Air Quality Archives

EPA's new report "America's Children and the Environment" notes that air pollution declined, but asthma prevalence continues to rise. One possible conclusion from this is that air pollution is not actually a cause of asthma. In fact, that's the most plausible conclusion. Every pollutant we measure has been dropping for decades pretty much everywhere, while asthma prevalence has been rising pretty much everywhere. This is true throughout the entire western world, not just the U.S. In fact, asthma incidence is highest in countries with the lowest levels of air pollution. Asthma is rare in developing countries with much more polluted air. Asthma incidence is simply unrelated to air pollution. Asthma attacks are probably unrelated as well. But even if air pollution can cause asthma attacks, it is a minor cause, responsible for less than 1% of all asthma attacks. EPA's own published estimates implicitly say this, but EPA never makes the percentage explicit, because that would undermine one of the agency's most potent weapons for creating unwarranted public fear.

Writing in the Washington Post, Joel Schwartz of the American Enterprise Institute says:

...in the real world, the costs of air pollution control mean higher prices, lower wages and lower returns on investments, reducing the resources we have available for everything else that affects our health, safety and quality of life. If our air is already safe to breathe, then the EPA's never ending war on air pollution is costing us much and providing little in return.

The Supreme Court accepted certiorari in Environmental Defense v. Duke Energy (formerly United States v. Duke Energy). I discuss the relevant issues here.

Law professor Shi-Ling Hsu takes aim at New Source Review in Regulation magazine.

The EPA announced new, tighter fine particulate standards yesterday. As expeceted, environmental activist groups said the new, tighter standards are not tight enough.

The D.c. Circuit ruled today that the U.S. EPA is not required to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. This is a huge victory for the Bush Administration (and yet another big loss for environmentalists in Clean Air Act litigation). Here's what I'm posting about the decision on NRO's The Corner:

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit just ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency is not required to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. The splintered opinion in Massachusetts v. EPA, in which three judges issued three competing opinions, is available here. This is a big victory for the Bush Administration as well as for common sense. (I've addressed some of the relevant legal claims here.) This case is not going away, however, as a petition for en banc and/or Supreme Court review is a near certainty.

UPDATE: The three opinions in the case are quite interesting. Judge Randolph believes the petitioners have standing, but believes the EPA properly exercised its discretion in refusing to regulate greenhouse gases. Judge Sentelle beleives there is no standing, but accepts Randolph's conclusion for the purposes of entering a judgment. Neither judge addresses the underlying question of whether the EPA even has the authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

Judge Tatel dissents. He believes the petitioners have standing, believes the EPA has authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, and believes they are required to do so. While I disagree with his conclusions, his thorough arguments (combined with the lack of a panel majority) increase the likelihood that this case will be reheard en banc or go up to the Supremes.

Lead was phased out of gasoline bought by consumers decades ago, but leaded fuel still exists. A few industries, including airlines and auto racing, were exempt from the rules. Today's NYT reports on an environmentalis campaign to eliminate the use of leaded fuel in NASCAR. Thus far, available substitutes have not done the trick -- or involved the use of other fuel additives (such as MTBE) that have their own problems. Soe other racing series (not named in the article) do use unleaded fuel.

Since the phaseout of lead from gasoline, ambient lead concentrations and average blood lead levels have dropped dramatically. So one could wonder whether the use of leaded gasoline by NASCAR drivers is much of a problem. Lead pollution poses the greatest risk to children, yet children would be among those least exposed by lead from NASCAR vehicles. Adult and chlid spectators alike are exposed to the emissions less frequently than NASCAR racers and employees. Yet no one knows the level of exposures involved here. Indeed, the NYT story notes that neither NASCAR, the EPA, nor any environmental group has tested air quality at a NASCAR race.

The Berkeley Electronic Press dedicated a recent issue to the Pollution Haven Hypothesis, i.e. do different jurisdictions try to lower their environmental standards to attract industry? There are a number of interesting papers available.

