Notwithstanding any provision of this title or title III, no stationary source shall be required to apply for, or operate pursuant to, a permit under this title solely because the stationary source, including an agricultural source, emits less than 25,000 tons per year of any greenhouse gas or combination of greenhouse gases that are regulated solely because of the effect of those gases on climate change.

The 25,000 ton standard reflects the EPA’s plan for starting global warming regulation under a “tailoring rule” limited to the few thousand stationary sources of more than that amount of carbon dioxide a year — in large part coal-fired power plants. However, Boxer’s text is poorly written, as many greenhouse gases are thousands of times more powerful global warming pollutants than carbon dioxide.

The new text — like that of the House bill — completely forbids the regulation of greenhouse gases under the criteria pollutant, hazardous air pollutant, and international air pollution sections of the Clean Air Act.

Although several progressive and environmental organizations have made the preservation of existing Clean Air Act authority in the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act a key demand, Democratic members of the Committee on Environment and Public Works — which is now beginning to mark up the legislation — are split on this issue. Committee members Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) are signatories, with Chris Dodd (D-CT), of a dear colleague letter in favor of allowing greenhouse gas regulation as a pollutant circulated by Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ). However, Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) had questioned the provision, and influential member Max Baucus (D-MT), the Finance Committee chair, strongly opposes EPA regulation.

Organizations that have called on the Senate to “save the Clean Air Act” include Friends of the Earth, 1Sky, and MoveOn, supported by youth and other grassroots activists.

Other changes to the original version of the legislation reflect industry-friendly demands from Democrats on the committee. They include: increasing free allowances to major oil refineries, putting the Secretary of Agriculture in charge of the agriculture offset program, and making owners of abandoned mountaintop removal sites (”private or public abandoned mine land”) eligible for “Greenhouse Gas Reduction Incentives.”

The chairman’s mark also adds some provisions which strengthen the bill: Rep. Doris Matsui’s (D-CA) tree-planting program language, incentives for rapid renewable energy deployment, and a program to reduce black carbon emissions from diesel.

Text in chairman’s mark of Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act restricting Clean Air Act regulation of greenhouse gases:

(g) AMENDMENTS CLARIFYING REGULATION OF GREENHOUSE GASES UNDER CLEAN AIR ACT.—
(1) AIR QUALITY CRITERIA AND CONTROL TECHNIQUES.—Section 108(a) of the Clean Air Act
(42 U.S.C. 7408(a)) is amended by adding at the end the following:
(3) PROHIBITION ON LISTING OF GREENHOUSE GASES.—On and after the date of enactment of this paragraph, the Administrator shall not include on the list of pollutants under this subsection any greenhouse gas on the basis of any effect the greenhouse gas may have on climate change.’’.
(2) HAZARDOUS AIR POLLUTANTS.—Section 112 of the Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. 7412) is amended by adding at the end the following:
(20) GREENHOUSE GAS LIMITATION.—No greenhouse gas may be added to the list of hazardous air pollutants under this section unless the greenhouse gas meets the criteria described in sub
Section (b) independent of the effects of the greenhouse gas on climate change.’’.
(3) INTERNATIONAL AIR POLLUTION.—Section 115(c) of the Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. 7415(c)) is amended—
(A) by striking (c) This section’’ and inserting the following:
(3) APPLICABILITY.—
(A) FOREIGN COUNTRIES.—This section’’; and
(B) by adding at the end the following:
(B) GREENHOUSE GASES.—This section does not apply to any greenhouse gas with respect to the effects of the greenhouse gas on climate change.’’.
(4) DEFINITION OF MAJOR EMITTING FACILITY.—Section 169(1) of the Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. 7479(1)) is amended—
(A) in the first sentence, by inserting
(other than any greenhouse gas), and 25,000 tons per year of carbon dioxide equivalent for any greenhouse gas or combination of greenhouse gases’’ after one hundred tons per year or more of any air pollutant,’’; and
(B) in the second sentence, by inserting
(other than any greenhouse gas), and 25,000 tons per year of carbon dioxide equivalent for any greenhouse gas or combination of greenhouse gases’’ after two hundred fifty tons per year or more of any air pollutant’’.
(5) PERMITS.—Title V of the Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. 7661 et seq.) is amended by adding at the end the following:
Sec. 508. EMISSIONS OF GREENHOUSE GASES. Notwithstanding any provision of this title or title III, no stationary source shall be required to apply for, or operate pursuant to, a permit under this title solely because the stationary source, including an agricultural source, emits less than 25,000 tons per year of any greenhouse gas or combination of greenhouse gases that are regulated solely because of the effect of those gases on climate change.’’.

This champion of “transparency,” however, attacked an investigation into the White House’s interference with the EPA last year, saying that “regardless of Administration, the President acting through the entire executive branch is fully entitled to express his policy judgments to the EPA Administrator”:

Instead we are here to politicize the internal deliberative process of the Administration under the guise of an update on the science of global warming hearing. While I welcome the opportunity to discuss the latest science on global warming, doing it in this heavily political setting with a predetermined outcome focused on internal deliberations of the Executive is not the right venue for such discussion. It is my view that regardless of Administration, the President acting through the entire executive branch is fully entitled to express his policy judgments to the EPA Administrator, and to expect his subordinate to carry out the judgment of what the law requires and permits. It can be argued that the “unitary Executive concept” promotes more effective rulemaking by bringing a broader perspective to bear on important regulatory decisions. . . .

Therefore, I consider this debate over censorship within the Administration to be a nonissue. All administrations edit testimony and all documents go through interagency review before any final agency action. I cannot support any investigations that could have a chilling effect within the deliberative process of the Administration, and cause future career and political employees from refraining from an open and honest dialogue.

By some strange miracle, Inhofe has had a complete change of heart on the inviolability of the “unitary executive” during the Obama presidency. In yesterday’s letter, Inhofe requests “all correspondence and records” from “all meetings, discussions and conversations between EPA and Carol Browner,” which “includes but is not limited to the following: letters and other written communications, electronic communications, phone records, meeting notes, documents prepared to summarize meetings and agendas, meeting dates, including attendees of listed meetings, and transcripts and notes from stakeholder briefings.”

