Tag Archives: Regulation EPA Electricity Energy

EPA Proposal Promotes Fossil Fuel Use over Renewable Wood Use for Heating Homes

The latest example of big brother schemes brewing in Washington this year is the proposal of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to significantly restrict solid particulate emissions from wood burning stoves. The Census Bureau estimated that 2.4 million U.S. homes use wood as a primary source for heating their homes. The EPA is proposing that manufacturers be required to reduce solid particulate matter emissions by any wood burning stove from the current level of 7.5 grams per hour to 4.5 grams per hour by 2015, and further reductions to 1.3 grams per hour by 2019 (see Table 3).

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USSC Hears Case on EPA Power

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments yesterday in a case that revolved around the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

In 2010, the EPA regulated emissions from vehicles in its so-called “tailpipe rule.” The agency said that promulgating the tailpipe rule triggered authority within the Clean Air Act that stationary sources that also emit GHGs — such as factories and plants, but even stoves, fireplaces, and campfires— can be regulated.

The issue in the case is basically whether it is permissible for the EPA to regulate stationary sources based on this separate regulation of vehicles.

Notably, that part of the Clean Air Act that would, according to proponents, justify greenhouse gas regulation sets emission thresholds at such low levels that schools and small businesses would be covered by the rule. To remedy this, the EPA simply raised those emissions thresholds. Was that a reasonable move, or an illegal exercise of authority? Swing vote Justice Anthony Kennedy told the solicitor general, “I couldn’t find a single precedent that strongly supports your position,” and Justice Alito said that there existed no precedent for such unilateral revision in “the entire history of federal regulation.”

Those who heard the oral argument report that Kennedy appears once again to be the swing vote on the issue. The Washington Times has the story here, and SCOTUS Blog has even more details here and here.

The decision should be out later this Spring.

Does Moneyball work for the EPA?: New EPA Particulant Regs Puffery?

Back in 2003, Michael Lewis wrote “Money Ball,” a book about how an Oakland, CA baseball team under head coach Billy Beane used player statistics to hire team members that gave them the greatest chance of a championship season at the lowest cost.
So by 2009 it was pretty clear what was coming when President Obama’s chief regulator, Cass Sunstein, began talking about how federal regulators should act less than green eye-shade bean counters and more like Billy Beane. Sunstein was going to base regulatory philosophy on statistics and cost/benefit analysis. On its face, that doesn’t sound like a bad thing.
But pointing out the difficultities of this approach is Susan Dudley, head of regulatory studies at George Washington University and Sunstein’s predecessor under President Bush. In her view, the new ‘statistics’ can be fudged to justify almost any kind of regulation. She uses recent EPA regs as an example
Dudley says that the bulk of “benefits” from Obama’s regulatory effort comes from new EPA limits on air particulates of 2.5 micrometers or less. Ask any electric power company executive and they will confirm that this has been the biggest expense for power producers in the last decade as they install expensive smoke stack scrubbers in their coal-burning plants.
Together, these regulations account for about 50% of the monetized cost of all new government regulations, according to Dudley. And they account for even more of the purported “benefits.”
The joke is in the calculation of the ‘benefits.’
According to Dudley the bulk of the benefit comes from extending the life expectacy of a certain group of citizens by 6 months.
Who are these lucky few? Says Dudley,’the beneficiaries of these life saving regulations is around 80-years-old.” Obviously, extending the life of 80-year-olds is a good thing to do. But there are also a lot of doubts about how much effect small particulants have on anybody’s health. Additionally, people in their 80s tend to have one or more other health conditions that may account for changes in mortality.
EPA adds to the accounting a claim that reducing air particulates also cuts back on fish exposure to heavy metals like Mercury that are contained in microscopic particulants. Whether or not these savings have been double-counted against other EPA interventions aimed at reducing Mercury, Dudley does not say.

Dudley, Susan, “Perpetuating Puffery: An Analysis of the Composition of OMB’s Reported Benefits of Regulation,” Business Economics, July 2012, Vol. 47 No. 3, pp 165-176
Lewis, M.M., 2004. Moneyball: The art of winning an unfair game, WW Norton. Available at: http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=oIYNBodW-ZEC&oi=fnd&pg=PR12&dq=%22I+was+inclined+to+concede+the+point.+The+people+with+the+most+money+often+win.%22+%22you+looked+at+what+actually+had+happened+over+the+past+few+years,+you+had%22+&ots=pcH3mzoxGM&sig=LtRBCL53W3-oazf2PxvVAnU8enY [Accessed September 26, 2012].