On Monday, I noted that Team Obama plans to set new-car fuel-economy standards for model years (MYs) 2017-2025, a nine-year period, despite the fact that the authorizing statute, the Energy Policy Conservation Act, 49 U.S.C. 32902(b)(3)(B), restricts the setting of fuel-economy standards to “not more than 5 model years.” No matter how hard or long government lawyers squint at the text, 5 does not mean 9. In the words of House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the standards proposed for MYs 2022-2025, which reach 54.5 mpg in 2025, are “outside the scope of law.”
Since writing that post, I have learned that Team Obama will try to finesse the legal problem by basing the MYs 2022-2025 fuel economy standards solely on EPA’s authority to set emission standards under CAA Sec. 202. This is Bizarro World jurisprudence.
EPA will be setting de-facto fuel-economy standards, pretending that GHG standards are not fuel-economy standards, but specifying CO2 reduction percentages that the agency avows, and everybody knows, convert directly into percentage increases in fuel economy.
Nobody but the judicial activists who gave us Massachusetts v. EPA can say with a straight face that when Congress enacted CAA Sec. 202, it meant to transfer the power of setting fuel-economy standards from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to EPA. Nor would any non-Bizarro lawyer contend that CAA Sec. 202 authorizes EPA to set fuel economy standards as many years into the future as the agency sees fit, despite EPCA’s explicit limit of “not more than 5 model years.”
Last month the EPA released its proposed 2012 cellulosic ethanol “mandate.” It suggests that there will be somewhere between 3.45-12.9 million gallons of qualifying cellulosic ethanol produced in 2012, though the number will be finalized in November. Note, as discussed previously, the industry has still not produced any qualifying cellulosic ethanol, and the EPA has consistently lowered the ‘mandate’ by over 90% in previous years. (A recently announced cellulosic plant claims it will produce cellulosic ethanol from, wait for it, corn waste. So much for being a bridge fuel to the future).
In comments on the proposed 2012 production volumes, the ethanol industry begged the EPA to use the higher end of the standard:
In contrast, Brooke Coleman, executive director of the Advanced Ethanol Council, urged the EPA to continue its aggressive goals regarding cellulosic biofuels, stating that the agency’s mandated volume directly affects the industry’s ability to produce fuel. “There is this funny thing going here where you guys have to go out and measure capacity, but the numbers you come out with and the amount of capacity that you put into the Federal Register will have a giant effect on how much capacity we actually create,” he said.
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Yesterday’s Greenwire (subscription required) reports that 11 Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states are working on a plan, modeled on California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) program, to cut the carbon intensitity (CI) of motor fuels by 5%-15% over the next 15 years. The Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management (NESCAUM), the association of Northeast air regulatory agencies, could release the framework for the plan “as early as this month,” writes Greenwire reporter Jason Plautz.
Plautz links to a NESCAUM-authored discussion draft for “stakeholders.” After a short introductory paragraph, the document states in bold italics: “This document is not intended for distribution beyond the participating agencies and should not be cited or quoted.” Hey, I just did — so sue me!
The document never mentions the potential impact of the LCFS on fuel prices. But what else did you expect? In the “trust us, we know what’s best for the planet” world of carbon politics, affordable energy is despised, not prized. [click to continue…]
President Obama, Auto Expert
Henry Payne, Planet Gore, 16 August 2011
Politico’s Disingenuous Attack on Rick Perry
Chris Horner, Daily Caller, 16 August 2011
Dead Birds Are the Unintended Consequence of Wind Power
William La Jeunesse, Fox News, 16 August 2011
Where Federal Energy Subsidies Really Go
Robert Bradley, Jr., Forbes, 15 August 2011
A Dim Light on Global Warming
Bjorn Lomborg, Project Syndicate, 12 August 2011
Fitch today reconfirmed its AAA credit rating for the US. Why isn’t Paul Krugman blasting them?
On August 5th, the day Standard & Poors issued its downgrade for the US, Krugman attacked it and its cohorts as unreliable miscreants. In his words, “it’s hard to think of anyone less qualified to pass judgment on America than the rating agencies. The people who rated subprime-backed securities are now declaring that they are the judges of fiscal policy? Really? … In short, S&P is just making stuff up — and after the mortgage debacle, they really don’t have that right.”
But as Krugman admits, when it came to those mortgage-backed securities Fitch performed as poorly as S&P. By Krugman’s logic, Fitch’s action today, in sticking to its AAA rating, is just as unreliable as was S&P’s downgrade last week. So why isn’t Krugman going after Fitch as well?
