Senate Votes to Remove Federal Clean Air Protections
Public health at risk from highly toxic air pollution.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Senate today narrowly voted to overturn a critical Clean Air Act safeguard that protects public health from highly toxic air pollutants that cause cancer, birth defects, and brain damage.
The Senate passed the legislation under the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to repeal the important U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rule that ensures that industrial facilities emitting the most toxic air pollution continue to meet Clean Air Act standards requiring maximum reductions in that pollution.
If it becomes law, the measure would allow nearly 2,000 polluting facilities to reduce their existing pollution controls and increase their emissions of the most highly toxic chemicals—including lead, mercury, arsenic, PCBs, benzene, and dioxins—and cease monitoring and reporting on their releases of toxic air pollution into communities.
John Walke, federal director for clean air at NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) issued the following reaction:
“This vote is a dangerous assault on public health. Enacting this measure would undo decades of progress, leading to more cancer, birth defects, brain damage, heart attacks, strokes, and asthma.
“There is no excuse for putting people's health at greater risk by allowing increased toxic air pollution to poison our children and communities across the country. This vote lets polluters run installed pollution-control equipment less and increase dangerous pollution above levels they have achieved for decades. It’s now up to lawmakers in the House of Representatives to decide if they will stand up for the health of our families or side with polluters in one of the worst congressional attacks on hazardous air pollution safeguards in the history of the Clean Air Act.”
NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 3 million members and online activists. Established in 1970, NRDC uses science, policy, law and people power to confront the climate crisis, protect public health and safeguard nature. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Beijing and Delhi (an office of NRDC India Pvt. Ltd).