4 www.coalage.com May 2016
editor's note
EPA Stacks the Deck with
'Independent' Science Panel
W
hile much of the disruptive damage to the coal chain
may look irreparable, there are a few groups dogging
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and ex-
posing the agency's shady methods for advancing President
Obama's clean power agenda. One of those is the Energy &
Environment Legal Institute (E&E; Legal), headed by Dr. David
Schnare, who is a 33-year veteran of the EPA.
E&E; Legal (www.eelgal.org) is engaged in strategic litiga-
tion, policy research, and public education on important en-
ergy and environmental issues. Primarily through its petition
litigation and transparency practice areas, it seeks to correct
onerous federal and state policies that hinder the economy,
increase the cost of energy, eliminate jobs and do little to improve the environment.
Last month, the E&E; Legal sued the EPA for illegally forming a key science ad-
visory committee — the EPA's Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee Particulate
Matter Review Panel for 2015-2018 (CASAC PM Panel). "The EPA has stacked the
panel, which is required by law to be independent and unbiased, with researchers
who have received more than $190 million in discretionary grants from the EPA,"
said Steve Milloy, an attorney and senior fellow with E&E; Legal. "This clearly vio-
lates the law and makes a mockery of the notion of 'independent' scientific review."
Coal Age readers should know Milloy. A lawyer, he ran the website junkscience.com,
which was dedicated to exposing faulty scientific data and analysis. Today's EPA is a
hotbed of faulty scientific data and analysis.
"We are asking the court to prevent the EPA from convening the panel until the
panel can be formed in a balanced manner in compliance with applicable laws,"
Schnare said.
The EPA's PM2.5 regulations have been a scientifically controversial policy since
the agency began the process of regulating it in the early 1990s. E&E; Legal has said
that, not only has the EPA hidden from public scrutiny the "scientific data" that its
PM2.5 regulation relies on, the agency stacks the legally required CASAC panel with
EPA-paid researchers.
Why is this important to the coal business? The agency's claims about the dangers
related to PM2.5 have been a primary basis for its justification of air quality standards
and the regulations related to the Obama administration's "war on coal," specifically the
Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, Mercury Air Transport Standard and Clean Power Plan.
"Not only does the EPA pay researchers to produce controversial research that
advances its PM2.5 regulatory agenda, but the agency pays the very same research-
ers to review their own controversial work," said Milloy. "Of the 26 members the EPA
selected to be on the CASAC PM Panel, 24 of them have been paid or are currently
being paid by the EPA a total sum in excess of $190 million. The EPA's supposedly
'independent' review process is entirely rigged to advance the EPA's agenda." That
would be an average of about $8 million per panelist of U.S. taxpayer dollars.
Fortunately, watchdog groups like E&E; Legal are exposing and documenting the
underhanded methods this administration used to subvert America's energy policy.
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