In June, Inhofe even supported a criminal investigation into whether the EPA was “suppressing science.” Inhofe’s newfound love for transparency in the executive branch stands in utter contradiction to his professed outrage last year:

INHOFE, 10/6/09: It’s astonishing that EPA, so confident in the scientific integrity of its work, refuses to be transparent with the public about the most consequential rulemaking of our time.

INHOFE & BARRASSO, 9/23/09: For example, our letter asks for — and we believe it’s important for the public to know — all communications between experts inside and outside of the agency who helped influence how the Agency arrived at the scientific conclusions found in the TSD.

INHOFE & BARRASSO, 8/4/09: From our limited vantage point, EPA’s process of determining endangerment appears to be marred by bias and, to some extent, political manipulation.

INHOFE, BARRASSO, & VITTER 6/30/09: In the coming weeks, we will make a series of inquiries to ensure EPA’s process governing the development of the endangerment finding is open and transparent—and that the Agency considers all view-points, and makes use of the best available, and most up-to-date, scientific data.

The reason why I don’t think they’ll try to do that through regulation is because certainly this president, President Obama knows that once the American people find out that they’re going to pay about $2,000 a year in taxes for something that doesn’t do anything, there’s going to be an outrage. And they want to be able to say, “Oh, no, that was Congress that did it.” My feeling is they’re using this for intimidation purposes and they’re going to try to intimidate Congress to do this.

Watch it:

CNBC’s promotion of right-wing fantasies originating from polluter-funded think tanks and conservative bloggers is nothing new. Energy and media multinational General Electric is often portrayed as a climate-friendly corporation which influences American politics to the left, primarily because of the presence of Rachel Maddow, Ed Schultz, and Keith Olbermann on MSNBC’s afternoon programming. On Fox News, Glenn Beck rants that GE is going to get “all kinds of contracts from the government on green energy” because it is “in bed with Obama.” The Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Steve Milloy claims the new Kerry-Boxer clean-energy jobs act is larded with “payoffs to GE.” Bill O’Reilly claims GE “is also pushing for the proposed cap-and-trade program” and “using its power and the airwaves to influence politics” so that it can “reap billions of dollars if the Feds OK the carbon deal.”

Not only does GE attack climate action through its CNBC network, it also supports several national lobbying campaigns against clean-energy legislation, through its membership in the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (GE Energy), the American Petroleum Institute (GE Oil & Gas), and the National Association of Manufacturers (GE Enterprise Solutions). Unlike GE, companies such as Duke Energy have abandoned NAM and ACCCE for their retrograde position on climate change.

Transcript:

KUDLOW: Is the Obama administration at the Environmental Protection Agency moving to create a backdoor energy tax, for American businesses, far and wide? With us now is Oklahoma Republican senator James Inhofe, who is the ranking member on the environment committee. I think, Senator, you do regulate or authorize the EPA?

INHOFE: That’s true.

KUDLOW: All right, that’s what I thought. I’m reading and listening to the EPA Administrator, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal. We’re going to regulate the carbon emissions of, what, 14,000 — let me get this right, 14,000 coal-burning plants, refineries, industrial complexes. Do they have the authority to do so? And is this like a backdoor cap-and-trade bill?

INHOFE: Larry, we talked about this before, but now we progressed to the point where if there’s an endangerment finding, then yes. If it’s finalized, they say they’re going to regulate anything using 25,000 tons of CO2 a year. Now, the reason they’re approaching it that way is they know the Clean Air Act was set up for SOx and NOx, for real pollutants. The threshold there is 250 tons, not 25,000 tons. They know there will be regulations, there’ll be lawsuits and they’ll be forced to regulate everybody. You talk about 250 tons a year. Larry, that’s everybody. Every mom-and-pop shop, every school, every nursery. And that’s what their intention is to do.

KUDLOW: Senator, who’s authorized this? My understanding is this ain’t legal and that the 1990 Clean Air Act was never designed to regulate carbon emissions.

INHOFE: No, it wasn’t, but if they declare, as they’re going to do, that CO2 is a pollutant like SOx and NOx, then they say they can do it. I have a different feeling about this, Larry. I don’t think they really want to do it. I think they want to use this to intimidate Congress to pass something. You saw what was introduced as no longer Boxer-Kerry, it’s now Kerry-Boxer. They’re going to try that. It’s the same thing! If we go back as we talked before, all the way back to Kyoto or Mccain-Lieberman or Warner-Lieberman or the Sanders bill, it’s still going to cost the American people somewhere between $300 billion or $400 billion a year. That’s what they want to get to, and I don’t care how they try to masquerade it, they’re going to try to get there. The reason why I don’t think they’ll try to do that through regulation is because certainly this president, President Obama knows that once the American people find out that they’re going to pay about $2,000 a year in taxes for something that doesn’t do anything, there’s going to be an outrage. And they want to be able to say, “Oh, no, that was Congress that did it.” My feeling is they’re using this for intimidation purposes and they’re going to try to intimidate Congress to do this.

KUDLOW: I think this is the kind of thing that can drive stocks into the ground, particularly commodity, materials and industrial type stocks. This may be an unheralded story in today’s stock market correction. It was front page in the New York Times. Big article in the Wall Street Journal, and so forth. If I quote you, $300 billion a year, $2,000 increase per family, is that what you’re talking with respect to the backdoor tax idea.

INHOFE: If you remember when the Marxy, uh, Markey-Waxman bill passed, they tried to say it was only a postage stamp a day — they were suppressing information they had from the U.S. Treasury department saying no, it’s going to cost $1,761 per family per year. Now that’s a conservative figure. But nonetheless, every analysis we’ve seen, MIT, the Whorten School, the Charles River Associates — it’s always between 300 and 400 billion dollars a year. But the thing about it is, Larry, something that’s happened since our last conversation. I had the administrator before us in our committee and I asked if we were to make this happen and start regulating in accordance to the Waxy, uh Waxman-Markey bill, how much would it reduce emissions? She said none. And the reason is obvious. We can’t do this in a vacuum. If only America does it, that will chase away our manufacturing jobs to China, other places where they have no emission restrictions. So it would have the effect of increasing, not decreasing CO2 emissions.

KUDLOW: I appreciate that point, but the EPA could fine these companies. It’s like a tax. We don’t know anything about this. There aren’t going to be any trading warrants. It’s not like a carbon tax that might be used to lower the income tax on the other side. In other words, are they just going to go off on their own to do this?

