Environmental Protection Agency Chief defended his refusal to support the State of California’s waver to regulate automobile emissions.

From the NY Times Article:

Defending his refusal to let California set limits on the greenhouse gas emissions of automobiles, the head of the Environmental Protection Agencyclimate change posed no “compelling and extraordinary” risk to the state. insisted before a Senate committee Thursday that

Describing such change as “not unique to” and “not exclusive to California,” the agency’s administrator, Stephen L. Johnson, called it “a global problem requiring a global solution or, at least at a minimum, a national solution.”

That is what has bothered me with regard to the Bush Administration’s activities regarding climate change. In many ways, it pays only lip service to global warming, but does nothing very progressive. But moreso, it seems to trounce on very traditional Republican policy in the process.

I’d like to claim a political conspiracy regarding this, but I’ve never seen any Democrat or Republican scheme like this.

California, as with any U.S. State, has a level of sovereignty with it. Republican doctrine is a strong supporter of this type of system (Federalism) . So why create a conflict when California, governed by a Republican Governor, openly wants to regulate itself? Further, the EPA won a supreme court decision last year allowing for regulation of auto air emissions. Why, then, would the EPA stand in the way of another sovereign government in attempts to regulate it?

That’s like a Democratic president lowering taxes and lengthening prison sentences. I just don’t get it. This is all a twisted perversion of all of my political stereotypes.

Then we still have the global warning doubters:

Appearing before the committee, Mr. Johnson was confronted with a hostile panel of senators, most of them Democrats. The only Republican present, Senator James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, questioned whether human activity was an important cause of global warming and disputed the idea that there was a consensus among scientists that this was the case.

Doubting gravity because you don’t understand it doesn’t make your doubts legitimate – you’re just stupid. To this day, scientists don’t even understand gravity – but in spite of their stupidity, airplane engineers design accordingly.

I wish I had something smart and insightful to say about this. The EPA Chief is no publically-elected official and shouldn’t impeding those who are for his own apparent political agenda. Oklahoma Senator James Inhove is no scientist and shouldn’t be using doubt of science as a reason to impede a States’ right to govern itself.

This is…unbelievable.

And much like all other Bush-appointed officials, Stephen Johnson has memory loss when it comes to matters of accountability:

The chairwoman of the committee, Senator Barbara Boxer of California, has been in a dispute with the environmental agency over access to its records, to determine whether Mr. Johnson overruled his staff in blocking state action on global warming.

Mr. Johnson said he could not recall whether the briefing papers prepared by his staff had included a recommendation. He denied having been pressured by the White House to protect the car industry.

This is an embarrassment.

The State of California is moving forward with its lawsuit against the US Environmental Protection Agency.  The case stems from a denial from the EPA to allow California to regulate its own green house gas emission using its own policy.  The EPA’s stance is that the measures taken in the latest energy bill (driven by CAFE standards increases) is more effective than California’s proposed regulation (AB1493).  The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is refuting the technical claims made by the EPA – which were not supported by any technical documentation – with its own analysis that shows otherwise.

From the study:

California standards regulate GHG emissions; federal CAFE standards are aimed at reducing the nation’s fuel consumption. This study makes the necessary calculations to allow the two programs to be evaluated so that the reductions in GHG gases under the California rules can be compared to those expected from implementation of the CAFE portion of the 2007 Energy Bill. The results show that the Administrator’s claim that the federal CAFE program is better than California’s program at reducing GHG emissions from motor vehicles is wrong, both in California and in those states that adopt the California standards (See Table ES-1).

The study gives a very detailed analysis of green house gas emissions based on actual usage (this is data that the state collects very meticulously from ever driver on a bi-annual basis).  So it’s difficult to argue with CARB’s assertions on a technical basis (you’d have to attack the fundamental assumptions to discredit it).

The chart above is very telling in that it shows the real importance of making severe changes now.  Each growth curve is predicated on a particular % improvement year over year.  Making big changes in the near term, then, will drive even larger end results in the future.

The real news is  EPA clearly has done no real analysis on this subject.  It’s not clear, then, why they were so flippant with California’s request.  States’ rights on environmental issues are usually well respected.  And CAFE standards are no real way to regulate GHGs.  This all seems very intellectually lazy on the part of the EPA which is very strange behavior.  The EPA’s reputation has historically been one of rigor and diligence with compliance (although that’s been different in this current administration).  But it’s strange that they would have had such a backhanded response to California’s desire to enact more stringent policies.