- The nation's top 50 polluting power plants are owned
by corporations that are tightly allied with the Bush Administration both
as major campaign contributors and in conducting pollution policymaking,
according to a new study released yesterday. Conducted by two nonprofit,
nonpartisan groups -- the Environmental Integrity Project and Public Citizen
-- the study utilized data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
and the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI).
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- Ranking the polluters based on their emissions of mercury,
sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide, the report finds that sulfur dioxide
and carbon dioxide pollution actually increased from 2002-2003, thereby
expanding risks of asthma attacks and lung ailments.
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- According to the report, America's Dirtiest Power Plants:
Plugged into the Bush Administration, the firms cited in the study, along
with their trade associations, met at least 17 times with Vice President
Cheney's energy task force.
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- The report found that since 1999, the 30 largest utility
companies owning the majority of the 89 dirtiest power plants in the study
have contributed $6.6 million to the Bush presidential campaigns and the
Republican National Committee. The 30 companies also hired at least 16
lobbying or law firms that have raised at least $3.4 million more for the
Bush campaigns.
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- "It is no coincidence that a wholesale assault on
the Clean Air Act is taking place today," said Eric Schaeffer, who
founded EIP after resigning in early 2002 from his post as director of
EPA's Office of Regulatory Enforcement, in protest of the administration's
rollback of environmental protections. "This is a well-connected industry
that is absolutely intent on preserving its 'right' to foul the air regardless
of the consequences to the American people."
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- The study ranked the top 50 polluters for each of the
three emissions (mercury, SO2, CO2). Because several companies were in
the top 50 for more than one pollutant, the list totaled 89 power plants.
Of those 89, some 47 have either been sued or placed under investigation
by the EPA for violating the Clean Air Act's New Source Review requirement,
under which plants that upgrade or expand must add expensive new clean
technology.
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- Last August the EPA stirred a huge controversy by relaxing
requirements for New Source Review, exempting many plants from the law's
pollution control requirements. A federal court stayed the new rules, but
as the report notes, "The result of the administration's policy, coupled
with the program's current status in legal limbo, is that many of these
companies have either had the cases against them undermined or simply dropped
by the Bush Adminstration."
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- The study lists five former executives or lobbyists for
the electric utility industry who have been placed in important regulatory
posts in the Bush administration. One is assistant administrator of EPA's
Office of Air and Radiation, another is counsel to that office, and a third
is deputy administrator of EPA. A fourth is now in charge of all government
lawsuits against coal-fired power plants, and the fifth helped write national
energy policy as assistant secretary at the Department of Energy.
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- The full report is available at www.environmentalintegrity.org.
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- Copyright © 2003 Environmental Media Services
- http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/mt_archives/000112.php
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