Nathan Willcox, Energy & Clean Air Associate, PennEnvironment
Introduction
Good afternoon. I would first like to thank the Council for passing its previous resolution, in which it identified that air pollution is a serious problem, determined that the Bush administration's air pollution plan and rollbacks of the New Source Review program would lead to more air pollution, and called for this hearing. And of course, I thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak before the Council on this very important issue. My name is Nathan Willcox, and I am the Clean Air and Energy Associate for PennEnvironment.
PennEnvironment is a statewide environmental advocacy organization with more than 10,000 members across the state. We work on both state and national level environmental issues, including clean air, clean water, energy policy, sprawl, and preservation issues.
History Of The Clean Air Act And Proposed Rollbacks
More than 30 years ago, Congress adopted the Clean Air Act to protect the country's public health from respiratory illnesses caused by soot, smog and toxic air pollution. Since then, the Clean Air Act has been promoting the development of ever-cleaner industrial processes and more effective pollution control technologies. Because of the proactive steps taken under the Clean Air Act to reduce dangerous pollution, we've begun to make progress toward making our air truly safe to breathe.
However, we still have a long way to go. Every year, air pollution from power plants cuts short the lives of over 2,000 Pennsylvanians and more than 30,000 Americans. Urban areas, including Philadelphia, are especially hit hard by this pollution. In addition, the severe environmental impacts of air pollution include global warming, acid rain, and mercury contamination of our waterways. In short, there is a lot of work left to be done in the fight against air pollution, and weakening the Clean Air Act should be the last thing on the government's "to-do" list. However, that is exactly what is happening, as the Clean Air Act is now being threatened with rollbacks from the White House and federal legislators in the House and Senate.
At the behest of polluting industries, especially coal and oil companies and utilities, the Bush administration has proposed legislation to let power plants and other facilities increase their pollution. Deceptively and inappropriately dubbed the "Clear Skies Initiative" by the political spin-doctors in the White House, public health advocates recognize the plan as perhaps the largest clean air rollback in history. The president's plan—introduced in the House and Senate in February—is a massive weakening of our clean air safeguards.
Proposed Rollbacks To The Clean Air Act
To briefly summarize what is at stake, the Bush administration's air pollution plan, if passed, would do the following: First, the Bush administration's plan would threaten the public's health by delaying and diluting reductions in power plants' emissions of sulfur, nitrogen and mercury pollution. Second, and perhaps most important for Pennsylvania, the administration's plan would roll back the current law's public health safeguards to protect local air quality and curb pollution from upwind states. Lastly, the administration's plan would do nothing to curb power plants' growing emissions of carbon dioxide, the main cause of global warming.
These changes are even more alarming once one looks more closely at the specifics. To illustrate this, I will now go through each section of the administration's plan and compare it with the current Clean Air Act.
First, the proposed changes weaken public health protections from dangerous soot and smog.
As has been highlighted by other speakers, dangerous levels of soot and smog are causing thousands of premature deaths and asthma attacks each year in Pennsylvania. Under the current Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Agency and individual states must clean up dangerous soot and smog, and provide most citizens with air that meets public health standards by 2010. Current law requires deep reductions in power plants' sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions within this decade in order to meet these public health standards. In September 2001, EPA told the industry's main lobby group, the Edison Electric Institute, that existing law would cut power plants' soot-forming sulfur dioxide pollution from 11 million tons today to 2 million tons by 2012, and cut their smog-forming nitrogen oxide pollution from 5 million tons today to 1.25 million tons by 2010. In short, the current Clean Air Act clearly will work to reduce soot and smog pollution.
However, the Bush administration's plan delays deadlines for meeting public health standards, allowing violations of soot and smog health standards to continue until 2015 or later. Power plant pollution cuts are delayed and diluted. The end result is that tens of millions of people across the country are denied healthy air, even as late as 2020 and beyond.
