Senate tries to cap emissions EPA won't

[babylonsister]

Senate tries to cap emissions EPA won't

By: Ryan Grim
Nov 8, 2007 06:20 PM EST


Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) is the House’s assistant principal. If you’re called down to his hearing room, more likely than not, you’re in for it. Thursday’s unfortunate delinquent is Stephen Johnson, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

His misdeed, as far as Waxman is concerned: failing to exercise his executive branch obligation to regulate carbon emissions as pollutants.

Across campus, the Senate is addressing climate change in a different way, by working to pass legislation that would create a legal obligation for the executive branch to regulate carbon emissions.

The dueling approaches are the result of political calculations and a recent Supreme Court ruling, Massachusetts v. EPA, which requires the federal agency to treat carbon as an air pollutant.

The Senate bill, sponsored by Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) and John Warner (R-Va.), would cap carbon emissions and create a market where industry can trade emission permits.

Why is the Senate trying to cap emissions if the EPA can already do it? In short, because the EPA doesn’t want to, which is why Johnson has been sent to the office.

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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1107/6785.html