INHOFE: Larry, the honest way to do this, if they want to do this, is to just go ahead and have a carbon tax. The reason they don’t do it is because they don’t want people to know what it is. So, cap and trade, they can say, “We’re going to give credits to our favorite people, it’s not going to affect you,” but it will.

KUDLOW: If you had to guess, Senator, last word, will the EPA follow through? I think Ms. Jackson is talking about enforcing it 2011. It’s over a year. Do you think we’re going to see this?

INHOFE: I don’t think we’re going to see this. It’s really Carol Browner, the czar. I don’t think they want to be responsible to have to tell the people it’s a big tax increase. They want Congress to do it and that’s the strategy in my opinion.

KUDLOW: All right Sen. Inhofe, you’re very kind to come up with that update, because I think this is a pretty scary story for the American economy and other things. Thank you very much, sir.

INHOFE: You bet.

Under EPA’s current interpretation of PSD [Prevention of Significant Deterioration] and title V applicability requirements, promulgation of this motor vehicle rule will trigger the applicability of PSD and title V requirements for stationary sources that emit GHGs.

Today’s proposed rule — which allows public comment until December — technically is a “tailoring rule” to limit regulation of global warming pollution to emitters of 25,000 tons of carbon dioxide a year, instead of the automatic statutory amount of 250 tons. This 250-ton standard would cover about four million businesses and homes — the “glorious mess” President Bush used as an excuse for his inaction. The EPA plans to raise the pollution limit to 25,000 tons, so that only 14,000 industrial pollution sources nationwide would be covered by the regulations, 11,000 of which are currently covered by the Clean Air Act permitting requirements already. Each stationary source covered would be required to apply for a title V operating permit, and all new sources would require a new source review permit.

Today’s announcement by the EPA comes hours after the introduction of legislation to limit global warming pollution by Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) this morning, two-and-a-half years after the U.S. Supreme Court mandated action on global warming pollution, and 17 years after the United States ratified the Rio de Janeiro climate treaty, pledging to “prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.”

Why is Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) behaving like an outlaw? It’s jarring to learn that Sen. Murkowski wants to take away U.S. Environmental Protection Agency authority to limit greenhouse gas emissions from oil refineries, coal-burning power plants and other smokestack industries. As reported in Environment and Energy Daily, Murkowski has filed a proposed amendment to spending legislation for EPA that would prohibit the agency from regulating greenhouse pollutants except those from cars or other “mobile” sources:

“Senator Murkowski is concerned about the economic consequences of EPA command-and-control regulation of emissions,” said spokesman Robert Dillon. The senator plans to file the amendment, Dillon said, adding that he did not know whether a decision has been made to press for a vote.

Murkowski’s amendment would thwart the 2007 Supreme Court ruling that said EPA does have authority under the Clean Air Act to deal with climate pollution, as long as the agency determines that it is a threat to health and/or the environment. EPA is moving ahead with that determination. Because the judicial branch has spoken so definitively, EPA must follow the law. By trying to block the agency through such a sneaky, back-door approach, Murkowski is bidding to become a climate outlaw.

The weird part here is that Murkowski herself has warned about the impact of global warming on Alaska — where, as Politico put it earlier this year, “the Alaskan tundra thaws and fishing villages disappear into the ocean.” USA Today once called Alaska the “poster state” for climate concerns.

And no wonder: Alaska’s climate has warmed about 4°F since the 1950’s. That has prompted more rain, the melting of two major glaciers and permafrost melting which has caused erosion, landslides and damaged infrastructure. Some coastal towns could be overwhelmed by flooding. Carbon-caused ocean acidification threatens fish populations.

Grotesque evidence of the problem was recently reported as scientists determined the Arctic sea ice had reached the third lowest-level ever recorded: up to 200 walruses, which appear to be mostly new calves and yearlings, were reported dead near Icy Cape on the north coast of Alaska.

We can’t wait to hear Murkowski’s argument should she proceed with this ill-considered idea. Is she going to claim that this is something better handled by Congress? If so, why has she denounced the comprehensive climate legislation approved by the House? We suspect Murkowski is responding to the big campaign contributions she has received from the oil and electric power industries, both of which oppose EPA action. One major contributor is ExxonMobil, which continues to operate in Alaska despite its notoriety over the Exxon Valdez spill.

Several hours after Clean Air Watch alerted reporters by email about the Murkowski plan, a spokesman for Murkowski argued she “is not trying to subvert the process”:

The senator has no interest in trampling on that Supreme Court decision as it relates to mobile sources.

Exactly our point: she does want to trample on the Supreme Court decision as it relates to stationary sources. Murkowski has shown no interest in being constructive on the climate debate, so her defense of waiting for congressional action is obviously a fraud designed only to kill the Clean Air Act. Which is exactly what the big oil companies and her other financial supporters want. Her plan to handcuff the EPA is nothing but duplicitous special-interest pandering that should be rejected out of hand.

Calling for the “Scopes trial of the 21st century,” the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has delivered a petition to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for a public hearing on the EPA’s proposed global warming endangerment finding. The petition, acquired by the Wonk Room, claims that scientific research demonstrates global warming has stopped, the oceans aren’t acidifying or warming, sea level isn’t rising, extreme weather events aren’t increasing, tropical diseases aren’t spreading, wildfires aren’t increasing — but even if the planet were getting warmer, then U.S. citizens will be healthier, air pollution will decrease, and U.S. agriculture will benefit. The petition, authored by corporate legal titan Kirkland & Ellis LLP, attacks the “insupportable claims about the impacts of climate change on public health and welfare,” and goes on to argue that a show trial must be held to “eliminate the taint“:

Only such a neutral, record-based and science-based process can hope to eliminate the taint that has now infected the proposed endangerment finding process.

The Chamber concludes that if there is not a public proceeding, the EPA must “withdraw the endangerment proposal entirely”:

The current state of the EPA docket presents the Agency with only two choices. One is to grant the Chamber’s petition, and convert this proceeding to one based solely on the record, so that questions of scientific uncertainty can be narrowed, questions of conflicting scientific views can be resolved, and certain scientifically-indefensible assertions can be put to rest, all with transparency and scientific integrity. The other option is for EPA to withdraw the endangerment proposal entirely.

