Clearing the air: why I quit Bush's EPA

Washington Monthly, July-August, 2002 by Eric Schaeffer

JUST AFTER THE 2000 ELECTION, WHILE THE nation's attention was focused on the Florida recount, my colleagues at the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department celebrated a dramatic victory of their own. Two of the country's largest utilities had just agreed to cut pollution from their old, coal-fired power plants by two-thirds, or more than half a million tons a year. As director of the EPA's Office of Regulatory Enforcement since 1997, I helped to bring lawsuits against some of the nation's largest electric utilities. The government charged these companies with violating the Clean Air Act by expanding their coal-fired electric plants without controlling emissions such as nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide--noxious gases that cause smog, asthma, lung cancer, and premature death. The post-election settlement with Cinergy and Dominion was a landmark, pressuring other companies to follow suit and clean up their act as well.

Unfortunately, Washington's energy lobbyists understood this dynamic all too clearly. And when President Bush assumed office, they wasted little time blocking this new momentum toward cleaner air by persuading the administration that the problem wasn't the polluters, but our anti-pollution laws. It wasn't a hard sell. The Bush administration quickly set about weakening the Clean Air Act, stoking public fears of energy shortages and blackouts as a rationale for leniency (even though 2001 was a record year for power plant expansion). White House staff and the Energy Department, working closely with lobbyists for the same companies we had sued, directed EPA to expand loopholes that allow 40- or 50-year-old power plants to continue pumping out 12 million tons of sulfur dioxide a year, without implementing modern pollution controls. What's more, in March, EPA Administrator Christine Whitman shocked everyone by publicly suggesting that companies hold off on settlements pending the outcome of litigation. Not surprisingly, Cinergy and Dominion backed out of their agreements and refused to sign consent decrees. (Recently, the administration rolled out a series of "reforms" making it so easy for these big plants to avoid pollution controls that they might as well have been written by defendants' lawyers.) A year and a half later, nothing has improved, and the opportunity for cleaner air that once seemed so close has been lost--the other companies, once on the path to settlement, have drifted away from the negotiating table.

In a matter of weeks, the Bush administration was able to undo the environmental progress we had worked years to secure. Millions of tons of unnecessary pollution continue to pour from these power plants each year as a result. Adding insult to injury the White House sought to slash the EPA's enforcement budget, making it harder for us to pursue cases we'd already launched against other polluters that had run afoul of the law, from auto manufacturers to refineries, large industrial hog feedlots, and paper companies. It became clear that Bush had little regard for the environment--and even less for enforcing the laws that protect it. So last spring, after 12 years at the agency, I resigned, stating my reasons in a very public letter to Administrator Whitman.

Enforcing environmental laws has never been easy. Even in the Clinton administration there were bureaucratic turf battles, truculent congressmen, and relentless industry lobbyists to contend with. But hard work yielded progress; the job was sometimes a headache, but I never doubted that we were having a positive effect. Under Bush, the balance has shifted, to a degree few outside the bureaucracy may realize.

The administration's most obvious assaults on the environment have drawn fire. The press and environmental groups attacked recent EPA rule changes that allow coal-mining companies to dump waste in valleys and streams, and when the EPA last year overturned Clinton-era regulations to reduce arsenic in drinking water, the public reaction was so intensely negative that Whitman eventually backed off. But these public efforts to roll back regulations are only half the story. Behind the scenes, in complicated ways that attract less media attention (and therefore may be politically safer), the administration and its allies in Congress are crippling the EPA's ability to enforce laws and regulations already on the books. As a result, some of the worst pollution continues unchecked.

Gorsuch to Gore

This is not the first time this has happened. More than 20 years ago, President Reagan appointed Ann Gorsuch to head the EPA with the understanding that she would weaken the newly created agency's ability to oversee industry. As part of that campaign, Gorsuch scattered the staff of the enforcement office among various other programs, virtually eliminating its ability to keep polluters in check. She and her deputies were so ham-handed in their efforts--which led to such embarrassments as the Conviction of Rita Lavelle, the head of the hazardous waste program--that the White House bowed to public pressure and unceremoniously dumped her. A period of detente followed. Though resources were never adequate, the Reagan administration--no doubt chilled by the watchful eyes of Democratic committee chairmen--generally seemed to accept that political appointees should not bow to industry requests to call off investigations.