Markey: EPA Emissions Reporting Rule Crucial Step to Successful Climate and Energy Legislation
WASHINGTON (March 10, 2009) – Since the United States must significantly cut global warming emissions, it is imperative that utilities, and the nation, know how much heat-trapping pollution we are sending up into the atmosphere. Today, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) took a giant, long-overdue step towards setting a baseline for emissions when they announced a draft rule to implement a national system for reporting global warming emissions. Today’s EPA announcement complies with Congress’s mandate on emission reporting, one that the Bush administration had ignored. Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), who chairs key energy and environment panels in the House with jurisdiction over the EPA, praised the announcement as a crucial step towards curbing heat-trapping emissions.
“The first step to recovery is acknowledging you have a problem. The second step is understanding the size of the problem,” said Rep. Markey. “This new program creates a global warming pollution map to tell us where we are and where we need to go.”
Last week, Rep. Markey’s Energy and Environment Subcommittee hosted a briefing with European environmental leaders. One lesson from the EU’s experience with their carbon control system is the importance of a full accounting of emissions at the beginning of the program, or else regulators will not know how many pollution credits to distribute. An excess of credits leads to false price signals in the market and underinvestment, whereas a shortage of credits makes compliance unnecessarily expensive.
“The European Union’s initial failure to accurately identify their emission levels severely handicapped their carbon pollution control system. We must learn from the EU’s mistakes in moving forward our clean energy policies,” continued Rep. Markey. “EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson’s quick action in producing this draft rule is vital as the Energy and Commerce Committee moves forward in drafting climate legislation this Spring. Accurate and timely reportage of U.S. global warming emissions is crucial to the successful implementation of climate legislation.”
Congress mandated that the EPA institute such a reporting rule as part of the FY2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act (H.R. 2764; Public Law 110–161).
The full text of the EPA’s draft rule can be found by clicking here.
The Select Committee was active during the 110th and 111th Congresses. This is an archived version of the website, to ensure that the public has ongoing access to the Select Committee record. This website, including external links, will not be updated after Jan. 3rd, 2010.
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