The Chamber argues that “none of the claims that climate change will cause extreme weather events that could injure the population of the United States appear to have any support in peer-reviewed studies that examine issues of causation” and that “there is no scientific basis to link allergic disorders in any significant way to climate change.”

The Chamber’s petition relies on the work of oil-fueled ideologues, little of it published in peer-reviewed form, to challenge the overwhelming scientific consensus that climate change is damaging the public health. The bloggers Chip Knappenberger and Anthony Watts are cited, as are the oil-funded scientists Pat Michaels, Willie Soon, Roy Spencer, and Richard Lindzen, alongside the docket submissions of the National Mining Association, American Farm Bureau, American Petroleum Institute, American Energy Alliance/Institute for Energy Research, and the North American Coal Corporation.

Download the petition here.

It would be evolution versus creationism. It would be the science of climate change on trial.

In 1925, Tennessee schoolteacher John Scopes was indicted for teaching evolution against state law. His trial, intended as a test of the law, became a national phenomenon when as the World Christian Fundamentals Association and the American Civil Liberties Union brought the famed lawyers William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow into battle. Scopes was found guilty. Even though the state supreme court overturned the verdict of the “bizarre case” on a technicality, the public fallout was intense. The anti-evolution movement lost steam (before being reborn as “intelligent design“) and science textbooks with biblical quotations were phased out.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is taking a similarly bizarre approach here, calling for a show trial of climate science. Perhaps Kovacs and other officials at the U.S. Chamber believe that the rest of the business world shares their extremist views. After all, U.S. corporations continue to fund their multi-million-dollar lobbying against health care and energy reform.

It’s also possible this is an attempt to disrupt the effort to fight global warming with a culture war, tying the science of climate change to fundamentalists’ unease with evolution. Conservative activists have already made the connection. “It’s still a theory,” a town hall protester confronted Rep. Mike Castle (D-DE) after he supported climate legislation in June. “So is Darwin’s theory of evolution! And yet we have the audacity to say global warming is accurate, it’s more than a theory?”

There aren’t many natural parallels between the physics of greenhouse gases emitted by burning fossil fuels and the biology of natural selection, but the American conservative movement depends on the cozy relationship between oil and the Christian right. It seems like a high-risk strategy to convince Americans that God means for us to pollute His creation on behalf of oil and coal tycoons. But when reality is not on your side, there’s not much else left.

No better example of this can be found than the Environmental Protection Agency’s April finding that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions endanger public health and welfare. It turns out that when the EPA issued their finding about the impact of greenhouse gases, they didn’t tell the whole story. They routinely ignored relevant, credible scientific information that contradicted their findings, including information generated by the agency’s own staff. Cherry-picking only the evidence that bolsters your claim is the opposite of scientific integrity, transparency, and openness. . . The wrong way would be to impose barely debated, ineffective, and burdensome new regulations based on shaky, selective data.

Kovacs is alluding to work of Alan Carlin, an economist for EPA’s National Center for Environmental Economics. Carlin had plagiarized arguments from right-wing blogs that the world’s climate scientists are wrong about global warming. The right-wing Competitive Enterprise Institute promoted Carlin’s report and the false story that his work was being unfairly suppressed. CBS News and Fox News then pushed Carlin’s tale of woe.

By asserting that the ravings of oil-funded climate deniers like Ken Gregory, Pat Michaels, and Chip Knappenberger are “relevant, credible scientific information,” Kovacs is embarassing himself and the Chamber, supposedly “the world’s largest business federation” and the “voice of business.” This reactionary behavior is leading forward-thinking corporations like Nike and Johnson & Johnson to break with the Chamber, and support Mindy Lubber’s attempt to bring American business into the 21st century.

No one fared worse before the Supreme Court this Term than the Earth.  The justices heard five environmental cases, and they sided against defenders of the environment in every single one.  Among these cases, the Court upheld a Bush-era regulation that placed costs to power plants above destruction of aquatic life; it absolved from liability a chemical company that allowed pesticides to spill into the environment for years; it erected new obstacles to environmental organizations challenging federal environmental policy; and it upheld a mining company’s plans to dump literally millions of tons of mining waste into a pristine lake.

Two of these cases in particular highlight the Court’s disregard for laws intended to protect the environment:

• A New Loophole For Polluters (Coeur Alaska v. Southeast Alaska Conservation Council)

Using a technique known as “froth-floatation,” a mining company in Alaska plans to extract new gold from a mine that has been closed for decades, but this technique would produce approximately 4.5 million tons of “slurry,” thick waste-product laced with toxic elements such as lead and mercury. Even worse, the mining company’s intends to dispose of this waste by dumping it into a nearby lake, a plan which would eventually kill all the lake’s fish and nearly all of its other aquatic life, decrease the depth of the lake by fifty feet, and flood the surrounding 40 acres of land with contaminated water.

Although federal law forbids “[t]he use of any river, lake, stream or ocean as a waste treatment system,” the Supreme Court created a massive new exception to this law. Under Justice Kennedy’s decision in Coeur Alaska, pollutants are exempt from this law so long as they have “the effect of . . . changing the bottom elevation of water.” In other words, polluters now have a free hand to dump whatever they want into pristine waters, so long as their waste products are solid and significant enough to reduce the depth of the lake, river or stream. As Justice Ginsburg wrote in dissent, such a reading of federal law “strains credulity” because it allows “[w]hole categories of regulated industries” to “gain immunity from a variety of pollution-control standards.”

• Placing Profits Before The Law (Entergy v. Riverkeeper)
  

Power plants’ cooling systems collectively remove more than 214 billion gallons of water from the nation’s waterways every day, in the process killing over 3.4 billion aquatic organisms per year. The Clean Water Act requires that EPA regulate these cooling systems based on “the best technology available for minimizing adverse environmental impact.” During the Bush administration, however, EPA ignored this direction and instead employed a skewed cost-benefit analysis in deciding how to regulate. As a result, power plants were allowed to forgo the advanced technology required by the plain language of the law in favor of cheaper but far less protective measures.

Ignoring the law’s plain language, Justice Scalia’s decision in Riverkeeper upheld the Bush administration’s action.  As Justice Stevens explained in dissent, Congress determined that the costs of requiring power plants to pay for environmentally friendly technology “are outweighed by the benefits of minimizing adverse environmental impact” when it enacted the Clean Water Act, but the Court substituted the Bush Administration’s judgment for that of the law.

