The Latest on Clean Air Act Limits on Greenhouse Gas Pollution

Meanwhile, the EPA continues to move to reduce greenhouse gas pollution using the Clean Air Act, but sadly not as urgently or ambitiously as the crisis demands.

Most recently, EPA issued new fuel economy standards for the 2017-2025 model years. With transportation such a big piece of the carbon pollution pie, more fuel-efficient cars and trucks are critical to warding off the worst effects of climate change. But the new vehicle standards require only modest fuel economy improvements and will still allow total greenhouse gas emissions from cars and light trucks to increase over the long term.

Read all about it in a piece by our Senior Counsel Vera Pardee in the Huffington Post.  Another example of one step forward, one back, came in recent new Clean Air Act standards targeting industrial carbon pollution from power plants.

While the new standards will likely help stop construction of new dirty coal fired power plants, the EPA exempted existing power plants from the new rules, thus allowing them to continue to operate without any limits on industrial carbon pollution.

This past January to August were the warmest eight months on record in the contiguous U.S. The extent of Arctic sea ice reached a record low and continues to melt. That’s the bad news.  

The good news is that we already have a powerful tool that’s ours for the using: the Clean Air Act.

But, it’s clear we need to push the EPA to use the Clean Air Act ambitiously and urgently.

And we need to be stronger than those that attack the Act. That’s where our Clean Air Advocates like you come in. 

With many thanks for all you do,Rose Rose Braz, Climate Campaign DirectorCenter for Biological Diversity415.632.5319rbraz@biologicaldiversity.orgFollow us on twitter: @CBD_Climate