by Rich Trzupek
Last month, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson responded to Senator Jay Rockefeller’s (D-WV) questions about potential greenhouse gas regulation under the Clean Air Act. A careful reading of Jackson’s answers shows that EPA’s threats to use the Clean Air Act to force nationwide greenhouse gas reductions are a paper tiger and, if implemented, such actions will not result in any substantive decrease in greenhouse gas emissions during president Obama’s term.
Recall that there are two routes available to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. The first is “cap and trade,” along the lines of the Waxman-Markey bill that is currently stalled in the Senate. This is the method that environmentalists and their supporters in Congress prefer, for a couple of reasons. Cap and trade would attach monetary value to waste by-products, chiefly carbon dioxide and methane, and would allow certain carbon speculators – the name Al Gore springs immediately to mind – to grab even more cash in the resultant massive redistribution of wealth.
