This Sunday climate czar Carol Browner said the Obama Administration will soon “make an endangerment finding” on carbon dioxide and said, “the next step is a notice of proposed rule making” for new regulations on carbon-dioxide emissions. According to the Wall Street Journal, Browner claims that the Obama Administration “would limit regulation to facilities over a certain size” but as we have pointed out many times, the Clean Air Act does not for such selective enforcement.
Chamber of Commerce vice president William Kovacs told WSJ: “Once carbon dioxide is regulated, they can no longer contain the Clean Air Act…and it would completely shut the country down.”
The New York Times adds:
If the environmental agency determines that carbon dioxide is a dangerous pollutant to be regulated under the Clean Air Act, it would set off one of the most extensive regulatory rule makings in history.
…
“Potentially, it’s a huge mess, not only for E.P.A. but for state regulatory agencies, because the Clean Air Act is second only to the Internal Revenue Code in terms of complexity,” said Mr. Holmstead, now director of environmental strategies at the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani.He said that under the clean air law any source emitting more than 250 tons of a declared pollutant would be subject to regulation, potentially including schools, hospitals, shopping centers, even bakeries, which has prompted some critics to call it the “Dunkin’ Donuts rule.”
