EPA Set to Give Ethanol a Big Boost?

In the midst of a drive by Washington’s powerful ethanol lobby to expand what critics often deride as an artificially created, and government aided and promoted market for “fuel made from food,” the top administrator from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Wednesday testified before the Senate Interior and Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, telling lawmakers the agency will make a final determination late summer on allowing higher levels of ethanol to be blended into gasoline.

The ethanol industry is currently petitioning the EPA for a waiver to increase ethanol blends in gasoline from 10 percent to 15 percent, in order to create a larger market–and artificial demand–for the fuel source.

Administrator Lisa Jackson said the agency’s decision awaits completion of Department of Energy (DOE) tests on ethanol—namely, how higher ethanol blends might adversely affect vehicle engines, a long-running concern of automakers and the marine leisure industry, among others—which she expects to receive by May. “We expect that once we get that additional data, and it will be publicly available, the EPA will be in a position to move toward a final decision on the waiver, late summer in the time period,” Jackson said in response to a line of questioning by ethanol booster Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

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Tags: automakers, Ben Nelson, Department of Energy, EPA, epa waiver
Posted Mar 8th 2010 at 4:23 pm in Congress, Environment, News, Politics | 86266171 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/capitolconfidential/2010/03/08/epa-set-to-give-ethanol-a-big-boost/EPA+Set+to+Give+Ethanol+a+Big+Boost%3F2010-03-09+00%3A23%3A12Capitol++Confidential

Bully Boys Waxman and Markey Promote ‘Endangerment’ of Economy, Democracy

This week (March 3, 2010) was the deadline Reps. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) set for Mark Crisson, President and CEO of the American Public Power Association (APPA), to explain why APPA is urging Senators to support Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s Congressional Review Act resolution to veto the EPA’s finding that greenhouse gas emissions endanger public health and welfare. The Senate may vote on the Murkowski resolution as soon as next week.

Now, aside from the merits of the issue, which I’ll get into in a moment, Waxman and Markey’s behavior is out of line. Waxman and Markey (W/M) are Members of the House of Representatives. What business is it of theirs if the APPA lobbies Senators about a bill pending in the Senate? Senators can conduct their own inquiries without any assistance from W/M. And why didn’t W/M copy Sen. Murkowski or at least Senate Energy Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) on their Feb. 25 letter to Mr. Crisson? Failure to “cc” any of the principals in the Senate flouts one of the most basic rules of legislative courtesy.

Besides being busybodies, Waxman and Markey are bullies.

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Tags: american public power association, appa, Barbara Boxer, cap-and-tax, cap-and-trade
Posted Mar 5th 2010 at 9:51 am in Congress, Environment, News, Politics | 84922144 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/mlewis/2010/03/05/bully-boys-waxman-and-markey-promote-endangerment-of-economy-democracy/Bully+Boys+Waxman+and+Markey+Promote+%27Endangerment%27+of+Economy%2C+Democracy+2010-03-05+17%3A51%3A02Marlo+Lewis%2C+Jr.

Another EPA Power Grab in the Offing

Sources in Washington say Sen. Frank Lautenberg is drafting a new version of his Kids Safe Chemicals Act, which stalled out in 2008 after environmentalists complained the bill was toothless and didn’t grant the EPA enough power to regulate chemicals used to make products. Lautenberg’s new version of the bill is likely to increase the EPA’s authority to limit – or even ban – the use of common chemicals.

As the EPA’s carbon “endangerment finding” in December has demonstrated, it might not be such a good idea to vest virtually unlimited power in a single government agency, especially one that has become as politicized as the EPA.

And like the global warming hysteria the “endangerment finding” was supposed to address, the argument in favor of this aggressive power grab is thin, based on emotional, not scientific appeals, and fairly obviously designed to encroach on the free market. One organization advocating for the EPA power grab, “Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families,” is actually sponsoring a virtual Million Baby Crawl on Washington. Expect the stunts to get more ridiculous after Lautenberg’s bill drops.

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Tags: chemical exposure, chemical regulation, chemical toxicity, EPA, EPA regulations
Posted Feb 2nd 2010 at 11:41 am in Congress, Environment, News, Politics | 6875448 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/capitolconfidential/2010/02/02/another-epa-power-grab-in-the-offing/Another+EPA+Power+Grab+in+the+Offing2010-02-02+19%3A41%3A25Capitol++Confidential

Little Green Men and their ‘Indispensible’ Big Green Lobbyists

Today E&E News reports (subscription required) green group faux-rage that industry reps were consulted on drafting an amendment by Sen. Lisa Murkowski to (IMO, rather unwisely) grant the Democrats a one-year reprieve from their looming political nightmare of EPA threatening to actually try and regulate greenhouse gas emissions from stationary sources by regulation under a Clean Air Act never designed for such foolishness.

