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Pruitt scales back EPA’s use of science

Rogue Valley

Rogue Valley

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Pruitt scales back EPA’s use of science

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Scott Pruitt

April 24, 2018

Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt announced Tuesday he would seek to bar the agency from relying on studies that don't publicly disclose all their data, a major policy change that has long been sought by conservatives that will sharply reduce the research the agency can rely on when crafting new regulations. The unveiling of the proposed rule delivers a win to Republicans like House Science Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), who unsuccessfully pushed legislation to impose the same type of change. At an invitation-only meeting at EPA headquarters with Smith, Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) and other supporters of the policy, Pruitt said the proposed rule was critical in ensuring that the agency was transparent about how it is making decisions to justify costly new regulations. It is the latest step Pruitt has taken to fundamentally shift the agency’s approach to science.

The proposal, based on legislation pushed by Smith, is intensely controversial, and scientists and public health groups say it will prevent federal regulators from enacting health and safety protections. Nearly 1,000 scientists, including former EPA career staffers, signed a letter opposing the policy sent by the Union of Concerned Scientists to Pruitt on Monday. Their primary concern was that many of the country's bedrock air and water quality regulations are based on research that cannot disclose raw data because it includes the personal health information. Pruitt’s predecessor Gina McCarthy, and her air chief Janet McCabe, in an op-ed in The New York Times in March said concerns about studies are dealt with through the existing peer-review process, which ensures scientific integrity. “[Pruitt] and some conservative members of Congress are setting up a nonexistent problem in order to prevent the E.P.A. from using the best available science,” they said.
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Pruitt is ordering by fiat, what the US Congress writ large, and the American people do not support. He will be removing peer-reviewed science research from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Mr. Pruitt's EPA mandate from Trump is to take America back to the 1950's, when industry could despoil and pollute the environment at will to enhance corporate profits.

Related: Scott Pruitt’s Attack on Science Would Paralyze the E.P.A.
 
Oh, yeah, that is a profanity.

As the article notes, it would eviscerate the EPA's ability to do much of anything. Obviously, you cannot ethically expose people to toxic levels of chemicals then see what happens to them.

In addition to the effect of preventing the EPA considering any wide-scale confidential studies conducted on people after environmental disasters, it rules out a tremendous amount of long-term studies that offered confidentiality if they happen to have some use in the EPA's decisions. (ie, there has been a study running for something like 25ish years that started with kids in grade school (signed up w/ parental consent) and follows them through adult hood, with periodic check-ins - that couldn't be used).

So of course the complete scumbag dresses up the decision in "transparency" language. I can only hope the admin yet again ****s up compliance with the APA and this gets tangled up in court for years.









I have doubt that the usual suspects will be along to fill the next X-XX pages with endless repetitions of some form of "yay transparency" or "who needs an environment?" without making the slightest effort to sensibly discuss things. And like so many of the actions the Idiot they blindly support, I can't just shrug it off as something that will only hurt them as they deserve. It'll hurt everyone.

(I'm being extremely and undeservedly kind by using "suspects" in "usual suspects").
 
 
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