One of the more interesting papers deals with New Source Review (NSR) under the Clean Air Act, which has been in the news recently with a major D.C. Circuit opinion that upheld changes made by the Bush Administration to deal with problems involving NSR --- the exact same sort of problems addressed in this particular paper. The paper's authors explain, "In our examination of more than 2500 and 2200 plant-level modification decisions and closures, respectively, we find empirical evidence suggesting that NSR retards modification rates, while doing little to hasten the closure of existing dirty plants."

UPDATE: The authors conclude, "In sum, then, the finding that NSR deterred plant modifications that could have led to reduced emissions, in combination with the nonexistent effects of NSR on pollution-intensive plant closures, suggests the possibility that in the short run the NSR stipulation for existing manufacturing plants has led to more, rather than less, pollution." [authors' emphasis, not mine.]

The U.S. Court of Appeals today largely upheld the Bush Administration's controversial revisions to the "New Source Review" regulations under the Clean Air Act. The full 73-page opinion is here. It's not a total win for the Bush Administration, to be sure, as some portions of the revisions were struck down. But it nonetheless illustrates how many of the environmentalist attacks on the Bush revisions were unfounded. Combined with the 4th Circuit's recent decision on NSR enforcement, the decision is definitely a setback for those opposing Clean Air Act reform.

UPDATE: The AP covers the decision here.

SECOND UPDATE: How Appealing has a round up of news stories on the decision here. It's interesting that some environmental groups and those states that challenged the NSR rules are claiming victory. When the Bush Administration proposed their rules, environmentalists and northeastern states charged the rules were illegal and would cause dramatic increases in air pollution. Now, in the wake of a Fourth Circuit ruling that utilities have more leeway to modify their operations than environmentalists and the Clinton EPA had claimed, the D.C. Circuit has upheld the vast bulk of the Bush Administration revisions, and Greens are pretending to be pleased as punch. They can't have it both ways. Either they were exaggerating before, or now they are spinning to cover a disastrous loss. Personally, I'm inclined toward the former. As I explained here, I never considered the EPA's revisions to be that big of a deal.

The Supreme Court's recent decision to end the "substantially advances a legitimate state interest" takings test in Lingle v. Chevron is already making its way into the circuits. A takings claim rested among a host of other claims brought before the 9th Circuit by a game ranch. (For the Congressional Budget Office's explanation of what a takings is, see here, and how the courts evaluate takings claims, see here.)

The ranch was affected by Montana voter initiative I-143, which passed in November of 2000. The initiative outlawed fee hunting on existing game ranches and prevented the creation of future game ranches. (Game ranches entail the raising of "alternative livestock" usually elk, deer, or exotic game on fenced-in properties. This should not be confused with ranching for wildlife where landowners improve habitat in return for tags they can sell to hunters for pursuing wild game on their property. For more on ranching for wildlife, as opposed to game ranching, see here.) The 9th Circuit refused to hear a substantially affects theory of takings in light of Lingle and left a deprivation of all economic value theory of takings (which remains valid under current Supreme Court precedent) to be decided once the state courts have decided whether a takings has occurred under Montana law.

Around the environmental horn in other cases this week:

Senator Kit Bond is making progress in his effort to delay adoption of a new rule limiting emissions from lawnmowers and small-engine machines. His stated concern is that adding catalytic converters to lawnmowers could ose a fire threat, and is seeking to delay the rule until EPA conducts a study examining such concerns.

Joel Schwartz argues that it's worse on paper than in reality. The worst air quality is still in California. Among those places with the worst air off of the West Coast? Liberty, Pennsylvania.

I just noticed today that Transport for London is testing fuel cell buses on a certain route (RV1 - Covent Garden to Tower Gateway). The buses visibly advertise "zero emissions" -- right above a tailpipe which is clearly emitting something...

This emission is water vapour, as stated on the TFL website:

The only emission from the fuel cell bus is water, which forms a vapour cloud as it leaves the exhaust and enters the atmosphere.