Such unseemly whimpering is about as credible as the greens’ phony “hacked emails!” outrage, over what was from all appearances a whistleblower releasing “ClimateGate” email evidence of dirty green tricks. These are the same crowd whose slimy green tactics include stealing my trash on a weekly basis and working with, e.g., the Guardian to dishonestly cobble together unrelated, out-of-context (unlike ClimateGate) excerpts from emails to paint a false picture. (”Greens involved in journalism process!”; sadly, the Guardian never called me for their “story” about, well, me, so I must confess I wasn’t involved).

Specifically, E&E notes how:

“the Washington Post reported yesterday that [Bracewell & Giuliani's Jeff Holmstead] and another former EPA official, Roger Martella, ‘helped craft the original amendment Murkowski planned to offer on the floor last fall.’…

Environmentalists pounced on the reports as evidence that coal and oil interests are behind Murkowski’s efforts. ‘We now have proof that lobbyists for Big Oil, dirty coal and other special interests are directly involved in recent attempts to bail out big polluters and gut the Clean Air Act,’ said a Sierra Club press release. ‘What’s more, these big polluter lobbyists are the same former Bush administration officials who completely disregarded the Clean Air Act and even disobeyed the Supreme Court for years.’

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Tags: alcoa, Big Business, Big Green, clean air act, climategate
Posted Jan 12th 2010 at 10:37 am in Congress, Environment, News, Politics | 5873823 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2010/01/12/little-green-men-and-their-indispensible-big-green-lobbyists/Little+Green+Men+and+their+%27Indispensible%27+Big+Green+Lobbyists2010-01-12+18%3A37%3A29Christopher+C.+Horner

ObamaCare: Running for Rushmore?

“Ever since Teddy Roosevelt first called for reform in 1912, seven presidents — Democrats and Republicans alike — have taken up the cause of reform time and time again,” President Obama said in a statement hailing the Christmas Eve Senate vote to take over 1/6 of the nation’s economy.  “Such efforts have been blocked by special-interests lobbyists who have perpetrated the status quo that works better for the insurance industry than it does for the American people.”

Note the date of TR’s “calling” for reform. It’s 1912.  Nationalized health care was part of the platform of the Progressive Party that year and every year thereafter. Americans are more familiar with the name Theodore himself gave to that third party bid. After being shot by a would-be assassin in Milwaukee, TR said it takes more than a single bullet to stop a Bull Moose. Instantly, the colorful sobriquet was applied to the Progressive Party.

What did Theodore himself think of his new-found allies, the Progressives? He was sincerely committed to reform. And he certainly thought he had been cheated out of the Republican Party presidential nomination in 1912. After all, he had won all the state party primaries in the limited number of states that held them. But TR also recognized that some of his Progressive supporters went over the top. For them, he coined the wonderful phrase, “the lunatic fringe.”

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Tags: bernie madoff, Bill Gates, Bull Moose Party, carbon dioxide, carbon regulations
Posted Dec 29th 2009 at 10:17 am in Congress, Economics, Healthcare, History, Obama, Politics | 53118137 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/kenandken/2009/12/29/obamacare-running-for-rushmore/ObamaCare%3A+Running+for+Rushmore%3F2009-12-29+18%3A17%3A00Ken+Blackwell+and++Ken+Klukowski

Disputed Science Can Lead to Disastrous Decisions in Copenhagen

As President Obama jets off to Denmark for the UN’s climate conference, I hope he will take some time as he flies over the Atlantic Ocean to revisit the science that led him to this trip.

The EPA sure didn’t.

Last week, unelected officials at the EPA abruptly put an end to honest debate by unilaterally declaring carbon dioxide a “harmful substance” and putting themselves in position to begin regulating emissions from every business and farm in America.

In making this rash decision, they have relied heavily upon findings by climate-change scientists that have been subsequently discredited by the scientists’ own e-mails, which indicate data manipulation and the exile of fellow researchers who didn’t agree with the group’s accepted, foregone conclusions.

