would suggest you are.
But speaking of crappy (pseudo?) science, are there any climatologists of note who are denying the effects that greenhouse gases are having on the planet due to their artificially raised levels? (read: human caused global warming)
I know there's quite a few "scientists" coming from the right-wing "think" tank realm offering their opinions on a branch of science they don't study. The righties have broken a bunch of toes kicking over rocks to find PhDs who'll advance their talking points for a fee ... they just can't seem to find any credible climate scientists who are willing to advacnce the right-wing pseudoscience garbage.
But if you can disprove what I've said, I'm all ears.
-cindy
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I am so happy we are making progress. I was at a republican meeting where they announced that our Navajo Coal Power Plant was super clean and we should write elected officials to not spend 320 million to bring it to standards. I looked it up and it is the 11th dirtiest in the nation and people living around it call it cancer alley. It only took one minute to see they were lying and what is their motivation? I obviously they must have their pockets full of money from those that run those filthy plants. They also don't care about anyone getting sick from the 19 million tons of CO2 coming from the plant as long as special
interest groups keep funding their campaigns. It will cost 1.2 billion from the coal ash plant in Tennesse and these costs are not only passed on to the consumers, the land and wildlife suffer enourmously and that becomes another project for charites to fix. There is tremendous progress in solar that haa dropped the cost of producing electricity. Try Nano Solar for new breakthroughs in the strength of solar and reduction of costs. I am sure it is only one example of many
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Great! It's crappy science. The EPA should hang its collective head in shame at being bullied by a bunch of do-gooder dupes into classifying carbon dioxide as a pollutant.
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Great!! It's one step. : D
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We aren't going to accomplish anything until we start treating those who drive privately-owned motor vehicles the way we currently treat the handful of people who smoke. Traffic smoke is the leading cause of preventable disease and death today. It's our excessive use of cars/trucks that is melting the polar ice caps and killing off the rain forests. Yet as a culture, we insist that we have the right to drive as much as we wish, and we haven't even begun to impose reasonable limits on driving.
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