Reply #75: Powerful Energy Lobbying Group ALEC Writing Anti-Climate Legislation in 16 States (March 2010) [View All]

There is anti-EPA legislation metastasizing in 15 (and now 16) US states, aimed at ending the Obama administration’s backstop use of the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

Within months of the December EPA rulings on greenhouse gases, the bubbling up of all these state level initiatives would appear to be spontaneous eruptions of righteous local anger at supposed “job-killing” proposals – but in fact they have been centrally coordinated. All these state resolutions have almost identical language.

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is literally writing the anti-EPA legislation for these states! The basic resolution opposing the EPA endangerment ruling being adopted in the 15 states was drafted by ALEC’s Natural Resources Task Force.

The powerful and very effective lobbying group receives one third of its support from 10 energy companies, including Exxon, Chevron, Amoco, Shell, and Texaco. Energy industry groups such as Koch Industries, American Petroleum Institute, and the American Electric Power Association pay dues of up to $50,000 a year to support industry-friendly legislation for the fossil energy industry.