CO2, EPA, Politics, and all that

This needs to be addressed on 2 fronts…
Cap and Trade and the EPA Clean Air Act
Both most be stopped or this battle is lost, and maybe even the war. Do not kid yourselves into thinking the bloated bureaucracy of DC will hinder the EPA, the regulations are drafted and the funding for enforcement is in place courtesy of the Stimulus Bill providing a 50% increase in funding or 3.6 Billion per year for two years on top of the 7.2 Billion operating budget, what do you think that funding was for?
In either scenario the EPA will receive enforcement powers, and they intend to use them.
The Chamber of Commerce has been subverted already as have the Oil Companies and Steel Workers Union. Utilities have been green lighted to pass the costs to consumers thanks to Sen Boxer neutering the Thune Ammendment.
The units are all in place, the battlefield has been selected and the command to advance given.
Lets send the Administration to Copenhagen empty handed, which is their greatest fear on the International Stage, an embarrassed President communicating the real will of Americans to the world.

Re: [snip – not interested in your opinions on lead, take it somewhere else – Anthony]
[snip again ~ charles the moderator this time. Seriously, if you want to contribute then contribute, but hurl insults somewhere else]

Robert Bateman (21:20:13) : I’m no Dem, but there are “not now” Dems we could appeal to, and just trying to get the minority party to listen gets us nowhere. With even one R, the activists have cloture, and they’ve got ol’ John McCain in the bag. But if you say to the Dems “please don’t let them do this to us, please don’t do it to us yourself, not now, not when we are still hurting from the economy” you’ll find that in their high minded “empathy” they may have a hard time not listening.

CO2 declared a “dangerous pollutant”!
This is a recipe to bring our republic, the greatest experiment in government ever created, to its knees … and if followed, means back to the dark ages for the USA.

Agree with David Hagen and Roger Sowell.
A couple of additional points for those making comments to the EPA:
– The second proposed finding, namely that emissions from new motor vehicles contribute to the atmospheric concentrations of the 4 named greenhouse gases emitted by motor vehicles, is probably not worth spending a lot of energy on. To be sure, there are weaknesses in the EPA’s position, particularly in terms of whether “new motor vehicles” is to be understood as “additional” motor vehicles that will also be driven full tilt, or whether it is understood to mean “new” in the sense of replacing older motor vehicles (e.g., when I bought my new car last year, I stopped driving the old one). Nevertheless, this second proposed finding largely follows from the first proposed finding. Thus, the real meat of the discussion needs to be on the first proposed finding.
– The first proposed finding, namely that “greenhouse gases in the atmosphere endanger the public health and welfare of current and future generations,” is where the real battle should lie. There are several potential attack points in this first proposed finding:
First, it appears that the EPA is claiming that the *current* concentrations threaten the public health and welfare of the *current* generation. The larger pre-publication document is less direct on this point than the summary sheet, but it appears that this is the EPA’s position. This is a significant weakness, as the evidence marshalled by the EPA in support of this position seems to consist only of blanket statements that recent events have been caused by climate change, coupled with concerns about “likely” projected future events. Further, the idea that *current* concentrations threaten the public health and welfare today is a significant departure from even most CAGW supporters, other than perhaps the most fanatical fringe, a la Hansen. Almost all CAGW alarm is directed at future possible events, and there are numerous public acknowledgements that it is impossible to link any particular current catastrophic event to climate change.
I have not researched the issue enough to be certain, but I believe the EPA’s claim that the current concentrations threaten public health and welfare here and now may be necessary in order to bring the matter under the EPA’s purview or at least under particular sections of the Clean Air Act. In other words, if the EPA were to conclude that some anticipated future concentration would constitute a threat to public health and welfare in the future, would the EPA still have the full slate of regulatory tools at its disposal? I suspect not, but if anyone can point us to chapter and verse, please do so.
In either case, the EPA’s position that the current concentrations are a threat here and now, is, in my estimation, the weakest chink in the EPA’s findings from an evidentiary standpoint.
Second, the EPA is specifically not seeking to regulate CO2 because it is directly harmful to humans. The EPA acknowledges that it is not, and that it is only through the secondary effects of climate change that the threat exists. I believe this is a significant departure from the EPA’s standard operating procedure, namely, that a specific pollutant can be shown to have a direct and demonstrable link to health and/or welfare. If anyone knows otherwise, please let me know. If I am correct in my assessment, this represents perhaps the weakest legal link in the EPA’s position.
Third, and the part that jumps out at most people, is that there are dozens of statements of “fact” that are widely in dispute. These will hopefully be challenged one by one, but permit me to suggest that most individuals who provide comments to the EPA need not get bogged down in each and every one of these misstatements. I would recommend that if you have good evidence — particularly peer reviewed literature — to counter specific statements, then by all means present it. Otherwise, I believe the old adage “silence is better than a bad argument” should rule. For example, be wary of random links to graphs and charts on the Internet that are not well documented — you argument will be better served by not proffering questionable evidence. Commenters who do not have the time or expertise to challenge each of the EPA’s “factual” statements can still provide valuable input on the absurdity of regulating CO2, the failure of models to adequately predict current climate events, the fact that even if warming occurs, it will not necessarily be net detrimental, etc.
Fourth, the pre-publication document has a section on uncertainties. This section should be exploited by pointing out how the EPA has vastly understated the uncertainties in its findings, while vastly overstating its confidence in projections and models that have to date proven inadequate to the task.
– Finally, some have asked about water vapor. The full pre-publication findings do spend about 2 pages discussing water vapor, but solely for the purpose of explaining why it should not be regulated under the Clean Air Act. Specifically, the EPA states that “direct water vapor emissions from human activities have only a negligible effect on atmospheric concentrations of water vapor” and that “changes in water vapor concentrations are not an initial driver of climate change, but rather an effect of climate change which then acts as a positive feedback that further enhances warming.” This is not the most worthwhile area to spend time on in comments to the EPA, but there may be some value in a couple of brief, well-placed challenges to these statements.

