Enzi: Copenhagen and EPA announcement have double disaster potential
by Senator Mike Enzi media release
December 8, 2009
Washington, D.C. – Today, while climate change discussions continue at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, U.S. Senator Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., is concerned about a sweeping announcement by the Environmental Protection Agency that could suffocate the economy and kill jobs and business production in the United States.
"Administrator Jackson’s announcement comes at a bad time for Americans who are struggling to keep their families afloat this holiday season. It is not a good idea to pressure Congress into passing climate change legislation that will kill jobs, raise energy prices, and make goods and services more expensive. Unelected bureaucrats at the EPA should not be making decisions of this magnitude and it is wrong for the Administration to use this backdoor method to implement their radical environmental agenda."
"This finding could lead to federal regulations affecting everything from vehicles to coal-fired power plants," said Enzi. "While the Senate needs to approve any treaty or agreement that could come out of the Copenhagen Conference, the EPA could have free reign over carbon emissions from now on, without Senate approval. This is not the role the EPA was ever intended to play."
Today EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson announced that carbon dioxide and seven other greenhouse gas emissions pose a danger to the public’s health and welfare. This announcement allows the EPA to use authority from the Clean Air Act to implement a nation-wide carbon emissions cap if Congress fails to enact climate legislation.
In 2007 the Supreme Court ordered the EPA to determine whether greenhouse gases qualify as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act.
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