As governor of a state that will be unfairly and dramatically impacted by the EPA’s ill-informed decision – one that will cost each Texas family $1,136 annually in higher costs and eliminate as many as 400,000 Texas jobs – this is simply unacceptable.

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Tags: Barack Obama, cap-and-trade, carbon caps, carbon emissions, climate change
Posted Dec 17th 2009 at 10:29 am in Environment, Featured Story | 48490235 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/rperry/2009/12/17/disputed-science-can-lead-to-disastrous-decisions-in-copenhagen/Disputed+Science+Can+Lead+to+Disastrous+Decisions+in+Copenhagen2009-12-17+18%3A29%3A20Gov.+Rick+Perry+%28R-TX%29

Waiting To Exhale: Carbon Command and Control Will Leave You Breathless

There are reports that the administration is essentially holding our economy hostage as it threatens to regulate carbon dioxide — what we breathe out — as a dangerous substance* because it could lead to global warming. If the Congress doesn’t pass economically crippling cap and trade, the Environmental Protection Agency will regulate carbon.

Be sure to keep an eye on this issue as it develops. It is a massive government power grab and threatens to regulate every breath you take and every move you make.

* Indeed, the words some elected leaders and big-government types breathe out are dangerous to our nation

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Tags: CO2, Endangerment, EPA
Posted Dec 9th 2009 at 11:59 am in Environment, Political Humor | 4350630 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/bjacobson/2009/12/09/waiting-to-exhale-carbon-command-and-control-will-leave-you-breathless/Waiting+To+Exhale%3A+Carbon+Command+and+Control+Will+Leave+You+Breathless2009-12-09+18%3A59%3A41Bret+Jacobson

Anatomy of a Green Scare: Consumer Reports or Distorts Facts About BPA?

It’s a chemical that has been used in everyday plastic products like eyeglasses, medical equipment, bottles, and food can linings for over fifty years.  But the compound Bisphenol A (BPA) has been the target of scare campaigns over the last few years.  On one hand critics contend that BPA at low doses can affect endocrine systems and reproduction, and cause birth or developmental effects, as well as cancer.  On the other hand, a search of the literature finds no single case of illness or death related to BPA.

Most recently, BPA came under attack November 2 when Consumers Union, the parent organization of the respected Consumer Reports, sent out a press release announcing the results of its lab tests that purportedly showed high levels of the suspect compound in 19 food products.  The authors of the Consumers Report article did not claim that they had found any harmful effects in anyone, just that BPA had been detected.

The Consumers Union press release inspired panic-inducing headlines.  ABC News, the Los Angeles Times, Fox News, and the New York Times dutifully announced the “results” with alarm.  In a separate commentary, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristoff compared the danger of BPA to those he has faced as a reporter of “threats from warlords, bandits and tarantulas.”

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Tags: BPA, Chapel Hill Consensus, chemical exposure, Consumers Union, EPA
Posted Nov 27th 2009 at 4:41 pm in Environment, Healthcare, Media Criticism, News, Politics | 3781059 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/mgrabar/2009/11/27/anatomy-of-a-green-scare-consumer-reports-or-distorts-facts-about-bpa/Anatomy+of+a+Green+Scare%3A+%3Cem%3EConsumer+Reports%3C%2Fem%3E+or+Distorts+Facts+About+BPA%3F2009-11-27+23%3A41%3A05Mary+Grabar

Obama’s Big Climate Change Tool: Yes, It Is a Big Deal

The Chamber of Commerce recently bowed to pressure from big member companies which have crafted schemes to pick your pocket under cap-and-trade, and cravenly pleaded for some form of global warming legislation. It defended this with the argument distilled as “we merely restated our position. A different way.” So it is with Congress, in a fashion, with its controversial Sec. 707 identically stuck in both the Waxman-Markey and Kerry-Boxer bills.

Some on Team Liberty insist there’s nothing to see here, because you’ll notice that the language says the President “shall” exercise “existing statutory authority”. QED. My former CEI colleague Jonathan Adler adopts Ed Morrissey’s position posted on Hot Air, phrasing it on Volokh:

“The above provision grants no new powers to the federal government, let alone the President. Zero. Zilch. Rather, it directs the President to have agencies use “existing statutory authority” to ensure greater greenhouse gas emission reductions.  In other words, it requires the President to ensure that agencies are using all the tools Congress has already delegated to them to reduce greenhouse gas emissions — tools that such agencies could use even if the section is not triggered — and demands the President “submit to Congress” a request for additional authorities the President believes are necessary to ensure greater emission reductions.  Moreover, insofar as this provision constrains the Executive Branch’s discretion over what emission-reduction measures it wants to take, it actually reduces executive authority.”

