Energy Tomorrow Blog

EPA Advances Smart Regulation with Benefit-Cost and PM NAAQS Actions

national ambient air quality standards  epa  clean air act 

Mark Green
Posted December 15, 2020

Let’s make a couple of points from last week’s EPA actions – one that will bring transparency to some of the agency’s rulemaking processes and another that leaves in place effective standards for microscopic soot.

Transparency first. The goal in EPA’s new benefit-cost rule is pretty straight-forward: Americans should be able to judge whether the benefits of future Clean Air Act regulation are justified by potential costs to society. The new rule will help by requiring that future regulation under the act must be written using sound analyses, where data to evaluate environmental, scientific and economic impacts be transparent and replicable.

Many of the natural gas and oil industry’s opponents reject bringing cost-accountability to the development of regulation. Many of them also subscribe to a more-is-better federal regulatory approach – which gets us to point No. 2.

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EPA's Particulate Matter Proposal Makes Sense

epa  national ambient air quality standards 

Mark Green
Posted April 14, 2020

Some points and data that help frame EPA’s proposed rule on National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for particulate matter (PM), which would retain all six of the current standards:Annual concentrations of PM_2.5 have dropped 39% since 2000, and the U.S. has reduced emissions that can contribute to PM – including an 84% drop in sulfur dioxide (SO₂), and a 54% decrease in nitrogen oxide (NOx) – since 2000. Fuel switching to clean natural gas in the power sector played an important role in those reductions. This progress can be helped by continued implementation of existing regulations.

Also: Retaining the current PM NAAQS is supported by the absence of compelling new evidence to lower the existing standards. Another NAAQS review was completed in 2015, and at that time an economic analysis indicated there could be a significant impact on the income of families and potential job losses if a lower NAAQS option was selected.

And: EPA’s proposal is consistent with the recommendation of the agency’s independent Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, which voted 5-1 to keep the current standards.

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EPA on Ozone: Leap Before You Look

climate change  economic growth  energy policy  epa  ghg  global warming  national ambient air quality standards  over regulation  ozone  regulations 

Mark Green
Posted July 29, 2011

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A Hearing To Listen To

domestic access  domestic energy  emissions  energy policy  epa regulations  frack fluid  fracking  hydraulic fracturing  hydrofracking  job creation  national ambient air quality standards  wyoming 

Mark Green
Posted July 15, 2011

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Please Turn Out the Lights

domestic energy  energy policy  epa  greenhouse gas emissions  moratorium  ozone standard  epa standards  national ambient air quality standards 

Jane Van Ryan
Posted October 5, 2010

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is moving forward with proposals that could sound the death knell for millions of jobs across the country. We've already told you about the potentially disastrous effects of the EPA's proposed ozone standard and its plan to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but there's more--much more. 

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