Cheney Forced EPA Climate Change Change

From Congressman Edward J. Markey’s Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming:

Executive summary

I. President Bush’s Deputy Chief of Staff Joel Kaplan and numerous heads of cabinet agencies and White House offices endorsed EPA’s finding that greenhouse gas emissions endanger public welfare, and EPA’s proposal that both vehicle and stationary source greenhouse gas emissions should be regulated under the clean air act.

II. There was widespread agreement within the Bush administration that greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles endanger public welfare and should be regulated.

III. EPA additionally concluded that greenhouse gas emissions from stationary sources such as power plants and refineries should also be regulated using clean air act authority.

IV. The oil industry argued against regulatory action, and had the support of the office of Vice President Cheney.

V. Doing the oil industry’s bidding, the Bush administration reversed course.

[…others, including oil industry representatives from ExxonMobil, the American Petroleum Institute, and the National Petrochemicals and Refiners Association…argued that regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions would tarnish the President’s anti-regulatory legacy and therefore should be best left to the next President.]

The Report (pdf)

Committee Chairman Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) said in a news release: “This is the dysfunctions and motivations of the Bush administration laid bare. The fact that they can, with near unanimity, completely switch positions on global warming to please the oil industry is shocking, and yet disappointingly predictable.”

Gerstenzang: LA Times