The EPA has dropped its long-awaited (since President Obama became president) bombshell, declaring that greenhouse gases — mainly carbon dioxide — generated by human industrial activities is a threat to public health and welfare. You can read the EPA’s press release here. And Monitor colleague Mark Clayton has a story here.
In fact, for now it’s a proposed finding, one subject to public comment for 60 days. The agency will hold public hearings in Arlington, Va., on May 18 and in Seattle, Wash., on May 21. You can read more about that process here.
The vehicle for the EPA’s jurisdiction if and when the finding becomes permanent is the Clean Air Act.
But earlier in the week, the agency took a step to see if it also has jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act. The link? Ocean acidification, another serious byproduct of humans pumping CO2 into the air. You can read more about it here, here, and here.
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Pete Spotts, The Christian Science Monitor, 17 April 2009. Full article.