Notably, Riverkeeper reversed a Second Circuit decision by Judge Sonia Sotomayor, a hopeful sign that President Obama’s nominee for the high Court does not share her future colleagues’ willingness to rewrite environmental legislation to benefit big industry.

The thing is phony. I feel so good about being redeemed after all of these years, because they have been throwing this thing in my face since 1998 when we realized that all of those scientists that Al Gore had lined up — and I’m talking about Claude Allegre in France, David Bellamy in UK, and Nir Shaviv in Israel — all of them used to be on his side. They all said, “Wait a minute, this science is not right.” That’s exactly what Allen Carlin said. We’ve already started a investigation.

Watch it:

When asked if there should be a criminal investigation, Inhofe replied, “There could be and there probably should be.” Continuing his attack, he claimed that the EPA “have been suppressing science and coming out with what they want people to say. You might remember — I talked to you about it on this station. When I first realized that this thing was a hoax and I made the statement that the notion that man-made gases, anthropogenic gases, CO2 cause global warming, it is probably the greatest hoax ever perpetrated.”

In reality, what Fox News, Inhofe, and right-wing bloggers are promoting as a suppressed EPA report is nothing of the kind. Carlin’s paper, released by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (”CO2: they call it pollution, we call it Life“), is a hodgepodge of widely discredited pseudoscience. Carlin was given permission by the NCEE to cobble the paper together even though he is not a climate researcher, and “the document he submitted was reviewed by his peers and agency scientists.”

The Carlin document cites the usual array of global warming deniers, including Joe D’Aleo, Don Easterbrook, William Gray, Christopher Monckton, Fred Singer, and Roy Spencer — all of whom worked with Sen. Inhofe’s former aide Marc Morano to disseminate denials of climate science. Carlin’s references come from denier blogs such as ICECAP.us and Watts Up With That, as well as publications from the Heartland Institute, the Science & Environmental Policy Project, and the Friends of Science Society, all conservative front groups. RealClimate’s Gavin Schmidt summarizes the paper as “a ragbag collection of un-peer reviewed web pages, an unhealthy dose of sunstroke, a dash of astrology and more cherries than you can poke a cocktail stick at.”

Similarly, although the 76-year-old botanist David Bellamy, 72-year-old geochemist Claude Allegre, and 32-year-old astrophysicist Nir Shaviv publicly question man-made global warming, they represent a steadily dwindling number of scientists, few of any of which actively study climate change, that argue fossil fuel emissions are not warming the planet.

What’s really shocking, however, is that “the CEI press release was reported with a more or less straight face by at least two media outlets, CBS News and New York Times Greenwire, without any questioning of CEI’s own motivations or role in the affair.” Both stories show the effect of the collapsing of the mainstream media industry — the CBS story is crossposted by CNet.com reporter Declan McCullagh, the libertarian who fabricated the “Al Gore invented the Internet” story. And the New York Times story is crossposted from E&E News, an independent subscription news service.

The main argument conservatives and big oil and coal companies use against the American Clean Energy and Security Act (H.R. 2454) is that it would cripple American households with a crushing energy tax. To make that claim, they have distorted cost estimates from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and conducted their own biased studies. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency obliterated these phony numbers with the release of its economic analysis of H.R. 2454. The EPA estimated the bill would actually lower household electricity bills:

As a result of energy efficiency measures, consumer spending on utility bills would be roughly 7% lower in 2020 as a result of the legislation.

That’s right — lower bills. In 2007, this would have saved the average residential user $84, or 23 cents per day. EPA’s analysis also found:

The overall impact on the average household, including the benefit of many of the energy efficiency provisions in the legislation, would be 22 to 30 cents per day ($80 to $111 per year).

We don’t have to just wish we were there — we can have a clean energy economy for the cost of a postcard stamp a day. And the EPA’s analysis does not “take into account the benefits of reducing global warming.”

EPA’s findings are consistent with the independent Congressional Budget Office analysis released on June 19th. CBO determined “that the net annual economywide cost of the cap-and-trade program in 2020 would be $22 billion—or about $175 per household.” CBO did not evaluate the impact of the energy efficiency measures on consumer spending on utilities.

The bottom line is that independent analyses found that ACES would cut spending on utilities, as well as have minimal overall costs to the average household – somewhere between 22 to 48 cents a day. Hopefully, representatives will pay heed to these government studies and ignore conservatives’ counterfeit estimates when they vote on the American Clean Energy and Security Act this Friday.

We think that they ought to at least be able to evaluate indirect land use, but I’m still thinking about this one,” he said, noting he had just learned about it.

This is the same biofuel-industry loophole for which Agriculture Committee chair Collin Peterson (D-MN) has been holding up comprehensive climate and clean energy legislation. By replacing petroleum, biofuels have the potential to dramatically reduce global warming pollution. But scientists have found biofuels can also worsen global warming by encouraging farmers to cut down the diversity-rich tropical forests that soak up carbon dioxide. It is critical that the federal government’s mandate for billions of gallons of ethanol production be coupled with regulations that take into account the science of indirect land use change.

Dicks, an environmental champion, should know this.

As the House Energy and Commerce Committee deliberations continue on the American Clean Energy and Security Act, H.R. 2454, opponents have made a number of wild charges about the cost of the bill. These claims are false. A new EPA analysis found that “compared to the draft bill, H.R. 2454 would likely result in lower allowance prices, a smaller impact on energy bills, and a smaller impact on household consumption.”

Committee opponents made a range of histrionic claims about cost, often citing partisan studies such as Heritage Foundation analyses, or a discredited study by a right-wing think tank in Spain, neither of which actually model the specific provisions of the bill. The Heritage Foundation, for example claimed that the bill would destroy over a million net jobs, impose over $1,500 in energy costs on families, and slash GDP by $9.6 trillion by 2030.

But the EPA’s nonpartisan analysis of the original bill’s more stringent environmental targets found that these outlandish predictions were wrong by a factor of eight or more. Indeed, according to the EPA, GDP would increase by more than $5.1 trillion by 2030, and costs to families would be no more than $140 per year, without even counting the reduced energy costs from efficiency and greater use of renewable energy from the sun and wind.

