December 19, 2007, 8:34 pm
E.P.A. to States: CO2 Is Not Your Problem
By Andrew C. Revkin
An unbending reality in Washington is that when someone has to release news that’s likely to generate criticism, it comes after hours. So one can assume the Bush administration was bracing for incoming fire when the Environmental Protection Agency administrator, Stephen L. Johnson, scheduled a phone briefing for 6:30 tonight.
The news? The agency denied California a waiver under the Clean Air Act that would allow it (and indirectly at least a dozen other states following California’s lead) to set limits on carbon dioxide emissions from motor vehicles.
“The Bush administration is moving forward with a clear national solution — not a confusing patchwork of state rules,” the AP quoted Mr. Johnson as saying. “I believe this is a better approach than if individual states were to act alone.” (Dave Roberts posted a fun blow-by-blow reaction to Mr. Johnson’s statements on Gristmill.)
Environmental groups, Democratic lawmakers and California officials and the office of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger all fired back with a volley of press releases and conference calls of their own, saying the decision denied them the right to move more aggressively. Micheline Maynard, our Detroit business writer, has just filed an update.
The move seemed to take the states and private groups by surprise, coming just days after the Bali climate talks, at which the administration touted its efforts to limit warming from greenhouse gases. The administration clearly saw the new gas-mileage standards set in the energy bill President Bush signed today as sufficient (California’s standards would kick in almost immediately.)
Just a few years earlier, in another round of treaty talks, the chief Bush administration negotiator, Harlan Watson, gave a speech holding out state actions as evidence of American initiative on climate.
At those talks, in Milan in 2003, Mr. Watson listed a variety of initiatives begun by states and communities, which he said were like “laboratories where new and creative ideas and methods can be applied and shared with others and inform federal policy - a truly bottom-up approach to addressing global climate change.'’
Now the dynamic seems to have flipped, at least when it comes to limiting carbon dioxide from motor vehicles.
