Science doesn’t back up all EPA claims

See EPA overreach based on politics by Bernard L. Weinstein. He is associate director of the Maguire Energy Institute and an adjunct professor of business economics in the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University. Excerpts:

"Ground level ozone, which helps produce smog, has been falling for years. As our economy has grown 30 percent since 2000, ozone levels have dropped 18 percent"

"Though ozone regulations were tightened in 2008, the EPA now wants to lower acceptable levels by another 14 percent."

"the Environmental Protection Agency is pushing three disruptive and expensive regulatory initiatives to lower ozone emissions from vehicles, carbon emissions from power plants, and methane releases from oil and gas"

"this could be one of the costliest regulations ever adopted in terms of reduced economic output and lower job creation."

"The EPA touts the health benefits from lower ozone levels, arguing that ozone is a major cause of asthma and other diseases. But science doesn’t back up this claim. In fact, the incidence of asthma has been rising as ozone levels have been falling, and the National Institutes of Health cites neither climate change nor ozone as a cause of asthma. What’s more, recent studies have shown no measurable reductions in deaths and illnesses from cardiovascular and respiratory illnesses in communities that have recorded more than a 20 percent drop in ozone levels."

"In July, the EPA proposed a set of regulations designed to further reduce carbon emissions, or GHGs, from the nation’s electric power plants. To achieve this 32 percent reduction by 2030, hundreds of coal-fired generators will have to be mothballed while some gas-fired plants may have to shut down as well."

"The EPA has acknowledged neither the fact that GHG emissions are lower today than 20 years ago nor the huge costs businesses and consumers will bear as a result of shuttering America’s lowest-cost power plants. According to the Energy Information Administration, while electricity from coal and natural gas plants averages $43 per megawatt-hour, wind power averages $107."

"if the EPA power plan is implemented household electric and heating bills will rise by an average of $680 annually."

"the agency has proposed a 45 percent reduction of emissions within 10 years."

"Methane emissions from natural gas production have decreased 38 percent since 2005 while those from hydraulically fractured wells have dropped 79 percent."