The EPA’s new analysis of the revised version of the bill, released on Sunday, found that recent changes to the bill would reduce its cost even further.

H.R. 2454 would bring clean energy to American families at even lower cost, while simultaneously achieving greater utilization of carbon capture and sequestration technology.

New cost-saving provisions of H.R. 2454:

— The EPA predicts that the allocation of nearly a third of emissions allowances to local distribution companies (regulated utilities) will lower the price of household bills below the modest cost from the original discussion draft. Chairman Waxman said that the new bill would cost “less than a postage stamp a day.”

– The new analysis also predicts that the price of emissions allowances will be more than 7% lower due to a 17% greenhouse gas reduction target in 2020, compared to an original target of 20%. Changes in the offsets calculations would also reduce the cost of compliance.

– Changes to the incentive structure will result in “greater penetration of coal with carbon capture and sequestration technology by 2020″ compared with the original discussion draft.

It’s no secret that both the pollution reduction goals and the renewable electricity standard are not as aggressive as in the original version. EPA found that these changes would reduce the cost of the program. Even with the lower reduction, H.R. 2454 would achieve emissions reductions equivalent to taking half a billion cars off the road. That’s twice the number of cars that exist in the US today.

The Bush-Cheney policies increased the yearly energy costs of the average American household by $1,100 while ignoring rising oil dependence and global warming pollution. While the U.S. was focused on oil, it slipped behind China in the production of solar panels, and has remained behind Denmark in the production of wind turbines. The U.S. did nothing while our economic competitors raced ahead to produce the clean energy technologies of the future.

H.R. 2454 is a bargain by comparison. Not only will it lead to energy efficiency and reduced consumption at home, but it also creates a wide variety of incentives for private sector investment in every form of clean energy technology – technologies that will lower the cost of carbon-free energy while creating jobs, increasing export revenues, and reducing our costly reliance on imported oil.

As Congressional hearings on draft green economy legislation begin, the Environmental Protection Agency has found that the bill will “play a critical role in the American economic recovery and job growth.” The initial EPA analysis, based on the draft of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) released by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA), looks only at the effects of the cap-and-trade “market-based emissions program,” without modeling the effects of the complementary renewable energy and energy efficiency standards in this comprehensive legislation. Despite the limited review, the EPA has found that Waxman-Markey would “enable American workers to serve in a central role in our clean energy transformation”:

The draft bill would establish a wide range of policies to promote the development and deployment of new clean energy technologies that would fundamentally change the way we produce, deliver, and use energy. The bill would: (1) advance energy efficiency and reduce reliance on oil; (2) stimulate innovation in clean coal technology to ensure that coal remains an important part of the U.S. energy portfolio by capturing harmful greenhouse gas emissions before they enter the atmosphere; (3) accelerate the use of renewable sources of energy, including biomass, wind, solar, and geothermal; (4) create strong demand for a domestic manufacturing market for these next generation technologies that will enable American workers to serve in a central role in our clean energy transformation; and (5) play a critical role in the American economic recovery and job growth – from retooling shuttered manufacturing plants to make wind turbines, to using equipment and expertise in drilling for oil to develop clean energy from underground geothermal sources, to tapping into American ingenuity to engineer coal-fired power plants that do not contribute to climate change.

The ACES Act does not address the question of how allocate the revenues of a carbon market auction. Industry executives and conservative allies like Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) are calling for free giveaways to polluters. However, the EPA analysis finds that polluter giveaways are “highly regressive.” A full auction of permits and equitable returns, however, allows for working families to come out ahead:

Assuming that the bulk of the revenues from the program are returned to households, the cap-and-trade policy has a relatively modest impact on U.S. consumers. . . . Returning the revenues in this fashion could make the median household, and those living at lower ends of the income distribution, better off than they would be without the program.

The EPA modeling finds that a significant proportion of the required emissions reductions in Waxman-Markey are achieved through the use of one billion tons of international offsets a year. Because of the use of offsets, the U.S. electricity sector is expected to produce 10% fewer greenhouse gas emissions from 2010 to 2025, although the overall cap declines by over 25 percent.

Total US GHG Emissions & Sources of Abatement

Source: EPA Waxman-Markey Discussion Draft Preliminary Analysis

The definition of “welfare” in Section 302(h) of the Clean Air Act states:

All language referring to effects on welfare includes, but is not limited to, effects on soils, water, crops, vegetation, manmade materials, animals, wildlife, weather, visibility, and climate, damage to and deterioration of property, and hazards to transportation, as well as effects on economic values and on personal comfort and well-being, whether caused by transformation, conversion, or combination with other pollutants.

From soils and water to weather, economic values and, of course, climate — all of these elements of our welfare have been unequivocally damaged by manmade global warming already, with much worse to come if the pollution is not arrested.

This decision comes more than 16 years after the United States ratified the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992. As Center for American Progress senior fellow Robert Sussman — now the EPA senior policy counsel — explained last year, the EPA will be able to move forward with regulations to limit greenhouse gas pollution to build a clean-energy economy:

The Clean Air Act, for example, imposes emission performance standards on new major sources of pollution and modifications of existing sources with emission increases over a set threshold. It should be possible to limit these standards to large power plants and other facilities that are significant emitters of CO2, and to exclude smaller sources, such as the hospitals, schools, stores, and apartment buildings of concern to the president. And it should be possible to implement a trading system for large sources that provides flexibility and reduces compliance costs. That is not to say, of course, that large sources would be off the hook from controlling their CO2 emissions — why should they be? — but it does mean that meaningless requirements with no climate change payoff can be avoided.

The Obama administration is finally removing one of the great blots of the George W. Bush legacy with this action.

In a widely reprinted column, the National Center for Public Policy Research’s (NCPPR) David Ridenour attacks White House energy and climate change adviser Carol Browner as a “socialist” and “zealot” with “so much baggage she could be an airline”:

As little respect as she has shown for the law, she has shown even less for science.

Ridenour’s arguments include the bizarre Drudge Report attack that Browner is a socialist, accusing Browner of complicity in an EPA case for which she was fully acquitted, and the repetition of a 1995 claim of “illegal lobbying” by then-Congressman David McIntosh (R-IN), which the New York Times explained then involved “doing things that have long been routine functions of officials in the executive branch, practices that lawyers in Republican and Democratic administrations alike have declared legal.”