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I’ve written before about how the EPA cannot control the regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. My colleague Marlo Lewis knows this topic better than anyone, and I recommend reading this, this, and this, if you want to grasp the nitty-gritty details. Here’s our thesis in a nutshell:
Regulating air quality under the Clean Air Act is like eating Pringels: Once you pop, you can’t stop. That is, the Clean Air Act is structured such that regulation begets more regulation. This chain reaction is a major reason why the Obama administration’s decision to regulate greenhouse gases pursuant to the Clean Air Act was either foolish or diabolical. In so doing, the Environmental Protection Agency opened Pandora’s Box. It wants to choose when and where it regulates greenhouse gases, but it doesn’t have this discretion. Environmentalist special interests can and will use the courts to force the EPA’s hand. By the same token, however, this means EPA can use such suits as political cover, claiming it does not want to regulate this or that industry, or does not want to regulate under this or that Clean Air Act provision, but has no choice because ‘the court made us do it.’
The latest link in this runaway chain reaction is an environmentalist lawsuit launched this week that seeks to limit the EPA’s discretion as it pertains to the regulation greenhouse gases from biomass power plants. Once again, green groups are using the courts to dictate the pace of the EPA’s climate policies.
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I’ve written a number of posts, opeds, and a study about the Environmental Protection Agency’s outrageous assault on surface coal mining in Appalachia. Simply put, the EPA is destroying an industry that employs 15,000 miners, on behalf a short-lived insect. In order to placate the President’s environmentalist base, the EPA is trading jobs for bugs.
Last Tuesday, the Obama administration launched its latest assault against Appalachian surface coal mining. This one comes from the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), and it is best described as ‘jobs for minnows.’
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In a sharply worded letter (August 11, 2011) to White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrel Issa (R-Calif.) contends that “the new Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) and EPA vehicle greenhouse gas (GHG) standards announced by President Obama and select automobile manufacturers on July 29, 2011, were negotiated in secret, outside the scope of law, and could generate significant negative impacts for consumers.”
Issa is also concerned “that the government’s ownership interest in General Motors and Chrysler at the time these negotiations were conducted creates a troublesome conflict-of-interest.”
Accordingly, Issa is launching “an investigation into the activities of the Administration leading up to the agreement for new CAFE standards for model years (MY) 2017-2025.”
I won’t try to summarize Issa’s 8-page letter, which among other things developes a detailed case that the 54.5 mpg fuel-economy deal will adversely affect vehicle prices, consumer choice, vehicle safety, and, hence, automotive sales and auto industry jobs. This post will only discuss the legal issues that Issa spotlights. My concern here — as in numerous previous columns — is with bureaucratic ‘lawmaking’: the trashing of the separation of powers and democratic accountability in the illusory pursuit of climate stability and energy independence. [click to continue…]
History tells us that listing a critter as an endangered species does little for the species and can do a great deal of harm to the local economies—the spotted owl and the delta smelt are two oft-cited cases. But there is not a big body of evidence showing how the listing decisions were made. It was just assumed that the species plight warranted protection. But that was before the listing proposal for the dunes sagebrush lizard threatened a large segment of U.S. domestic oil production and the economies of Southeastern New Mexico and West Texas. Rallies in opposition to the listing have drawn hundreds of irate citizens, hearings on the matter have had overflow crowds, and the public register has pages and pages of public comment. Both ABC and Fox News have done stories on the lizard.
Acting on the outrage of his constituents and using his law enforcement background, New Mexico State Representative Dennis Kintigh gathered a group of independent scientists—several from area universities—who have spent the last several months reviewing the science underlying the listing. Their report was released in a public meeting on Monday, August 15, in Artesia, New Mexico, in a roundtable format with the scientists available for questions.
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Liberals Standing Athwart History, Yelling “Stop!”
Washington Examiner editorial, 15 August 2011
Gouging, Free Markets, and the Psychology of Fuel Prices
Paul Schwennesen, Master Resource, 15 August 2011
Pawlenty out: More Climate Pandering than “ObamaneyCare” Duck
Chris Horner, AmSpecBlog, 14 August 2011
Don’t Believe the EPA: The PNM Rip-off
William Yeatman, Albuquerque Journal, 12 August 2011
The Party’s over for Big Wind
Robert Bryce, Huffington Post, 12 August 2011
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