by Hank Boerner – Chair/Chief Strategist – G&A Institute
February 22, 2017
Quo Vadis (where are we going) with our Environmental Protection Agency?
The leader’s baton is passed and the U.S. EPA has a new head of agency. E. Scott Pruitt got passed the opposition mounted to his nomination by President Trump and is now the 14th Administrator of the Agency. He was the Attorney General of the State of Oklahoma.
Where he mounted more than a dozen attacks in the courts against the Federal protector of land, air, water and more. The cases are still pending; Administrator Pruitt has not yet said he would recuse himself from the proceedings.
The lawsuits challenged EPA on various rules dealing with mercury pollution, carbon emissions, smog, protecting of waters and wetlands, and more.
The EPA Highlights outreach today proclaimed that Scott Pruitt “…believes promoting and protecting a strong and healthy environment is one of the lifeblood priorities of the government…and EPA is a vital part of that mission…”
And — “…as Administrator, Mr. Pruitt will lead EPA in a way that our future generations inherit a better and healthier environment while advancing America’s economic interests…” We are on notice, I would say.
Meanwhile, hundreds of current and former EPA employees had urged the U.S. Senate NOT to ratify the nomination (450-plus signed on). In Chicago, at lunch time, possibly imperiling their careers at the Agency, EPA Region 5 employees poured out of the office and into the streets at lunch time in protest.
More than two dozen environmental groups also challenged his qualifications.
The Washington Post yesterday reported that on his first day in office Administrator Pruitt “made clear that he intends to step back from what he sees as the Agency’s over-reach during the [President Barack] Obama years. “The only authority that any agency has,” he told a noontime gathering at EPA, “is the authority given to it by Congress. We need to respect that…”
Oh yes, Administrator Pruitt was speaking in the Rachel Carson Green Room at EPA (named for the author of Silent Spring, which helped to launch the modern environmental movement). Perhaps someone passed along her book to the new leader.
The Administrator did say, according to the Post, that the EPA and the nation could do a better job of being both pro-energy and pro-environment. Time will tell, we could say, as the actions and proclamations and loud and whispered orders come down from on high at EPA in the days ahead.
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for clues as to what may be ahead with Scott Pruitt at the helm, we could look to a commentary that the new EPA Administrator published on Public Utilities Fortnightly — ” The Methane Myth” Incompetence and overreach at the EPA… (July 2012).
He wrote: “,.,,my views on energy policy might be discounted as a simple ploy to bolster the energy industry at the expense of environmental stewardship and responsibility. That perspective would be misguided. I do strongly support energy producers and their role in the nation’s economic sustainability, but this issue isn’t about oil. Nor is it about natural gas or hydraulic fracturing. This is about a wayward federal agency arbitrarily using unsubstantiated, inaccurate, and flawed data to achieve a specific policy objective…”
And…”…The agency’s actions are at best incompetent, and at worst reprehensible. They have a very real effect on families, businesses, communities, and state economies. Without justification, they erode the states’ ability to self-regulate, and they stifle exploration of domestic energy sources, putting our national energy security at risk..”.
There’s more for you to read and process at: https://www.fortnightly.com/fortnightly/2012/07/methane-myth?page=0%2C0
The post is by E. Scott Pruitt – Attorney General of Oklahoma
and Chair, Republican Attorneys General Association
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One of the pioneer environmental protection associations is the NRDC – founded in 1970 as the Natural Resources Defense Council by attorneys and students. There are now 2 million members in the group. The group explained its opposition to AG Pruitt’s appointment in a post on its web site:
Pete Altman: “It could be his consistent record of siding with industry over public health, frequently choosing positions which benefited companies funneling money to Pruitt’s campaign, his PAC or groups he was raising money for (see here, here and here.) Or that he’s a climate denier. Or that his record includes no positive environmental achievements—as colleague John Walke tweeted yesterday, out of more than 700 press releases from Pruitt’s office, not one touts any action to enforce environmental laws…”
NRDC and other of its peer NGOs and SRI investors and state officials will be watching the EPA actions VERY CLOSELY in the days ahead, we can say with some assurance.
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Late afternoon – Feb 22 — No sooner did I finish and post the above then the news came in —The Washington Post today (2-22-17) is reporting that “thousands of emails detail EPA head’s close ties to fossil fuel industry.”
In response to a legal action by the Center for Media and Democracy, thousands of the AG’s emails were released. The communications highlight, the Post report says, close relationships between AG Pruitt and fossil fuel interests.
“The emails show Pruitt and his office were in touch with a network of ultra-conservative groups…many receiving backing from billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, owners of Koch Industries, a major oil company…”
More in the late breaking story for you at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/02/22/oklahoma-attorney-generals-office-releases-7500-pages-of-emails-between-scott-pruitt-and-fossil-fuel-industry/?utm_term=.7f34f5c67cd1&wpisrc=nl_evening&wpmm=1
