On November 7 of last year, EPA sent the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) a rather important proposed rule – one that will, in some way, limit greenhouse gas emissions from new power plants. The Greenhouse Gas New Source Performance Standard for Electric Generating Units for New Sources has now been at OIRA for 120 days – the maximum allowed by Executive Order.
Executive Order 12866 is pretty clear on the deadline for OIRA to return rules to the agencies:
“… within 90 calendar days after the date of submission … The review process may be extended (1) once by no more than 30 calendar days upon the written approval of the Director and (2) at the request of the agency head.”
With this rule, as with many rules that go beyond 90 days, neither OIRA nor the agency has issued any public notification announcing that a 30 day extension has been requested or granted. But I’ll still give them the benefit of the doubt and give them the full 120 days. That makes it today.
The Administration is under tremendous political pressure over the rule, though the White House always maintains that OIRA’s actions are not based on politics. OIRA has hosted eight lobby meetings on this specific rule (12/15/11, 1/9/12, 2/1/12, 2/7/12, 2/7/12, 2/9/12, 2/13/12, 2/14/12). Nearly the entire Republican caucus in the House, plus 14 Democrats, sent OMB a letter two weeks ago opposing the rule.
The rule seeks to limit greenhouse gas emissions from power plants – the single largest stationary source of these climate-changing emissions. As one observer said of climate change: “Our generation's response to this challenge will be judged by history, for if we fail to meet it – boldly, swiftly, and together – we risk consigning future generations to an irreversible catastrophe.” That was President Obama, speaking in 2009.
This rule was featured in CPR’s latest Issue Alert as one of the critical safeguards currently under development that are in danger of not being completed during the current presidential term because of unreasonable delays. The kind of excessive interference from OIRA exhibited here is one of the primary contributing causes for these delays.
By my count, OIRA currently has 30 different final or proposed rules in its grasp for 120 days or more (fun fact: Chemicals of Concern easily leads the pack, at 664). For an Administration that cites Executive Orders over and over again as if they’re gospel, they sure ignore this one casually when they want to.
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Ben Somberg | March 6, 2012
On November 7 of last year, EPA sent the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) a rather important proposed rule – one that will, in some way, limit greenhouse gas emissions from new power plants. The Greenhouse Gas New Source Performance Standard for Electric Generating Units for New Sources has now been […]
Robert Verchick | March 5, 2012
The BP Oil Spill case settled! Well, part of it. The smaller part. But, still, we must count this a victory for U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier, whose reported 72 million pages of assigned reading will inevitably be shaved down. (Does this man have an iPad?) On Friday evening the court announced that BP had […]
Rena Steinzor | March 2, 2012
The toll: An estimated 6,500 to 17,967 premature deaths, 9,867 non-fatal heart attacks, 3,947 cases of chronic bronchitis, and more than 2.3 million lost work and school days. That’s just a partial tally of the costs Americans will bear because of unjustified delays in two critical health and safety regulations. More broadly, the Administration’s Fall […]
Sidney A. Shapiro | February 28, 2012
A new Pew public opinion poll published last week shows substantial public support for specific types of regulation, but skepticism about regulation in general. While 70-89% of the public would either expand or keep current levels of five specific types of regulation, 52% say government regulation of business usually does more harm than good as […]
David Hunter | February 27, 2012
a(broad) perspective Today’s post is first in a series on a recent CPR white paper, Reclaiming Global Environmental Leadership: Why the United States Should Ratify Ten Pending Environmental Treaties. Each month, this series will discuss one of these ten treaties. Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels Adopted and Opened for Signature on June […]
| February 23, 2012
On February 28, the Supreme Court will hear argument in Kiobel v Royal Dutch Petroleum, a case with far-reaching implications for efforts to hold corporations accountable when they commit or are complicit in abuses of human rights. For over fifty years, Shell has extracted oil from Nigeria, causing great harm to the environment and people […]
Rena Steinzor | February 22, 2012
Imagine for a moment that you’rethe chief executive of a company that manufactures chemicals used in plastics that become consumer products, especially plastic picnic ware. The head of your product development lab reports that she has just gotten some troubling results regarding one of your biggest sellers—a chemical agent that makes it possible for plastic […]
Robert Verchick | February 22, 2012
Mardi Gras Float, 2011 Well, another magnificent Mardi Gras has ended, and at this point, I’d normally be slouched on the sofa sipping a tomato juice (neat) and sorting beads. But not this year. That’s because next week, squadrons of lawyers, journalists, petroleum engineers, and fisher folk are scheduled to descend on New Orleans, […]
Kirsten Engel | February 21, 2012
On Feb. 28 and 29, the D.C. Circuit is scheduled to hear arguments on a suite of industry-led challenges to EPA-issued greenhouse gas rules. While attention has focused on industry’s challenge to EPA’s finding that greenhouse gases (GHGs) endanger the environment, industry’s challenge to the greenhouse gas permitting “tailoring” rule – a rule limiting the […]