In fact, it is the National Center for Public Policy Research that has little respect for the law, and even less for science:

Little Respect For The Law: Laundering $2.5 million for Jack Abramoff. Jack Abramoff was a member of NCPPR’s Board of Directors; he resigned in October 2004. From 1999 to 2001, NCPPR wrote “repeated articles that aligned with the positions of the lobbyist’s clients.” In October 2002, Abramoff directed the Mississippi Band of Choctaws to give $1 million to NCPPR, and then told Amy Ridenour to distribute the funds to front organizations he controlled. In June 2003, Greenberg Traurig, the firm that employed Abramoff, sent $1.5 million to NCPPR, which Ridenour again distributed to front organizations controlled by Abramoff. Amy Ridenour later testified to Congress that she was an unwitting dupe. [Raw Story, 3/8/06]

Less Respect For Science: NCPPR Is Part Of The Right-Wing Climate-Denier Machine. The National Center for Public Policy Research was founded in 1982 by Amy Ridenour, David’s wife and a compatriot of Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed, and Grover Norquist in the leadership of the College Republicans in 1981. NCPPR is a member organization of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Cooler Heads Coalition and the right-wing State Policy Network. In 25 years of operation, NCPPR has received about $280,000 from Exxon Mobil, in part to fund its “Envirotruth” climate denial website. [ExxonSecrets, SourceWatch]

Less Respect For Science: NCPPR Uses African Poverty to Attack Climate Change Action. Using its Project 21 front group, NCPPR put out a press release supporting CEI’s Third-World vs. Gore campaign on Amy Ridenour’s blog. It attacked “Gore and his celebrity friends” for “living opulent lifestyles” while “many in the Third World – particularly those in Africa – are literally dying due to a lack of adequate power, and the catastrophe that could result from imposing anti-global warming emissions regulations on power generation in these areas.” In fact, Africa is “one of the most vulnerable continents to climate change and climate variability,” with between 75 and 250 million Africans facing increasing water scarcity by 2020, potential food shortages and a rise in disease. [Project 21, 3/10/2008] [IPCC, 2007]

This hit piece was published in several right-wing publications, including Investor’s Business Daily, Robert Decherd’s Providence Journal, and Rev. Sung Yun Moon’s Washington Times.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce responded with dismay. Bill Kovacs, the Chamber’s vice president of environment, technology and regulatory affairs, complained:

By moving forward with the endangerment finding on greenhouse gases, EPA is putting in motion a set of decisions that may have far-reaching unintended consequences. Specifically, once the finding is made, no matter how limited, some environmental groups will sue to make sure it is applied to all aspects of the Clean Air Act. This will mean that all infrastructure projects, including those under the president’s stimulus initiative, will be subject to environmental review for greenhouse gases. Since not one of the projects has been subjected to that review, it is possible that the projects under the stimulus initiative will cease. This will be devastating to the economy.

Far from being “devastating to the economy,” a global warming endangerment finding is needed to allow the government and businesses to rationally guide future economic policy. As Robert Sussman wrote in the Wonk Room last year, responding to the same doom and gloom scenario painted that time by the Wall Street Journal, this fear is without merit:

The specter of bureaucrats running amok and strangling the economy — by intruding into small businesses and individual households and banning fuels on which millions of Americans depend — is a fantasy of die-hard free-market zealots. In fact, a new administration could enforce new global warming regulations with common sense, focusing on large emitters of greenhouse gases to achieve reasonable reductions while spurring trillions of dollars worth of economic growth and green-collar jobs.

Sussman is now the EPA Senior Policy Counsel.

If her only sin was zeal in protecting the public, firing her was wrong and will send a troubling message to EPA employees all across the country who are trying to do their jobs. Clearly, it’s up to Steve Johnson to explain why he fired Mary and up to Congress to investigate the circumstances.

Despite Congressional inquiries, Administrator Johnson never explained the firing, and only left his post when Bush left office. Now, however, Sussman — who supervised Obama’s EPA transition team — is the EPA’s senior policy counsel. According to the Michigan Messenger’s Eartha Jane Melzer, “Jackson also stated that newly appointed advisor, Robert Sussman, would provide oversight on the matter.”

Cleaning up the toxic Bush legacy will take years, but this is an welcome start, especially for the residents of Saginaw Bay.

Sussman was a Wonk Room regular, writing on the Mary Gade scandal, the Bush administration, and climate legislation. In particular, he explained in clear language why Bush’s disdain for environmental regulation was flawed. Sussman demolished the argument that laws like the Clean Air Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Endangered Species Act are not applicable to the threat of global warming:

The truth is that our environmental laws were not written to be static. They are flexible tools to address unanticipated or emerging problems that science identifies over time.

Sussman’s work for the Center for American Progress highlighted that practical approach. He crafted recommendations for regulatory and funding mechanisms to spur the development of carbon capture and sequestration technology for coal plants, “to reconcile reliance on coal for electricity with the need to reduce the threat of global warming.”

His knowledge, experience, and passion will be invaluable in restoring the mission of the Environmental Protection Agency.

With his election and with my appointment, President Obama has dramatically changed the face of American environmentalism. With your help, we can now change the face of the environment as well.

In her memo, Jackson said, “I will uphold the values of scientific integrity, rule of law and transparency every day.” Her pledges for action indict the record of the Bush administration EPA:

– “scientific judgments . . . suppressed, misrepresented or distorted by political agendas”
– “policy decisions should not be disguised as scientific findings”
– “EPA cannot misinterpret or ignore the language Congress has used”
– “EPA cannot turn a blind eye to the court’s decision or procrastinate in complying”
– “we are not doing an adequate job of assessing and managing the risks of chemicals”

Jackson also called on her staff “to connect with those who have been historically underrepresented in EPA decision making,” from the minorities and poor to small businesses and towns.

She also signaled that the clock for Congress to act on climate legislation will soon start ticking: “As Congress does its work, we will move ahead to comply with the Supreme Court’s decision recognizing EPA’s obligation to address climate change under the Clean Air Act.”