And we all know, water vapour is one of the most potent greenhouse gases. Perhaps someone should contact the UK's Advertising Standards Agency with regard to the false claims made on these buses...

THe New Hampshire legislature is considering tighter mercury emission standards for power plants than those proposed by the EPA. The legislation is motivated by local concern about potential hot spots and a desire for a more protective standard. This is how it should be. Where states have particularl environmental concerns, or environmental preferences, they should be free to adopt more protective standards. While I think it would be a mistake for New Hampshire to ban the trading of mercury emission credits altogether, New Hampshire retains the ability to do so within our federal system.

Speaking of mercury, Sandy Szwarc and Henry Miller seek to clear the air on mercury risks here.

One of the main criticisms that has been circulating of the EPA's new mercury rule is that of the Government Accountability Office finding that EPA failed to "quantify the human health benefits of decreased exposure to mercury, such as reduced incidence of developmental delays, learning disabilities, and neurological disorders."

No-one has ever done this, until now. In a study from the AEI-Brookings Joint Center, Ted Gayer and Bob Hahn quantify the health benefits of increased intelligence from decreased methylmercury consumption. The benefits are not great when compared with the cost of emissions reduction: a maximum present value benefit from the proposed rule of $150 million compared to a cost of $5.5 billion. The alternative proposal, favored by the environmental groups, actually produces fewer benefits ($140 million) at a far greater cost ($20.7 billion).

The authors conclude:

As a society, we are in real danger of focusing on de minimis risks if they become salient political issues. The regulation of mercury emissions from power plants is one such example. We are likely to spend billions of dollars on reducing mercury emissions from power plants and get very modest, if any, improvements in IQ scores in return.

The Bush Administration is proceeding with plans to adopt a tradable emission credit scheme for mercury. Here's the coverage in the NYT and WaPo.

Clear Skies failed to make it out of the Senate Environment Committee today. Several of the senators chose to portray the legislation as a failure to address climate change, most notably Republican-in-name Lincoln Chafee. While not what the legislation is supposed to be about in the first place, it seems fairly clear that Clear Skies could only help with climate change. For commentary on the benefits of Clear Skies, see this recent post over at the Volokh Conspiracy and my earlier post here at The Commons.

Hope remains alive, however, as the forthcoming EPA rules are supposed to closely mirror Clear Skies.

The Carolina Journal reports on how North Carolina's air quality legislation might have been designed to help local utilities escape federal enforcement actions. It's an interesting story.

Montana Governor-elect Brian Schweitzer plans on passing an ethanol bill in Montana ---what sort of bill remains unclear. Given that the few areas in Montana that can claim to have air quality problems cannot blame those problems on the automobile, any mandates for ethanol in the state would clearly be nothing more than subsidies to the agricultural interests in the state --- at the expense of the Montana taxpayers. Moreover, it remains unclear whether ethanol really is cleaner burning overall and whether it actually provides net energy gains.

The December issue of the Washington Monthly has an informative article on the the fight over the Clear Skies Initiative, subtitled "Why enviros can't admit that Bush's Clear Skies initiative isn't half bad." In the article, U.S. News and World Report contributing editor David Whitman explains how an initiative initially supported by both industry and environmentalists came to find itself in the crosshairs of both sides.

Clear Skies is mostly known for its attempt to further reduce emissions of several air pollutants via cap-and-trade. As Whitman contends, it was proposed as a trade-off. If industry would agree to Clear Skies, then the EPA and environmentalists would go along with changing the draconian rules on New Source Review, which force old power plants that wish to upgrade their facilities to meet all of the command-and-control technologies of a brand new plant. Whitman asserts that getting emission limits for carbon dioxide were also on the table in the negotiations.

According to Whitman, the deal fell apart when the perfect became the enemy of the good. Attorneys in EPA's enforcement division, who liked new source review, left their jobs to demonize Clear Skies proponents. The United Mine Workers undermined the legislation because of worries that fuel switching from coal to natural gas would cost coal mining jobs. And finally, environmentalists went on the attack because there was no carbon dioxide cap.

