Climate 411

The science is clear: We need a stronger smog standard

By EDF Blogs / Published: September 4, 2018

By Ananya Roy

A mom rubs her sons back as she murmurs softly “It’s going to be OK. You are going to feel better soon.”“Mom, am I going to miss baseball practice again?” Frustration lacing every word, as the young boy looked longingly at the sunshine streaming through the emergency department waiting area window. The sound of his wheezing carried across the room.

In the U.S. more than 26 million people are known to have asthma, of which 6 million are children. These are the Americans who may face situations like this one. The CDC estimates that asthma costs the U.S. economy more than $80 billion annually in medical expenses, missed work and school days and deaths.

We can and must do better.

Ground level ozone (also known as smog) is an air pollutant with well-established adverse effects on health including worsening of asthma. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is required by law to set national air quality standards that protect public health with an adequate margin of safety. Read More »

Posted in Clean Air Act, Health, Policy, Setting the Facts Straight / Comments are closed

Experts condemn the Trump administration’s attack on strong Clean Car Standards

By Erin Murphy / Published: August 29, 2018

Americans are already speaking out in droves against the Trump Administration’s proposal to roll back America’s Clean Car Standards.

The proposal, if finalized, would increase pollution by billions of tons, cost consumers hundreds of billions of hard-earned dollars at the gas pump, and attack long-standing state leadership on clean cars.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) are now accepting public comments (you can write to them here) and they’ll hold three public hearings in September – in Fresno, California; Dearborn, Michigan; and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (The administration had originally announced hearings in Los Angeles, Detroit and Washington D.C. – then abruptly cancelled them with no explanation.)

But right from the beginning, before the public comment period even started, people across the country were voicing their concerns about rolling back these critical protections. Automakers themselves, including Ford and Honda, have disavowed the path the Trump administration is taking.

Here are a few of the more recent statements:

Read More »

Posted in Cars and Pollution, Clean Air Act, Economics, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, Jobs, News, Partners for Change, Policy / Read 1 Response

How Trump’s EPA is leaving Houston and all of America at risk one year after Hurricane Harvey

By Felice Stadler / Published: August 24, 2018

This weekend marks one year since Hurricane Harvey made landfall and wreaked a huge amount of havoc in Texas and other Gulf Coast states. While there are many lessons we can learn from the storm, and much finger pointing that can be done, one fact is clear: Trump’s EPA failed to properly protect children and families in Houston from chemical leaks triggered by the storm.

We now know that Houston’s vast petrochemical industry released at least 8.3 million pounds of air pollution in the wake of the storm, and that many of the area’s toxic Superfund sites were improperly secured and subsequently flooded.

But perhaps worse than these impacts is the fact that one year later, the more than 134 million Americans who live near chemical plants and storage facilities, a disproportionate number of whom are people of color and lower-income, are still at great risk.

Map of US Chemical Manufacturing facilities. Source: EPA

The Trump EPA’s dangerous failures

During and after Hurricane Harvey, as well as Hurricanes Irma and Maria that followed, EPA failed to take important steps to protect families and neighborhoods from health threats:

  • Arkema chemical plant explosion: Neither EPA nor the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) moved fast enough to monitor air quality issues at the Arkema plant when chemical drums caught fire and lids exploded. But a lack of data didn’t stop them from reassuring residents about local air quality. To date, neither TCEQ nor EPA has taken any enforcement action against Arkema, despite the violations (although the company and its CEO and plant manager have been indicted for reckless emissions of dangerous pollutants).
  • Valero refinery leak: Hundreds of families in Houston’s Manchester neighborhood may have breathed in concentrations of benzene that could have damaged their health. But neither EPA nor TCEQ tested the air there until news outlets had published independent air quality monitoring results showing high benzene readings that EDF and Air Alliance Houston paid to do (as did the city of Houston).

