06/23/2008
EPA Making it Easier to Pollute National Parks?
By: Jacque
Not if Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander has anything to say about it. In an interview with the Associated Press, the Republican Senator vowed to urge Congress to overrule the Environmental Protection Agency if necessary.
What is the issue? The EPA may adopt a rule, that has been pending since last June, that will make it easier to build coal-fired power plants near national parks. Instead of focusing on reducing the impact of a new pollution source, the rule would change the way the EPA calculates the impact. According to John Bunyak of the National Park Service’s Air Resources Division in Denver, instead of looking at peak periods of pollution, the new rule would use annual averages.
National Parks Conservation Association representative, Don Barger, compares it to someone puting one hand in a block of ice and the other in a fire. “Your average temperature is just fine, but your hands are not.” (AP)