Whitman then says that a slide from a Powerpoint presentation gave environmentalists the misinformation they needed to bring the program down. An EPA presentation to sell the program to industry as more relaxed than the current Clean Air Act regulations escaped into environmentalists' hands. Even though the program would require more stringent reductions, but achieve them through less costly means, the environmentalists claimed that Clear Skies was weakening existing laws. This was patently false, but the misleading EPA Powerpoint slide allowed the characterization to succeed.

Whitman goes on to explain how when an environmental group did question the ruling orthodoxy, they were clubbed back into line by the rest of the environmental establishment.

Whitman also takes to task libertarian allies of the administration, citing in particular the Property Research and Environment Center. I assume he actually means the Property and Environment Research Center or PERC in Bozeman, Montana --- where I am affiliated as a scholar. Whitman contends that PERC blasted Clear Skies as "burdensome, costly regulation." I further assume he is referring to PERC's 2002 midterm report card on the administration as the 2004 report card made little mention of Clear Skies. In that report card, PERC was rather harsh on Clear Skies, giving the program a D for its efforts. This is indeed a harsh grade. (In fact, I imagine that with an overall grade of C- in 2002 and C+ in 2004, the Administration might take Mr. Whitman's assessment of PERC as an ally to be a questionable one.)

In its assessment of Clear Skies, PERC noted that cap-and-trade was a step in the right direction, but it was worried that insufficient assessments had been done regarding the benefits of the tougher regulations when compared to the higher costs of the additional regulation. When looking at the overall picture, the PERC report cards seemed to like the policy of moving toward cap-and-trade but not if the cost for such a move entailed extensive new regulations that create more costs than benefits. PERC did give the Administration's proposed changes to New Source Review a B+ in 2002 and spoke highly of cap-and-trade in its 2004 report. Hence, the devil is (as always) in the details.

All in all, Whitman's history of how Clear Skies became unjustly demonized is an informative and educational one. Whitman does a good job of reminding that good politics and good policy are often in conflict. According to Whitman, "The battle over Clear Skies has shaped up as a classic Washington tale of a creditable endeavor hopelessly mismanaged by its sponsor, demagogued by its opponents, and tainted from the start by the administration's well-earned reputation as handmaidens of industry." The result, writes Whitman, is that, "The resulting gridlock could delay attempts to clean up the environment and cost thousands of Americans their lives."

But Whitman also needs to ask, how many lives might be lost because of the increased costs of extending regulations? When power plants pass the costs on to consumers, some of the poor will have to decide between heating their homes and feeding their families. Lives will be lost there, too. Thus, whether Clear Skies is ultimately a good policy depends on what it is traded for at the political bargaining table and how it is implemented. That is not just a matter of the perfect being the enemy of the good, that is a question of whether the good even exists.

UPDATE: Grist has its own comments on the Whitman article here.

For those who missed it, the Administration plans to push forward with its Clear Skies legislation to extend cap-and-trade under the Clean Air Act. The Washington Post had the original story, but I think this link from the Boston Globe might be available longer.

Minnesota Public Radio analyzes the environmental policies articulated in last week's debate between Bush and Kerry. The article quotes both Bonner Cohen and Terry Anderson.

The Philadelphia Inquirer is running a series of 20 or so editorials attacking President Bush to explain their endorsement of Senator Kerry. For balance, they're commissioning a series of op-eds takng a contrary view. They asked me to write a piece defending the administration's air pollution policies. While I have my differences with the Administration, there is so much disinformation about these issues that the piece was easy to write.

On Friday, the California Air Resources Board unanimously adopted new regulations requiring significant cuts in automobile emissions of carbon dioxide. The NYT covers the move here, and the SacBee ran the AP story here (albeit with an exceedingly misleading headline -- the rules have nothing to do with "smog").