The only notable omission from the memorandum was a call for the EPA to restore its independence from the White House. Under Bush, the Environmental Protection Agency effectively became a servant of White House Office of Management and Budget officials, who corrupted the EPA’s work with the help of compliant EPA administrator Stephen Johnson. EPA must regain its authority as the independent watchdog of our nation’s environmental health.

Full text:

MEMORANDUM
DATE: January 23, 2009
TO: All EPA Employees
FROM: Lisa P. Jackson, Administrator-designate

I can think of no higher calling or privilege than rejoining EPA as your Administrator. I am grateful and humbled that President Obama has given me this honor. With his election and with my appointment, President Obama has dramatically changed the face of American environmentalism. With your help, we can now change the face of the environment as well.

During my 21 years in public service, I have witnessed firsthand the dedication and professionalism of EPA’s workforce. Thousands of committed, hard-working and talented employees for whom protecting the environment is a calling, not just a job, have made EPA a driving force in environmental protection since 1970.

EPA can meet the nation’s environmental challenges only if our employees are fully engaged partners in our shared mission. That’s why I will make respect for the EPA workforce a bedrock principle of my tenure. I will look to you every day for ideas, advice and expertise. EPA should once again be the workplace of choice for veteran public servants and also talented young people beginning careers in environmental protection — just as it was for me when I first joined EPA shortly after graduate school.

In outlining his agenda for the environment, President Obama has articulated three values that he expects EPA to uphold. These values will shape everything I do.

Science must be the backbone for EPA programs. The public health and environmental laws that Congress has enacted depend on rigorous adherence to the best available science. The President believes that when EPA addresses scientific issues, it should rely on the expert judgment of the Agency’s career scientists and independent advisors. When scientific judgments are suppressed, misrepresented or distorted by political agendas, Americans can lose faith in their government to provide strong public health and environmental protection.

The laws that Congress has written and directed EPA to implement leave room for policy judgments. However, policy decisions should not be disguised as scientific findings. I pledge that I will not compromise the integrity of EPA’s experts in order to advance a preference for a particular regulatory outcome.

EPA must follow the rule of law. The President recognizes that respect for Congressional mandates and judicial decisions is the hallmark of a principled regulatory agency. Under our environmental laws, EPA has room to exercise discretion, and Congress has often looked to EPA to fill in the details of general policies. However, EPA needs to exercise policy discretion in good faith and in keeping with the directives of Congress and the courts. When Congress has been explicit, EPA cannot misinterpret or ignore the language Congress has used. When a court has determined EPA’s responsibilities under our governing statutes, EPA cannot turn a blind eye to the court’s decision or procrastinate in complying.

EPA’s actions must be transparent. In 1983, EPA Administrator Ruckelshaus promised that EPA would operate “in a fishbowl” and “will attempt to communicate with everyone from the environmentalists to those we regulate, and we will do so as openly as possible.”

I embrace this philosophy. Public trust in the Agency demands that we reach out to all stakeholders fairly and impartially, that we consider the views and data presented carefully and objectively, and that we fully disclose the information that forms the bases for our decisions. I pledge that we will carry out the work of the Agency in public view so that the door is open to all interested parties and that there is no doubt why we are acting and how we arrived at our decisions.

We must take special pains to connect with those who have been historically underrepresented in EPA decision making, including the disenfranchised in our cities and rural areas, communities of color, native Americans, people disproportionately impacted by pollution, and small businesses, cities and towns working to meet their environmental responsibilities. Like all Americans, they deserve an EPA with an open mind, a big heart and a willingness to listen.

As your Administrator, I will uphold the values of scientific integrity, rule of law and transparency every day. If ever you feel I am not meeting this commitment, I expect you to let me know.

Many vital tasks lie before us in every aspect of EPA’s programs. As I develop my agenda, I will be seeking your guidance on the tasks that are most urgent in protecting public health and the environment and on the strategies that EPA can adopt to maximize our effectiveness and the expertise of our talented employees. At the outset, I would like to highlight five priorities that will receive my personal attention:

• Reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The President has pledged to make responding to the threat of climate change a high priority of his administration. He is confident that we can transition to a low-carbon economy while creating jobs and making the investment we need to emerge from the current recession and create a strong foundation for future growth. I share this vision. EPA will stand ready to help Congress craft strong, science-based climate legislation that fulfills the vision of the President. As Congress does its work, we will move ahead to comply with the Supreme Court’s decision recognizing EPA’s obligation to address climate change under the Clean Air Act.
• Improving air quality. The nation continues to face serious air pollution challenges, with large areas of the country out of attainment with air-quality standards and many communities facing the threat of toxic air pollution. Science shows that people’s health is at stake. We will plug the gaps in our regulatory system as science and the law demand.
• Managing chemical risks. More than 30 years after Congress enacted the Toxic Substances Control Act, it is clear that we are not doing an adequate job of assessing and managing the risks of chemicals in consumer products, the workplace and the environment. It is now time to revise and strengthen EPA’s chemicals management and risk assessment programs.
• Cleaning up hazardous-waste sites. EPA will strive to accelerate the pace of cleanup at the hundreds of contaminated sites across the country. Turning these blighted properties into productive parcels and reducing threats to human health and the environment means jobs and an investment in our land, our communities and our people.
• Protecting America’s water. EPA will intensify our work to restore and protect the quality of the nation’s streams, rivers, lakes, bays, oceans and aquifers. The Agency will make robust use of our authority to restore threatened treasures such as the Great Lakes and the Chesapeake Bay, to address our neglected urban rivers, to strengthen drinking-water safety programs, and to reduce pollution from non-point and industrial dischargers.

As we meet these challenges, we must be sensitive to the burdens pollution has placed on vulnerable subpopulations, including children, the elderly, the poor and all others who are at particular risk to threats to health and the environment. We must seek their full partnership in the greater aim of identifying and eliminating the sources of pollution in their neighborhoods, schools and homes.

EPA’s strength has always been our ability to adapt to the constantly changing face of environmental protection as our economy and society evolve and science teaches us more about how humans interact with and affect the natural world. Now, more than ever, EPA must be innovative and forward looking because the environmental challenges faced by Americans all across our country are unprecedented.

These challenges are indeed immense in scale and urgency. But, as President Obama said Tuesday, they will be met. I look forward to joining you at work on Monday to begin tackling these challenges together.