Specifically, the administration's plan allows more than twice as much sulfur dioxide for nearly a decade longer (2010-2018), compared with faithful enforcement of the current Clean Air Act. After 2018, sulfur dioxide emissions will still be one and a half times higher than if current law is enforced. The administration plan allows more than one and a half times as much nitrogen oxide for nearly a decade longer (2010-2018), and one third more nitrogen oxide even after 2018.
The proposed changes also weaken public health protections from toxic mercury.
Power plants are the largest uncontrolled source of mercury, a neurological toxin whose heath impacts have been well documented by previous speakers today. Under the current Clean Air Act, each power plant must install the maximum achievable control technology (MACT) for mercury emissions and other toxic air pollutants by the end of 2007, and then further limit any unacceptable health risks that remain. EPA told the Edison Electric Institute in December 2001 that enforcing current law could cut power plant mercury pollution by nearly 90 percent, from 48 tons today to about 5 tons, by 2008.
However, under the administration's plan, the current law's mandated mercury reductions are delayed and diluted. The administration plan lets power plants emit more than five times as much mercury for a decade longer (2010-2018), and three times as much after 2018. EPA data show that more than one hundred power plants may actually increase mercury emissions, and that some regions of New England and the Great Lakes will receive only very small reductions in mercury deposition - and may even suffer increases.
Second, the proposed changes repeal safeguards for local air quality.
The current Clean Air Act requires new power plants to install state-of-the-art pollution controls, and requires older "grandfathered" plants to install modern pollution controls when rebuilt or expanded in ways that increase their pollution output. In areas with dirty air, new or expanded plants must offset their pollution increases. This is the "New Source Review" section of the Clean Air Act, to which the EPA and the Bush administration have already instituted rollbacks. In response, Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection, on behalf of the state and Governor Rendell, are currently part of a legal effort with other northeast states to stop these rollbacks.
However, the administration's plan effectively repeals the remaining New Source Review air quality safeguards. Exemptions are not even limited to power plants, but are available to plants in any industry sector.
Third, and perhaps most importantly for Pennsylvania, the administration's proposed changes hamstring safeguards for downwind states.
Under the current Clean Air Act, when power plants in upwind states—such as Ohio—cause violations of air pollution health standards in downwind states-such as Pennsylvania, the downwind states can force the upwind facilities to cut their pollution. This is a crucial tool for Pennsylvania, as some of our worst air pollution comes from Ohio and other Midwestern states, as opposed to from plants within our state borders.
Unfortunately, the administration's plan effectively repeals this "state rights" provision. The Bush administration's plan prohibits downwind states from pursuing any pollution reductions from power plants in upwind states before 2012. The administration bill then increases the burden of proof after 2012, making it nearly impossible to prove that upwind power plants are causing downwind pollution.
Lastly, the administration plan worsens global warming.
Power plants are the largest source of U.S. global warming pollution, responsible for 40 percent of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions. Ignoring power plants' carbon emissions will lead to more global warming and the resulting costs from increased severe weather. Rather than establishing mandatory limits on CO2, which would start curbing this monumental hazard to our health and our environment, and at the same time, save billions of dollars, the administration's plan does nothing. The plan allows power plant CO2 pollution to continue to increase, relying instead on voluntary approaches, long proven to be ineffective. The administration's plan would allow another generation of investments in power plants with excessive carbon dioxide emissions— dramatically increasing future costs for utilities and their customers when the need to curb these emissions is finally recognized.
Call To Action
Given this clear threat to the public health of the citizens it represents, we call on the City Council to urge Pennsylvania's Representatives and Senators to reject any weakening of the Clean Air Act, including the Bush administration's air pollution plan. Despite the obvious air pollution problem in Pennsylvania and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Senators Specter and Santorum actually voted for some of the administration's rollbacks to our clean air laws earlier this year. Clearly, any action by this Council will give them much-needed political support to do the right thing the next time around.
Proactively, our Representatives and Senators should be encouraged to support the Clean Smokestacks Act and Clean Power Act respectively-two bills that will take us forward rather than backwards in the fight against air pollution. In closing, I would say that this is a clear opportunity for Philadelphia to speak out against further degradation of our public health and our environment, and I thank the City Council for working to address this very serious problem.
