Confirmed Feb. 17 by the Senate along mostly party-line [52-46], 48-year-old former Okalahoma Att. Gen. Scott Pruitt became the next director of the Environmental Protection Agency [EPA], replacing 64-year-old Gina McCarthy. Democrats objected Pruitt’s nomination because of his rejection of the Scientific community’s generally accepted theories of global warming, attributing climate change to CO2 emissions from burning fossil fuels. Former President Bill Clinton’s VP Al Gorge popularized global warming or climate change in his 2006 documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” winning him an Oscar Feb. 26, 2007. After losing the White House to former President George W. Bush Nov. 4, 2000 by only 500 disputed votes, Gore went on to found Current TV Aug. 1, 2005, a global news network eventually sold to Al Jazeera Jan. 3, 2013, netting him $100 million.
Picking Pruitt, an unapologetic climate denier, was a slap in the face to Democrats and some Republicans that agree with a convincing body of scientific data linking climate change with greenhouse gases or CO2 emissions from burning fossil fuels. “I think the measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of the impact,” said Pruitt, hedging his bets on man-made climate change. Pruitt, who’s from the fossil fuel-rich state of Oklahoma, represented the fossil fuel industry, opposed to regulating carbon emissions. Pruitt’s climate-change denial puts him out the mainstream on today’s global warming attributed to burning fossil fuels. Whatever evidence Pruitt knows exists on climate change, it takes a backseat to corporate interests advancing the fossil fuel industry.
Democratic members of Congress could stand on their heads to convince Pruitt about the importance of reducing the U.S. carbon footprint. Pruitt, like President Donald Trump, disparaged former President Barack Obama signing onto the April 22, 2016 Paris Agreement to reduce the world’s carbon footprint, with 196 countries agreeing to take concrete steps to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. “So no, I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see,” Pruitt told CNBC. “But we don’t know that yet, we need to continue the debate, continue the review and analysis,” denying that the issue is settled fact in the scientific community. Whatever Pruitt’s personal views on climate change, he can’t reverse current café standards, setting mileage requirements for the U.S. auto industry. No fossil fuel advocate should ignore evidence on climate change.
Advocating for the fossil fuel industry, including digging more wells and building pipelines, shouldn’t stop proponents from accepting the impact of carbon emissions on climate change. “We can be pro-growth, pro-jobs and pro-environment,” Pruitt told energy executives in Houston at CERAWeek, giving GOP talking points on climate change. Pruitt disagreed with the Supreme Court’s 2007 ruling that greenhouse gasses can be regulated, like any other pollutant, under the federal Clean Air Act. In 2009, the EPA listed CO2 and other heat-trapping gasses as pollutants. Consequences of climate change from melting polar ice caps, rising sea levels to super-storms have been well documented, not, as Pruitt says, from normal weather cycles but attributable to growing greenhouse gas emissions. Pruitt blames the EPA for going overboard in its regulatory authority.
President Ronald Reagan once campaigned in 1980 to shutter the EPA, claiming, “it didn’t produce a quart of oil or a lump of coal,” blaming it for making it impossible for many businesses in the U.S. “Decisions were made at the executive branch level that didn’t respect the rule of law,” Pruitt toll energy industry execs at CERAWeek. Pruitt wants the Congress to pass legislation to legitimize or not greenhouse gases as pollutants under the Clean Air Act. Pruitt told his confirmation hearing that he would uphold current EPA regulations until Congress passed new legislation. Environmentalists know with Pruitt they face a determined opponent to regulation that harms business. “We can’t afford to reject this clear and compelling scientific evidence when we make public policy. Embracing ignorance is not an option,” said Ben Santer, a climate scientist at Berkeley-based Lawrence Livermore laboratory.
Pruitt’s public remarks denying the link between man-made greenhouse gasses and climate change comes close to Reagan once saying California’s Giant Redwoods caused air pollution. Whatever issue Pruitt has with climate denial, he should park it away from the EPA. No serious public servant regulating the environment can respect a boss that embarrasses the agency. “The mask is off. After obscuring his true views during the Senate confirmation hearings, Scott Pruitt has outed himself as a pure climate denier,” said David Doniger, director of the climate program at the National Resources Defense Council. Pruitt’s detractors need to avoid the insults, hold Pruitt to enforce current environmental standards and continue efforts to reduce the U.S. carbon footprint. Without hurting the U.S. economy, Pruitt must work to help the U.S. conform to the 2016 Paris Climate Agreement.
