EPA Dodges Taking a Stance on Carbon Emissions
July 14, 2008
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The US Environmental Protection Agency on Friday dodged the opportunity to influence policy on the country’s carbon footprint by saying that Congress should be in charge of regulating carbon emissions.
In a conference call with reporters, Stephen Johnson, the EPA Administrator said that the existing law, called the Clean Air Act, was not up to the job of addressing carbon emissions in the country and that Congress should come up with something to fight global warming.
“It’s really at the feet of the Congress to come up with good legislation that cuts through what will likely be decades of litigation and regulation,” Johnson told reporters.
As justification for passing the work to Congress, Johnson said that the EPA was unable to regulate carbon emissions because it would involve too many other government agencies and stakeholders. Even if that is the case, the EPA must surely want to be involved in the regulation process to ensure that it does adequately tackle global warming. By passing all responsibility to Congress it may be passing up its chance to even have its voice heard.
It is widely expected that the next President, whoever that may be, will take a much tougher stance on global warming that the Bush Administration has. At the recent G8 summit in Japan, Bush and other world leaders agreed to cut carbon emissions by 50% by 2050, although it was not clear if the base year would be 2008, or 1990 as it is with the Kyoto Protocol targets.
Environmental groups have criticized this deal for not going far enough in cutting the country’s carbon footprint.
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