Free Republic

The west coast sees rising levels of ozone because of emissions from fast-developing Asian countries while the southeast sees increasing ozone from uncontrolled growth of the invasive species kudzu Thirty percent of the ozone- one of the primary components of photochemical smog found in the skies above the western United States during the spring- comes from coal-fired factories in East Asia (primarily China and India). (1) In about one week, winds carry ozone formed by emissions from cars, factories, and power plants in Asia to the US west coast, where it can add to locally generated pollution, worsening smog in...

But Dems say GOP needs to stop grandstanding: “We don’t want to regulate a puddle,” Boxer said. “That’s ridiculous.” House and Senate Republicans grilled Environmental Protection Agency head Gina McCarthy last week over a plan they say could give the agency control of “just about any place where water collects,” in the words of Rep. Bill Shuster (R-Pa.).That’s just not so, says McCarthy, who claims the proposal by the EPA and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers would simply clarify the Clean Water Act of 1972 and the kinds of waterways that fall under the agency’s jurisdiction. In fact, she said,...

Michigan Rep. Justin Amash was the sole Republican in the House to vote against the latest version of the bill advancing the Keystone XL Pipeline. Amash says he supports the construction of the pipeline, but he opposes legislation singling out one company. He has previously voted present on Keystone, but the addition of “new, unrelated sections empowering the EPA and the federal government with respect to local energy efficiency” pushed him to a no. In a statement published on his Facebook page, the tea party favorite said that the bill includes a lot of cronyism. Since 2013 he has argued...

Remember the EPA bureaucrat who got caught receiving $900,000 in pay without working because he claimed he also was employed by the CIA? According to a report from the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, the man, former climate policy expert John Beale, “retired” when questions arose about his spotty attendance and expense records. Only he didn’t file his retirement paperwork and continued to draw an active-duty salary for some time after. His boss at the time in the EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation, now-EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, knew this for about seven months and did nothing to stop...

"This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history. This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution." Those were the words spoken on Feb. 4 by Christiana Figueres, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), under the auspices...

Several top environmental groups have joined with the honey bee industry to urgently demand that President Obama ban a pesticide many blame for the downfall of the world’s No. 1 food pollinator before it is too late.Fearing that Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency is delaying action, the groups took the unusual step to press Obama directly in a letter that said inaction could jeopardize food supplies.“We hope that you will prioritize action on this issue of vital importance to our food system, economy and environment and make saving bees a key piece of your legacy as president,” said the letter provided...

When my husband and I move to a new area, we specifically look for a home with a wood burning stove. It’s cheaper and if the power grid goes down, we have a way to survive it. Yep, we’re preppers. These regulations are meant to do away with wood stoves and force people to get their heat from gas or electric, paid for at exorbitant rates from utility providers. In some areas, even with gas or electric, the only way to truly keep a home warm is with a wood or pellet stove. This is more of the EPA’s fascist...

When Congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972, it was exercising its power to regulate interstate commerce by prohibiting discharges into the nation’s “navigable waters.” If a body of water could be used to transport goods from one state to another, it was covered by the Act. Like so many other statutes enacted over the last 80 years – that is, since the advent of the administrative state under FDR – the Clean Water Act (CWA) depends on bureaucratic interpretation and enforcement. The two entities involved with the CWA are the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of...

Will the Keystone XL pipeline ever get built? Not if President Obama and the Environmental Protection Agency get their way.

"The EPA has once again made an attempt to expand federal jurisdiction on Florida’s waterways with its proposed changes to the rules guiding the implementation of the Clean Water Act. “The EPA claims that the purpose of this rule is to clarify which bodies of water are and are not subject to the Clean Water Act. The EPA claims that the proposed regulations will not significantly change what currently is considered Waters of the U.S. And the EPA claims the proposed regulations will not substantially effect communities like agriculture. “I believe this is another attempt by the EPA to regulate...