Read More »

Posted in Clean Air Act, Health, Policy, Pruitt / Comments are closed

A chorus of opposition to Wheeler’s sham Clean Power Plan replacement

By Charlie Jiang / Published: August 24, 2018

Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler just released his proposal to severely weaken America’s only nation-wide carbon pollution protections for existing power plants – to a chorus of opposition from the American public, state and local officials, faith organizations, health and environmental organizations, and leaders across the political spectrum.

Wheeler’s proposal would scrap the landmark Clean Power Plan –increasing harmful air pollution and exacerbating climate change. According to EPA’s own numbers, Wheeler’s proposal could lead to more than one thousand extra deaths and tens of thousands of additional asthma attacks each year. It forfeits the lifesaving benefits the Clean Power Plan would provide for the health and well-being of all Americans.

More than 70 percent of Americans – including a majority in every Congressional district in the country – support putting strict limits on carbon pollution from existing power plants, according to a recent poll analysis. A broad and diverse group of them spoke out in opposition to the sham Clean Power Plan replacement proposal.

Here are some notable quotes (and you can see a more complete list here).

Read More »

Posted in Clean Air Act, Clean Power Plan, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, News, Partners for Change, Policy / Comments are closed

Why accurate reporting of air pollution after Hurricane Harvey matters

By EDF Blogs / Published: August 23, 2018

By Matt Tresaugue. This post originally appeared in Texas Clean Air Matters.

Hartmann Park, Valero Refinery, Manchester County, Houston Texas.

In addition to dumping historic amounts of rain across southeast Texas, Hurricane Harvey triggered a wave of air pollution, with petrochemical plants and oil refineries releasing 8.3 million pounds of harmful chemicals that exceeded state limits. At least, that is what they told state officials.

Companies, however, reduced those estimates by 1.7 million pounds in later filings with the state, a new Environmental Defense Fund analysis found.

The steep drop suggests that some companies may not have accounted accurately for all Harvey-related pollution increases in their reporting to the state. As a result, people’s exposure to hazardous air pollutants, such as cancer-causing benzene and 1,3-butadiene, may be substantially underestimated.

Industry frequently justified the changes in emissions estimates by arguing that flexible state-issued permits, as well as Gov. Greg Abbott’s suspension of several environmental rules in advance of Harvey, made the pollution legal. Read More »

Posted in Extreme Weather, Health, News, Science / Read 1 Response

The Trump-Wheeler Polluting Power Plan: Five Key Takeaways

By Tomas Carbonell / Published: August 23, 2018

(Ben Levitan and Rama Zakaria co-authored this post)

The Trump Administration just released another proposal with a title that would floor George Orwell himself.

Less than a month after releasing the Safer and More Affordable Fuel Efficient Vehicles Rule to make our cars less safe and less fuel efficient, Trump and Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler unveiled the Affordable Clean Energy proposal – a plan that is neither clean nor affordable.

This new Trump-Wheeler proposal, ostensibly a replacement for the Clean Power Plan, is actually a major retreat from securing clean and affordable energy for Americans. It would subject our nation to more soot and smog and would vastly increase climate pollution – harming our health in the near term and exacerbating climate damage for generations to come.

Here are five things you should know:

1. The Trump-Wheeler plan would increase pollution and cost American lives.

EPA’s own numbers show the Trump-Wheeler proposal could lead to more than 1,000 annual premature deaths in 2030, compared to leaving the Clean Power Plan in place.

EPA map showing concentrations of additional premature deaths from soot and smog, compared to America under the Clean Power Plan. The areas in red will suffer most. See the Regulatory Impact Analysis, page 4-39.

It could also cause tens of thousands of childhood asthma attacks and more than 100,000 missed school and work days annually.

In 2030, the annual increase in health-harming pollution from the Trump-Wheeler proposal (compared to the Clean Power Plan) would be:

  • Up to 72,000 tons of sulfur dioxide, which contributes to dangerous soot pollution
  • Up to 53,000 tons of nitrogen oxides, which play a major role in smog formation

Read More »

Posted in Clean Air Act, Clean Power Plan, Economics, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, News, Policy / Read 1 Response