A few years ago, Bonnie Prince Barry and his Stormtroopers at the EPA declared war on Texas:
The necessary precondition for Texas’s unique economic success – a beacon in a deep recession – is energy. And the EPA is closing in for the kill.
This would be one thing if Texas were an outlier among the 50 states in terms of dirty air or an otherwise demonstrably imperiled environment. But the truth is closer to the opposite: the air in Texas has been getting cleaner; in the urban areas, much cleaner. And in spite of being by far the largest electric power producer of the 50 states, and heavily reliant on coal, Texas has been steadily reducing its emissions of the EPA’s least-favored compounds from coal combustion (e.g., sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide). Its emissions of NOx and SO2 are substantially lower than the national average; Texas is ranked the 11th lowest in NOx emissions (.098 lb/mmBtu in 2009, versus a national average of .159 lb/mmBtu), and 24th in SO2 (.309 lb/mmBtu in 2009, versus a national average of .458 lb/mmBtu).
But the EPA isn’t really making the argument that Texas is an environmental pigsty. It’s not putting any data or findings behind that premise, at any rate. Instead, it is simply acting high-handedly, assuming an authority that nothing in written law confers on it, to pronounce Texas’s procedures in violation of EPA rules – even when there is no basis for making that claim. To put it bluntly, the EPA is making a power grab.
Texas fought back. Without much fanfare, it was announced a couple of weeks ago that the EPA goons had “reached an agreement” with Texas. The “agreement” was that the EPA backed down and the State of Texas won. Kudos to Greg Abbott and the TCEQ for refusing to be bullied:
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott issued the following statement regarding the Environmental Protection Agency’s announcement that it has reached an agreement with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality for approval of Texas’ long-standing and successful Flexible Permits Program:
“For almost two decades, the Texas Flex Permits Program has been an effective and legal Texas-based solution to air permitting in our state. We are pleased that the State successfully negotiated with the EPA to obtain a long-overdue path to approval and an agreement that ensures the continued success of this long-standing, successful state air permitting program. This agreement strikes the right balance between helping keep the air we breathe clean while allowing Texas businesses to operate efficiently and create jobs.”
Texas’ Flexible Permits Program was established and sent to the EPA for approval in 1994 – when Ann Richards was Governor of Texas and Bill Clinton was President of the United States. Although the TCEQ has been issuing flexible permits without interference from the federal government since Texas first established the program in 1994, the Obama Administration’s EPA rejected the rules and disapproved the Texas program on July 15, 2010.