1 week Ago By Lisa Friedman
The Environmental Protection Agency has ordered the virtual elimination of a 15-year-old federal program that requires thousands of power plants, oil refineries, cement factories and other large industrial facilities to publicly report their greenhouse gas emissions, according to two people briefed on the decision. At an agency meeting last week, political appointees told staff members they planned to eliminate reporting requirements for all but one of the 41 categories that are currently ordered to submit data, according to the two people, who spoke on a condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss internal discussions. Gutting the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program would effectively leave the federal government blind when it comes to identifying and measuring sources of pollution that are dangerously heating the planet.
Without that data, it would be difficult to know which sector of the economy or particular facility was a heavy polluter or be able to track emissions over time. The decision was first reported by . Currently, the E.
P.A. requires about 8,000 of the country’s largest industrial plants to annually report their emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, three of the most common and potent greenhouse gases.
Under the planned changes, only certain oil and gas facilities would still be required to report their emissions. “The public has a right to know how much climate pollution is being emitted,” said Vickie Patton, the general counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund, a nonprofit organization. “Policymakers need to know and businesses have an imperative to know,” Ms.
Patton added. “The attack on the data, the attack on the science, is irresponsible.” We are having trouble retrieving the article content.
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