E.P.A. Plans to Get Thousands of Pollution Deaths Off the Books by Changing Its Math
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The Environmental Protection Agency plans to change the way it calculates the health risks of air pollution, a shift that would make it easier to roll back a key climate change rule because it would result in far fewer predicted deaths from pollution, according to five people with knowledge of the agency’s plans.
The E.P.A. had originally forecast that eliminating the Obama-era rule, the Clean Power Plan, and replacing it with a new measure would have resulted in an additional 1,400 premature deaths per year . The new analytical model would significantly reduce that number and would most likely be used by the Trump administration to defend further rollbacks of air pollution rules if it is formally adopted.
The proposed shift is the latest example of the Trump administration downgrading the estimates of environmental harm from pollution in regulations. In this case, the proposed methodology would assume there is little or no health benefit to making the air any cleaner than what the law requires. Many experts said that approach was not scientifically sound and that, in the real world, there are no safe levels of the fine particulate pollution associated with the burning of fossil fuels.
Fine particulate matter — the tiny, deadly particles that can penetrate deep into the lungs and enter the bloodstream — is linked to heart attacks, strokes and respiratory disease.
The five people familiar with the plan, all current or former E.P.A. officials, said the new modeling method would appear in the agency’s analysis of the final version of the replacement regulation, known as the Affordable Clean Energy rule, which is expected to be made public in June.
William L. Wehrum, the E.P.A.
assistant administrator for air and radiation.
Ron Sachs/CNP/MediaPunch
“It’s a very important issue, and it’s an issue where there has been a lot of debate over what the right approach is,” Mr. Wehrum said.
The E.P.A., when making major regulatory changes, is normally expected to demonstrate that society will see more benefits than costs from the change. Experts said that, while benefits would appear on paper in this case, the change actually disregards potential dangers to public health.
“Particulate matter is extremely harmful and it leads to a large number of premature deaths,” said Richard L. Revesz, an expert in environmental law at New York University. He called the expected change a “monumental departure” from the approach both Republican and Democratic E.P.A. leaders have used over the past several decades and predicted that it would lay the groundwork for weakening more environmental regulations.
“It could be an enormously significant impact,” Mr. Revesz said.
The Obama administration had sought to reduce planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Power Plan by pushing utilities to switch away from coal and instead use natural gas or renewable energy to generate electricity. The Obama plan would also have what is known as a co-benefit: levels of fine particulate matter would fall.
The Trump administration has moved to repeal the Obama-era plan and replace it with the Affordable Clean Energy rule, which would slightly improve the efficiency of coal plants. It would also allow older coal plants to remain in operation longer and result in an increase of particulate matter.
Particulate matter comes in various sizes. The greatest health risk comes from what is known as PM 2.5, the range of fine particles that are less than 2.5 microns in diameter. That is about one-thirtieth the width of a human hair.
The E.P.A. has set the safety threshold for PM 2.5 at a yearly average of 12 micrograms per cubic meter. While individual days vary, with some higher, an annual average at or below that level, known as the particulate matter standard, is considered safe. However, the agency still weighs health hazards that occur in the safe range when it analyzes new regulations.
Industry has long questioned that system. After all, fossil fuel advocates ask, why should the E.P.A. search for health dangers, and, ultimately, impose costs on industry, in situations where air is officially considered safe?
Mr. Wehrum, who worked as a lawyer and lobbyist for chemical manufacturers and fossil fuel businesses before moving to the E.P.A., echoed that position in two interviews. He noted that, in some regulations, the benefits of reduced particulate matter have been estimated to total in the range of $40 billion.
“How in the world can you get $30 or $40 billion of benefit to public health when most of that is attributable to reductions in areas that already meet a health-based standard,” he said. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
Mr. Wehrum acknowledged that the administration was considering a handful of analyses that would reduce the prediction of 1,400 premature deaths as a result of the measure.
He called the attention given to that initial forecast “unfortunate” and said the agency had included the figure in its analysis to show the varied results that can be achieved based on different assumptions.
Mr. Wehrum said the analyses the agency is conducting “illuminate the issue” of particulate matter and the question of what level is acceptable for the purposes of policymaking. He said new approaches would allow for public debate to move ahead and that any new methods would be subject to peer review if they became the agency’s primary tool for measuring health risks.
“This isn’t just something I’m cooking up here in my fifth-floor office in Washington,” Mr. Wehrum said.
Roger O. McClellan, who has served on E.P.A. advisory boards and as president of the Chemical Industry Institute of Toxicology, an industry-financed research center, said that the data for health risks below the particulate matter standard was weak and that he did not accept the argument that agencies must calculate risk “down to the first molecule of exposure.”
“These kinds of approaches — that every molecule, every ionization, carries with it an associated calculable health risk — are just misleading,” Mr. McClellan said.
To put the matter in perspective, most scientists say particulate matter standards are like speed limits. On many highways, a limit of 65 miles per hour is considered reasonable to protect public safety. But that doesn’t mean the risk of an accident disappears at 55 m.p.h., or even 25.
Jonathan M. Samet, a pulmonary disease specialist who is dean of the Colorado School of Public Health, said the most recent studies showed negative health effects well below the 12-microgram standard. “It’s not a hard stop where we can say ‘below that, air is safe.’ That would not be supported by the scientific evidence,” Dr. Samet said. “It would be very nice for public health if things worked that way, but they don’t seem to.”
Daniel S. Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute, a nonprofit research organization that is funded by the E.P.A. and industry groups, acknowledged there was uncertainty around the effects of fine particulate matter exposure below the standard.