The rules will undoubtedly be challenged in court by automakers and other groups. Not only will the rules generate insignificant greenhouse gas reductions -- even were California to eliminate all automotive emissions, the impact on global emissions would be negligible -- but there is a strong argument the rules are illegal under federal law. Specifically, the 1975 federal energy conservation law, which provides for federal fuel economy standards, explicitly preempts state rules governing automobile fuel economy. Although the standards explicitly target CO2 emissions rather than fuel economy, CO2 emission rules inevitably entail controls on fuel consumption. On this basis, automakers will argue -- with some justification -- that the rules are de facto fuel economy standards.

For an overview of this and other arguments against the new California regulations, see CEI's comments on the initial CARB proposal here.

A new report commissioned by the California Air Resources Board apparently confirms what many experts already knew: mandatory oxygenate requirements for gasoline do not produce cleaner air. To the contrary, requiring the use of ethanol -- the oxygenate of political choice -- actually increases emissions of ozone-forming compounds. The report is available here.

A new EPA report announces that summertime nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants and other large sources in eastern states declined by 30 percent since 2002 (and 70 percent from 1990), despite increases in energy production. The EPA claims these reductions show the NOx Budget Trading Program is a success.

Historically it was believed ambient air pollution causes asthma. Yet as air pollution in major cities has declined over the last few decades, asthma rates have continued a dramatic climb. While high smog levels can increase the number of asthma attacks -- that is, the experience of symptoms by those who already have asthma -- the claim that ambient air pollution causes asthma is a non-starter. (As I understand it, though, the jury is still out on whether some common components of indoor air pollution play a role.)

Despite these facts, Senator Kerry and some of his supporters want to blame President Bush for the asthma epidemic. This is absurd, as is Kerry's claim that he will end the epidemic as President. NR editor Rich Lowry discusses this issue further in his latest column.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has been known to make exaggerated claims -- utterly ridiculous, completely laughable statements -- about environmental issues.

This quote from him may explain why:

I have so much mercury in my body right now, having tested it recently, that if I were a woman of childbearing years, my child, according to Dr. David Carpenter, the national authority on mercury contamination, would have cognitive impairment -- permanent IQ loss.

In the same interview, from Grist magazine, the following exchange occurs:

Grist: So if you were to tell our readers the single most important environmental action they should take, what would it be?

Kennedy: If your choice is to buy a Prius or go work for a politician who is going to implement the CAFE standards, you better work for the politician. The most important thing you can do is participate in the political process. Support the environmental groups that wage legal action and lobby for these bills. Get rid of the politicians who are whoring for industry. It's more important than recycling. It's more important than anything you can do.

Why not eliminate the middleman?

That is, if you want to take your life in your hands. In 2002, the U.S. government's National Academy of Sciences released a report (Effectiveness and Impact of CAFE Standards 2002) saying that since CAFE standards were imposed in 1975, an additional 2,000 deaths per year can be attributed to the down-sizing of cars required to meet these fuel efficiency standards.

The National Center has a webpage devoted to fuel economy standards, our Fuel Economy Information Center. Stop by and take our quick poll: Should CAFE standards be raised, lowered or left where they are?

While spending the summer in Bozeman, one can readily determine whether there are major forest fires in the region. The more fires in the West, the hazier the view of the surrounding mountains. When produced by industrial facilties, haze in National Parks is regulated under federal law. Why, then, is the haze produced by forest fires not similarly regulated? Of course the government could not impose pollution controls on forest fires, but federal agencies could require the use of fire management techniques that reduce this form of pollution. After all, whether caused by burning coal or burning trees, haze pollutes the viewshed. Just a thought.

While spending the summer in Bozeman, one can readily determine whether there are major forest fires in the region. The more fires in the West, the hazier the view of the surrounding mountains. When produced by industrial facilties, haze in National Parks is regulated under federal law. Why, then, is the haze produced by forest fires not similarly regulated? Of course the government could not impose pollution controls on forest fires, but federal agencies could require the use of fire management techniques that reduce this form of pollution. After all, whether caused by burning coal or burning trees, haze pollutes the viewshed. Just a thought.