David Moulton, Director of Climate Policy at The Wilderness Society, released the following statement today in response to the decision of the Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to delay regulation of greenhouse gas pollution in the United States:
“Today EPA is expected to make it official: our nation’s protector of the environment has decided to take a summer vacation from global warming regulation, and instead has headed to the beach where it can spend a few more months ignoring science, the Supreme Court, and the damage to the planet being caused by global warming pollution.
“Despite all its efforts to appear responsible on the subject of global warming, this Administration is one of the only governments in the world that continues to argue that global warming pollution is not a danger to the public health and welfare of its people.
“EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson’s decision not to decide is a tragic echo of President Bush’s decision last week to punt global warming to the next administration. It is unforgiveable that the agency charged with protecting the nation’s environmental health and welfare has so little regard for its mission. More than a year has passed since the Supreme Court cleared up any question about EPA’s obligation to regulate greenhouse gas pollution. Instead of rolling up their sleeves and getting the job done, EPA’s leadership has slow-walked and steam-rolled this desperately-needed public health initiative.
“As the Supreme Court found, the emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by the developed world over 100 years is a danger that can no longer be ignored. EPA can take a vacation but our planet is trapped in an ever-worsening real-world warming crisis that doesn’t take a holiday. All our nation’s ecosystems are at risk: the watersheds that protect our drinking water, the open spaces that clean our air, the wetlands that buffer our coasts, the western snowpack and rains that suppress fire. It is folly to let politics stand in the way of moving ahead now with restricting greenhouse gas emissions and adopting a new economic model for the world based on clean renewable technology. Time will not be kind to today’s non-decision.”