He said it was reasonable of the Trump administration to study the issue, but he questioned moving ahead with a new system before those studies are in. “To move away from the way this has been done without the benefit of this full scientific peer review is unfortunate,” he said.
Initial image: The Hunter power plant in Castle Dale, Utah, which burns an estimated 4.5 million tons of coal a year. Brandon Thibodeaux for The New York Times
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So you're not talking about real deaths that occurred, but only "potential" ones that might, maybe, perhaps, happen.
Once again, the misleading title.
I don't agree. We deal with "theoretical" and "potential", all the time.
The title says that a change in math would take thousands of deaths off the books. I don't think that could possibly mean that the math would resuscitate dead people. "Potential/probable deaths" are the only kind that math can kill. (Hmmm... if we kill potential dead, do they become alive?)
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So much for the Pro-Life President and his sycophants. We can change counts of potential deaths to real ones and increase the costs of health care for everyone else that survives. All so some rich people can get a tiny bit richer.
Not to worry, we are all going to be dead in 12 years anyways because AOC says so!
I'm only pointing out the hypocrisy that the GoP can't even bother to hide anymore. AoC means less than nothing to me, but is sure seems to trigger some Dittoheads.
AOC is the new face of the Democratic Party.
And she has plenty of support.
best learn to accept and deal with it.
She is not. Pelosi and Shummer are the party leaders & Tom Parez is the DNC chairman. AoC is little more than one voice in the choir. Not that it matters since I'm not a Democrat anyway.
Whatever... keep trying to distract the conversation from the people that put our childrens' health and lives in danger for the sake of short term profits.
She's a freshman backbencher.
So why do you, and so many other "conservatives" get so excited about her?
oh, wait... a young non-White woman...
A young non-White progressive woman. I find it super interesting that many tighty alt+righties think progressives speak for everyone to the left of them.
I am not a conservation but I have to laugh at the moronic things she says just about every day, like growing cauliflower in NYC community gardens is somehow racist.
She is just plain stupid and that reflects bigly over onto the Democrat party. That she is Hispanic is simply left wing dog whistling.
I can see some things that a conservative might disagree with... but I see nothing "moronic".
Could you give me some examples of things you consider moronic?
You keep telling yourself that enough times and you'll even believe it.
Ah, the race card yet once again.
This discussion is over---I know nothing is left to be said once you have to resort to that tired, worn-out old tactic.
It is an immensely lazy intellectual argument.
Of course.
"Campaigns are so much more expensive than people think they are. Just to keep the lights on is several thousand dollars a month.
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/authors/alexandria_ocasiocortez
I know what it's like to access the privilege of a ZIP Code but also be born in one that could have destined me to something else. Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/alexandria_ocasiocortez_926299
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/alexandria_ocasiocortez_926299
The idea that we're going to austerity ourselves into prosperity is so mistaken, and honestly, I feel like one of the big problems we have is that, because Democrats don't have a deep understanding of or degrees in economics, they allow Wall Street folks to roll in the door and think that they're giving them an education. Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/alexandria_ocasiocortez_926287
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/alexandria_ocasiocortez_926287
Before ICE, we had Immigration and Naturalization Services, but it wasn't until about 1999 that we chose to criminalize immigration at all. And then, once ICE was established, we really kind of militarized that enforcement to a degree that was previously unseen in the United States. Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/alexandria_ocasiocortez_926317
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/alexandria_ocasiocortez_926317
A rose is a rose is a rose...
A racist is a racist is a racist...
What is "moronic" here?
If you think those were brainy quotes from AOC, there is nothing on earth that could ever make you see that some of them are moronic. Nothing can get through.
Ignorance is ignorance, and a fool is a fool.
I didn't say they were "brainy". (As usual, you're makin' shit up...)
I asked you what you found "moronic". You haven't answered.
Gee, I supplied the quotes I found to be moronic.
Just because you don't recognize them as such has no bearing on what I see.
And I didn't say you found them brainy. Please read what I actually wrote instead of putting words in my mouth and attempting to argue what you think I stated. It is intellectually lazy and dishonest.
Here is one example cited previously:
"Campaigns are so much more expensive than people think they are. Just to keep the lights on is several thousand dollars a month.
I find it moronic to believe that the utility bill for a campaign would amount to thousands of dollars per month.
If the bills are that high, then some moron got waaaaay too big of a space.
Here is another:
I know what it's like to access the privilege of a ZIP Code but also be born in one that could have destined me to something else.
I find it moronic that someone who is college-educated believes that zip codes determine anything other than establish the general area in which you live. Perhaps you feel zip codes determine success, I don't know.
"keep the lights on" is a common idiom that means the minimum expenditures required to keep an enterprise operating. It is a literal interpretation that is moronic.
Again, an idiomatic use of "zip code" to designate a privileged/wealthy area, and again ...
She has said stupid things, e.g. "Unemployment is low because everyone has two jobs." But all politicians do that on occasion, AOC not a moron; she's intelligent, like Warren, and an intelligent, progressive woman is a conservative's anathema.
As so often, the fundamental problem here is that many opinions are dogma-based. If an intelligent person makes a minimal effort to understand what AOC is saying, they find intelligence.
If, OTOH, they make an effort to find foolishness, they find that.
For many, tribal dogma is everything. Reality is of little importance.
NICE! You've done a wonderful job changing the conversation from THE TRUMP ADMIN DOESN'T CARE ABOUT DEAD PEOPLE to AoC. Good times!
Must have a real hard on for AOC.
Correction the Trump administration doesn't care about hypothetical/fictitious dead people.
I truly, honestly, hope you and yours don't become one of those hypothetical/fictitious people.