EPA gets ready to declare CO2 a danger to the public
This video portrays results from a new system for mapping CO2 emissions in the United States over time. In April, the EPA may announce a finding that the greenhouse gas endangers the public.
Three major developments today signal that historic action on climate change may be coming very soon.
Dow Jones Newswires is quoting sources inside the Obama administration as saying that the EPA is close to announcing that carbon dioxide endangers the public. These sources say an official announcement could come some time in April. Once the EPA makes this “endangerment finding,” carbon dioxide will have to be regulated just like other pollutants.
News of the possible announcement rippled through online financial publications today. (Here and here, for example.) It’s not too difficult to imagine why. An EPA endangerment finding on CO2 would trigger regulation under the Clean Air Act, and “could create a legal basis for challenging nearly every emitting source,” according to the Dow Jones story.
Meanwhile, the EPA also laid the groundwork today for the coming endangerment finding by proposing a national CO2 reporting system, Dow Jones reports. Under the proposal, roughly 13,000 facilities that produce 85 percent to 90 percent a significant portion [Ed: The number in the Dow Jones story must be incorrect] of the nation’s greenhouse gases would be required to report their emissions to a central registry.
And in one other piece of climate news, NOAA’s Science Advisory Board was scheduled to release a report today examining four blueprints for establishing a “National Climate Service” that would centralize federal information on climate change and solutions. According to a story on ClimateWire, NOAA’s Science Advisory Board ”seems to lean toward creating a federally sponsored nonprofit corporation or a new ‘national climate service federation’ of regional groups of ‘climate information providers…’”
One of the models for a “nimble” and “flexible” National Climate Service is reportedly the National Center for Atmospheric Research, here in Boulder, CO. I’m not sure how NCAR would serve as a model, since the climate service seems to be envisioned as an information clearinghouse, whereas NCAR conducts research as well as providing information to external users.
The idea of a National Climate Service was floated by Jane Lubchenco, Obama’s pick to lead NOAA, at her confirmation hearing back in February; it was first proposed back in the Carter Administration.
All this in one day. I wonder what might be coming tomorrow.
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