That first part is true.

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Tags: Barack Obama, cap-and-trade, carbon caps, carbon emissions, climate change
Posted Nov 13th 2009 at 1:22 pm in Congress, Environment, Justice/Legal, News, Obama, Politics | 3038621 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2009/11/13/obamas-big-climate-change-tool-yes-it-is-a-big-deal/Obama%27s+Big+Climate+Change+Tool%3A+Yes%2C+It+Is+a+Big+Deal2009-11-13+20%3A22%3A14Christopher+C.+Horner

How Sweeping Are the ‘Global Warming’ Bills?

So, now that we’ve opened this can, just how sweeping is the “global warming” bills’ curiously identical Sec. 707?

At risk of getting into a peeing match which my time budget may not allow me to finish, I believe that the dispute between Ed Morrissey over at Hot Air and the folks at the WashingtonExaminer joining Sen. David Vitter (and, by implication, I suppose me) is not necessary but worth resolving. Caution: it is also for the legislatively inclined or otherwise the pointy-headed. But, since I arguably joined the fray here on Big Government on Tuesday, here goes.

At issue is a provision buried in both the Waxman-Markey and Kerry-Boxer “global warming” bills.

I had to leave for a few hours after starting my comment on this, in which time I decided not to wage the war over how strongly we need to argue that it prima facie nullifies the rest of the respective legislative language that too many lobbyists tout was carefully crafted to provide “certainty”. Lobbyists of course tend to say things reflecting well on their defense of client interests.

What is inescapable is that this language dispels such notions of certainty. But that shouldn’t be shocking. The bills statutorily establish “global warming” causation, for every existing or new increment of GHGs (read: employers, economic activity), as well as harm caused. And they fail to preempt states and elsewhere EPA as needed, or the National Environmental Policy Act, Clean Water Act or Endangered Species Act, or every other tool that’s already being tried out as a “global warming” law. Let alone the rest of the U.S. Code. All of which is relevant to context, as we shall see.

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Tags: anton scalia, cap-and-trade, carbon concentrations, carbon emissions, clean air act
Posted Nov 12th 2009 at 10:51 am in Environment, Justice/Legal, News | 2925418 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2009/11/12/how-sweeping-are-the-global-warming-bills/How+Sweeping+Are+the+%27Global+Warming%27+Bills%3F2009-11-12+17%3A51%3A56Christopher+C.+Horner

Big, Green, Global Government

One learns a new language upon first wading into the world of ,what’s favorably called by the Al Gores and Jacques Chiracs of the world, “global governance”. That term, used in all seriousness and intended as a compliment, means the web of international agreements (typically in the name of the environment), committing the prosperous world to agree to  do things it would never enact via its own democratic processes. New words such as “subsidiarity” and “additionality” are forged and tossed around like Mardi Gras beads at earnest negotiating sessions and in deathless texts. It’s Esperanto for the bossy jet-setters racked with guilt over your lifestyle.

Another of my favorites is “capacity building”, which means wealth transfers to prepare a poor society to receive a larger wealth transfer in the future. You see, certain among those societies our green superiors are trying to hector into behaving in a certain way – which is all of them – are not yet able to deal with the financial windfall due them from the Kyoto Protocols of the world. These international agreements frankly are more about redistribution than anything else. For example, Kyoto is in no way about actually reducing “greenhouse gas emissions”, but instead it creates a Ponzi-like scheme of paying other countries to sell you pieces of paper saying that you reduced greenhouse gas emissions.

And a good thing, too, because those few countries who are covered by Kyoto have all – like the rest of the world – increased their actual emissions since agreeing to this “historic emissions reduction pact.” Still, as we approach the December deadline for agreeing to a successor, Kyoto will be nonetheless be hailed for its accomplishment. Maybe by this they mean the recent cooling.

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Tags: Al Gore, Alliance for Climate Protection, cap-and-tax, cap-and-trade, Center for American Progress
Posted Oct 8th 2009 at 11:10 am in Congress, Culture, Environment, Politics | 1438632 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2009/10/08/big-green-global-government/Big%2C+Green%2C+Global+Government2009-10-08+18%3A10%3A19Christopher+C.+Horner

EPA’s Next Priority: Meat Control?

