EPA official quits, rips White House

IN HIS RESIGNATION letter, Eric Schaeffer complained specifically about what he saw as attempts to weaken Clean Air Act regulations on coal-fired power plants.
“It is hard to know which is worse,” he wrote of a review of a key Clean Air Act provision, “the endless delay or the repeated leaks by energy industry lobbyists of draft rule changes that would undermine lawsuits already filed” against power plants.
Those lawsuits were filed during the Clinton administration, but a review ordered at the start of the Bush administration has left the status of such actions unclear.
“At their heart, these proposals would turn narrow exemptions into larger loopholes that would allow old ‘grandfathered’ plants to be continually rebuilt (and emissions to increase) without modern pollution controls,” Schaeffer said.