Thursday, April 15, 2010 3:40 PM
Reagan EPA Chief Blasts Anti-Regulatory Moves
By Margaret Kriz Hobson, NationalJournal.com
William Ruckelshaus, who served as EPA administrator during the Nixon and Reagan administrations, today criticized congressional efforts to strip the environmental agency of its authority to control greenhouse gases. Speaking at an event marking the EPA's 40th anniversary, Ruckelshaus said that thanks to the 2007 Supreme Court decision on global warming, EPA "clearly has the right to regulate carbon."
"Anybody who would take away that power -- it's a terrible idea," Ruckelshaus said. "Ultimately, it may be the only way we have to address the problem" of climate change.
Ruckelshaus' comments came at a time when Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee ranking member Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, has proposed overturning the agency's ruling that global warming pollution damages human health and the environment. Without that scientific conclusion, the agency would be unable to regulate greenhouse gases. Across the aisle, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., has introduced legislation that would suspend for two years EPA's power to control greenhouse gas pollution from energy companies and manufacturers.
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