The really nice thing about having left-wing comedy hosts is that Democrat officials have absolutely no problem appearing on their talk shows. It’s really nice to have these people interviewed in a comfortable non-confrontational setting, because the darndest things will come out.

Bill Maher in a rare hard-nosed moment, presses EPA administrator Lisa Jackson to answer a tough question about whether the EPA intends to regulate meat. After she dodges the question, Bill asks it again.

Now I could be wrong, because she was stuttering badly, but didn’t the United States EPA Administrator say that she is looking into Meat Control? She certainly advocated a restriction on food grown outside of the US.

But MEAT CONTROL? I’ve met a lot of vegetarians in my travels. I don’t really care about those who practice it themselves, although I often question their logic. I look at vegetarianism as a sort of religion, and have no problem with it being practiced in the privacy of one’s own cat-filled home. But in America we have a separation of church and state, and if you intend to force me to conform to your religious dietary restrictions, I’m going to make a little noise.

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Tags: beef tallow, Bill Maher, carbon dioxide, climate change, EPA
Posted Oct 5th 2009 at 11:25 am in Culture, Environment, Political Humor, Politics | 12698101 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/tslagle/2009/10/05/epas-next-priority-meat-control/EPA%27s+Next+Priority%3A+Meat+Control%3F2009-10-05+18%3A25%3A04Tim+Slagle

Who Is and Isn’t Qualified to Speak on Global Warming

Mere days before Senators Barbara Boxer and John Kerry are scheduled to introduce their version of controversial global warming “cap-and-trade” legislation — if several months after EPA whistle-blower Dr. Alan Carlin drew attention to the fact that the recent published scientific literature presents a decided tilt against prevailing “global warming” scientific wisdom — the New York Times has run a piece diminishing Dr. Carlin’s stature and findings.

This meme is picked up by those running with the Times’ “news”. For example, today’s trade press outlet “E&E Daily” styles their #2 story this way: “Employee lacked credentials for endangerment views”.

That’s odd.

Carlin has been with EPA since its inception in the early 1970s, having earned a degree in physics from CalTech. His lack of the same qualifications implicitly possessed by our law-givers comes from his having gone on to attain a PhD in economics from MIT.

This is different than the Times’ (and others’) treatment of and lack of interest in the academic training of the individual regularly cited without such “just an economist” commentary as a leading and essentially unimpeachable authority, the economist and former railway engineer Rajendra Pachauri. The Times has even hailed Pachauri in the past as the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s chief “climatologist”. Climatology is a specialty field if ever there was one but a qualification which Pachauri, for all of his other virtues toiling for years in the UN vineyards, attained by virtue of being appointed to head the IPCC. This is unfairly disparate treatment.

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Tags: CalTech, Climatology, Dr. Alan Carlin, EPA, IPCC
Posted Sep 25th 2009 at 11:23 am in Environment, Media Criticism, Politics | 863064 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2009/09/25/who-is-and-isnt-qualified-to-speak-on-global-warming/Who+Is+and+Isn%27t+Qualified+to+Speak+on+Global+Warming2009-09-25+18%3A23%3A55Christopher+C.+Horner

Obama’s EPA: In a Classroom Near You

Pavlik Morozov’s life exemplified the duty of all good Soviet citizens to become informers. Although his story didn’t end well (nor did that of his parents), the concept for which he will ever carry the banner lives on. For example, this week we read that the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency is working with – surprise! – grant-receiving community organizer types to, ah, “educate” and send forth tens of thousands of little eco-pioneers to audit their parents’ adherence to preferred lifestyle decisions.

Our “enviro” crowd hopes to sniff out whether parents are being sufficiently green, via tactics reminiscent of the old reds.

The latest odious stunt by Big Green – whose ranks include enablers in Big Government standing to gain as much or more from imposition of Green Statism as any other vested interest – moves beyond their avowed goals of “getting them young” and engaging the young for their “pester power”. I detailed this growing use of children, and even enlisting them to report back on their parents, in my “Poisoning the Little Ones” chapter of “Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud, and Deception to Keep You Misinformed”. 

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Tags: Al Gore, Big Green, climate change, EPA, Obama
Posted Sep 24th 2009 at 8:55 am in Culture, Environment, Obama, Politics | 783060 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2009/09/24/obamas-epa-in-a-classroom-near-you/Obama%27s+EPA%3A+In+a+Classroom+Near+You2009-09-24+15%3A55%3A08Christopher+C.+Horner