I agree with Fat Man (20:28:05) that the time before anything comes to pass will take years, however there is a simpler solution to the problem.
First, realize the reason CO2 was declared a “pollutant” was via the Supreme Court. If you thought the IPCC was a loosely credentialed scientific organization, what does that make the Supreme Court?
The Obama administration is floating a trial balloon by having the EPA start this process. The Administration agenda right now is to solve: financial crisis, health care, energy, Iraq, immigration, and on and on. The political reality is that not everything can be done. As soon as they meet serious resistance they will switch to a different topic. And they most certainly will meet resistance when the public realize that following the EPA down the path of CO2 = pollution is a one-way ticket to national poverty.
The best solution to the problem will be to force Congress to rewrite the Clear Air Act. Clearly written statutes from Congress will remove any possibility for the courts to make mischief with their interpretations. A Clean Air rewrite may be the first bipartisan bill of the current Congress, as Republicans and centrist/rust-belt/Blue Dog Democrats unite to support American economic and reform the environmental laws that have lead us to this current fiasco.
So by all means submit comments to the EPA, but I suggests a more fruitful approach would be to lobby your Representatives and Senators and demand a Clean Air Act rewrite now.

Wait, there may be some hope yet. There is a techhnology known only to GWAs that deniers haven’t been told about yet. There are large tanks of this toxic CO2 gas in the storage rooms of hundreds of thousands of restaurants all over the world.
Somehow this gas known to cause serious harm to humans, as it travels through a special tube to a top secrete machine, is mixed whith certain chemicals and served as refeshinng drink.
In all seriousness, the health dept did come by and lable my CO2 tank as a toxic gas. If it sounds too incredible to be true check with the Riverside, Co CA health Dept as to how all CO2 tanks are labled.
How long before CCola is sued? My guess is that GWAs would rather not have attention drawn in that direction because the general public won’t go along with any regulation that messes with their fav soft drink.
Best to stick with endless studies on the contribution of cow farts to AGW. We haven’t gotten hooked on drinks made with those yet.

