Our Natural Heritage Reports

Behind Closed Doors: The Local Impacts of the Bush Administration's Assault on the Environment and Public Health

2003-04-22

Executive Summary

Behind closed doors, away from public scrutiny, electric utilities, the oil industry, big timber companies and other corporate polluters are coordinating an organized assault on our cornerstone environmental and public health protections. And the Bush administration is helping them.

The Bush administration's anti-environmental posture is no secret. However, since the November 2002 elections, the Bush administration has quietly accelerated its campaign to undermine nearly every program that protects our air, water, forests, wetlands, wild places and public health. Over the last six months, the administration has announced profound changes in the way it implements our environmental laws, often discretely making these announcements late on Friday afternoons or before a holiday—likely in recognition of the unpopularity of the administration's agenda and in deference to the powerful interests that drive it.

Each state in the Union will share the burden of policies written by the polluters and enacted by the Bush administration. This report details some of the administration's worst attacks on the environment and reveals how communities across the country will experience the very real, very local effects of these harmful actions.

• Darkening our skies. Owners of dirty power plants have been pushing for new loopholes in the Clean Air Act for years. On New Year's Eve, the Environmental Protection Agency finalized the first phase of its rollbacks to the Clean Air Act's "New Source Review" program, allowing the country's oldest and dirtiest power plants, refineries and other industrial sources to expand their plants without installing modern pollution control equipment. On the same day, EPA announced the second and more severe phase of its rollbacks to the New Source Review program. In addition, in February 2003, Congress acted to codify the Bush administration's so-called "Clear Skies" plan as law. These actions will result in more air pollution, contributing to more asthma attacks, more premature deaths, more acid rain and more global warming.

• Gambling on the global environment. The electric utilities and auto industry ardently oppose any policy to cut U.S. emissions of carbon dioxide and other global warming gases. Under pressure from these powerful industries, the Bush administration has continued its policy of delay. In December 2002, instead of taking action to cut global warming pollution, the Bush administration announced yet another five-year study of the causes of global warming. In February 2003, the Bush administration launched a partnership with industry to obtain voluntary emissions reductions that, if implemented, would only slow the upward trajectory of carbon dioxide emissions rather than reverse the trend.

• Polluting our waterways. Factory farms, oil and coal industries, manufacturers and other large polluters have long sought ways around the Clean Water Act. Since the November 2002 elections, the Bush administration has responded with a series of proposed policies that would deprive many streams, ponds, and wetlands of the protection they deserve under the Clean Water Act; permit factory farms to pollute waterways with animal waste; and otherwise allow more toxic pollution into our lakes, rivers, bays and oceans.

• Logging our National Forests. The timber industry, supported by the mining industry and manufacturers of off-road vehicles, has been working overtime to obtain unprecedented access to our national forests, including currently protected roadless areas. Since the November 2002 elections, the Bush administration has proposed or enacted numerous policies that chip away at forest protections by increasing commercial logging in the name of fighting forest fires and restricting public participation in the management of our national forests.

• Spoiling our public lands. The oil and gas industry has pushed for a federal energy policy that facilitates rapid and often reckless development of domestic oil and gas resources, including those on national monuments and other fragile areas. The off-road vehicle lobby also has called for unrestricted access to these pristine areas. Over the last six months, the Bush administration has approved enormous oil and gas drilling projects in the Rocky Mountain West; reversed a ban on snowmobiles in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks; and revived a 19th century law to facilitate road-building on public lands.

• Letting the Department of Defense off the hook. The Department of Defense is one of the most prolific polluters in the United States. The Pentagon, capitalizing on increased public sympathy for the military and desire for homeland security, has petitioned Congress for blanket exemptions from five environmental laws. These laws are designed to protect people living on and near military sites from exposure to toxic waste and air pollution; preserve critical habitat for endangered species; and protect marine mammals from harm caused by military activities.

• Shortchanging Superfund. Superfund is the nation's preeminent law for making polluters clean up the country's most contaminated toxic waste sites. Unfortunately, the Bush administration is undercutting the letter and spirit of the Superfund law by failing to reinstate the program's funding and shifting the burden of paying for toxic waste cleanups to the American taxpayer. The Bush administration's FY2004 budget for Superfund, released in February 2003, asks taxpayers to pay at least 79 percent of the cleanup costs.

• Foregoing nuclear security. The tragic events of September 11, 2001 raised serious concerns about safety and security at the country's nuclear power plants. Many facilities cannot even meet the current security requirements, which most experts consider inadequate. However, in December 2002, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission ruled that it does not have to consider the threat of terrorist attacks when licensing nuclear reactors or other nuclear facilities.

• Maintaining our dependence on foreign oil. The auto industry has fought every effort to regulate it since the 1970s, often with success. Fuel economy is at a 21-year low, making cars, SUVs and light trucks the largest consumers of oil in the country. America's cars do not have to be gas guzzlers. However, the Bush administration has consistently opposed meaningful increases in fuel economy, finalizing a token 1.5 mpg increase in the fuel economy of SUVs and light trucks in April 2003.

Our leaders are making these harmful decisions behind closed doors. Once these doors open, the impacts quickly spread beyond the D.C. Beltway into states, counties, towns and neighborhoods across the country.

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