A former Environmental Protection Agency regulator warns that while the Obama administration now has coal in its crosshairs, natural gas is next in line. David Schnare cites a proposed rule on methane emissions as one of the ways President Obama and the EPA will clamp down on natural gas. The 33-year EPA veteran, who once sued utilities for coal-fired plants that didn’t meet Clean Air Act standards, is director of the Center of Energy and Environmental Stewardship at the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Schnare said the EPA — as part of its “Clean Power Plan” rule that would...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Republican Gov. Scott Walker's budget would prohibit the state Department of Natural Resources from purchasing any land through its stewardship program until at least 2028 — if the program still exists then. The budget the governor released Tuesday would place a moratorium on stewardship land acquisitions. It would last until the DNR's debt service on purchases that already have been made drops to $1 for every $8 spent since the program's inception in 1989. The program won't reach that ratio until 2028. The moratorium is expected to save the state $13 million in debt by then,...

Better go out and buy a gas fireplace and stove soon before federal regulations make them more expensive. Federal officials are looking to regulate the energy usage of fake fireplaces as part of the Obama administration’s effort to fight global warming.The Energy Department has proposed new regulations that would mandate that “gas-fired hearth products” like decorative fireplaces and stoves be more energy efficient and produce fewer carbon dioxide emissions. DOE says its rule would save $165 over the lifespan of the average hearth and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 11.1 million metric tons through 2030.The major change DOE demands is...

The U.S. Senate passed a bill Thursday approving the Keystone XL oil pipeline, setting up a looming veto showdown with the White House. The legislation passed on a 62-36 vote

Between a President who lies about global warming, climate change, a Congress composed mostly of lawyers who are clueless about the actual science, the best we can hope for is a Republican Party determined to rein in the EPA I made a promise to myself that I would not write about President Obama’s State of the Union speech because that would require me to watch him deliver it. Like many others I can barely watch him under any circumstance because, to my mind, that means having to watch a psychopathic liar. The problem with that is that he is the...

Almost ever electronic device made today except some for the military have solder joints that contain no lead. This is an effort to save our groundwater and our public health. The fact that the lead has been generally replaced with silver or bismuth, both of which are actually greater health risks than lead, well we’ll leave that one for Ralph Nader. The longer-term trend is toward all-tin connections, anyway, but they don’t work very well, either. Costs have gone up for computers with lead-free solder, mean time between failures (MTBF) has gone down (in this case down is bad) and...

EPA chief headed to Vatican to talk climate change Brian Roewe  |  Jan. 27, 2015 Eco Catholic The head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is scheduled to make a brief Vatican visit at the end of the week on the topic of addressing climate change. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy will meet there Friday with senior officials, among them Cardinal Peter Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. She is also slated to meet with Catholic journalists Friday morning and business leaders in Rome that afternoon. The agency initiated the meeting through U.S. Ambassador to the Holy...

A federal appeals court has agreed to hear arguments in a pair of cases challenging the Obama administration’s climate rule proposal for power plants. The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said Tuesday that it will hear oral arguments from the various sides in the cases on the morning of April 16. Twelve states, led by West Virginia, along with coal mining company Murray Energy Corp., filed separate lawsuits last year asking the court to overturn the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed rule to cut carbon pollution from power plants by 30 percent by 2030. In briefs...

In politics, much as with a Broadway chorus line, timing is everything. That’s a lesson that current EPA Director, Gina McCarthy will probably take to heart after this one. As the northeast braces for what is being described as a potentially historic snowstorm, Ms. McCarthy spent the beginning of her weekend huddling with environmental activists with a clear message. These climate change deniers will ruin the ski industry because we’re going to run out of snow. The Environmental Protection Agency, Aspen Skiing Co., and a pair of Olympic snowboarders teamed up Thursday to help spread the word about climate...

EPA chief Gina McCarthy was harshing on everyone’s mellow up in Aspen Thursday going on about global warming and generally being a buzzkill. Not content just to catch the men’s snowboard superpipe, McCarthy used the Winter X Games as an excuse to lecture the liberal crony class on the benefits of investing in tank tops versus GORE-TEX. According to the Denver Business Journal: McCarthy was in Aspen to make the point that warmer temperatures caused by carbon pollution hurt the winter-sports industry, and to advocate for Obama administration policies to curb greenhouse gases. Apparently we can’t stress this enough because...