GK, you make some good points. However, the politicians and EPA under Obama do not listen and will not listen to anything but the AGWers. Al Gore, Hansen, and others have effectively made their song the only one on the radio (or IPod).
The AGWers have waited a very long time to get to this point in history, and they are not about to let anything stand in their way, not facts, not evidence, not credentials, not persuasive arguments made by eloquent speakers, not even record cold and snow. The AGWers have painted the picture so that everything that happens can be and is made to be a result of man-made GHGs. Very clever, these AGWers. No-lose situation for them.
Given all that, an outpouring of comments, well-written, and pointing to facts as Eric Anderson wrote above are still necessary to show the level of disagreement. Even then, the EPA will issue the proposed finding. This is not about the facts, and never has been.
One can only hope that entire industries write comments, with threats to shut down factories and lay off thousands (millions) of people should this CO2 regulation be passed. Americans out of work by the millions is about all a politician cares about. Out-of-work voters do not vote for the party that put them out of work.
We are seeing industries shutting down or moving out already in California, and Texas has made rumblings about shutting down refineries and chemical plants if their costs to operate increase due to carbon cap and trade. Shell in Australia made similar arguments a few weeks ago – said they would shut down the refinery (a major employer) and simply import gasoline and diesel and jet fuel. And that threat is real. Several major refineries either just started up, or are under construction around the world, so there is plenty of refining capacity.
Every industry that uses energy (and that includes EVERY industry) will be impacted, steel, aluminum, copper, electronics, textiles, aircraft, automobiles, refining, defense, lumber, every single employer will see their costs rise. Only import tariffs will keep America competitive, and those are generally forbidden by international agreements.
Once the manufacturing is gone overseas, all the other satellite industries are finished, too, such as finance, banking, and mortgage lending. With millions out of work, retail and entertainment collapse, and restaurants and coffee shops soon follow. Construction collapses too.
It is far cheaper for manufacturing to move overseas and ship the goods back to the U.S.A. Many millions will be out of work, as there are not enough hamburger joints in the U.S. for all of us to get a job sprinkling salt on the fries. People will resort to making their own baloney sandwiches again, like we did in the 1950’s.
And the ironic thing is, the Democrats and AGWers can always point to the economic crisis that started under George Bush, and blame it all on Bush. They will never accept any blame for CO2 caps causing any problems. Their economic models show that capping CO2 is good for the economy and increases employment. By the way, those economic models make the GCMs look great.
Still, we can and should write the comments. At least we can later point to the comments and say I Told You So. I’m drafting mine now.

It will require a police force larger than the military to police this.
How will they decide who is guilty of which emissions by how much?
Welcome to Brave New Worlds.

Isn’t the issue to focus on how and why CO2 is not a significant greenhouse gas ? That this is absolutely paramount to the debate ?
On the one side we have temperature and ice recordings that are diverging from measured CO2 trends in the atmosphere. That’s good
On the other side we don’t have good enough models and explanations (both amoung scientists and for the layman?) to show that CO2 is not a significant greenhouse gas. This is very important, no ?

Fatman is right that this will take years and before it’s done, we’re likely to see a planet sufficiently cold that the idiots will not be able to maintain the political power required to do anything really dangerous to the economy. Some lawyers will make money.
Having done my share of environmental permitting, I further believe that if they did declare CO2 a pollutant, the agencies would have to consider the cost of avoiding the pollutant, and that this cost would not be economic in almost all situations. Industry is required to use “best management practices (BMP)”, not “zero pollution”. Sure, it would be possible to use EPA to halt all (new) industrial development in the US but this is not going to happen.
An “air permit” is basically a legal agreement between a business and the government where the business gets to pollute in certain ways and amounts but not in other ways, and which, in return, the business is made immune to lawsuits over its pollution. See the EPA description of air permits.
Once you get a permit, all you have to do is stay within its limits. Then lawsuits on our pollution have to go to the permitting EPA office, not us. If the EPA system really were as extreme as a lot of people (who have never had to deal with it) believe, industry would have halted long ago in the United States. The permitting agencies are state agencies, not US government. In those states which desire industrial growth, permits are made easier because states are not that stupid; they know business knows how much time permits will take and avoid states with long permit delays.
I believe that this global warming stuff will have no effect on US industry even over the very long term and even if we weren’t diving into a cold spell. It’s basically grandstanding for the left wing voters who gave Obama all that money. He’s gone back on his other campaign promises, this is the only thing he’s doing. But the way this is going, it will have no real effect. Obama’s gig seems to be another politician simply after power, more like Clinton than a true believer.

Anthony,
as you have one million plus visitors here every month, of which the majority are concerned as to where the AGW movement are leading us, what would happen if even half of your visitors sent an email to the White House expressing there concern as to the direction this administration is heading? I think that if 500,000 emails arrived to the President on a particular subject even he, just might spend a few seconds to reflect.