Bush does a GOOD for environment - Tougher Diesel off road Emission Rules

EPA announced new regulations Monday to significantly reduce emissions from tractors, bulldozers, locomotives, barges and other nonroad vehicles propelled by diesel fuel- Bush actually does a good for the Environment! Next Hell will freeze over!

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/11/politics/11ENVI.html

Tougher Emission Rules Set for Big Diesel Vehicles
By MICHAEL JANOFSKY

ASHINGTON, May 10 — <snip>Michael O. Leavitt, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said after a meeting with President Bush that the regulations would be made official on Tuesday, setting in motion a plan for full compliance by 2012.

The new regulations require refineries to produce cleaner-burning diesel fuel and engine makers to cut diesel emissions by more than 90 percent, a reduction that health experts say could prevent as many as 12,000 premature deaths and 15,000 heart attacks every year.

<snip>The new regulations, the first for this group of vehicles, were developed through years of collaboration among environmental groups, public health advocates, engine makers and fuel refineries. Representatives from all of the groups said the adoption of the new standards reflected an extraordinary, and unusual, willingness of the E.P.A. to listen to everybody.<snip>

Phil Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust, which has battled the White House on other environmental issues, said the new regulations placed the biggest financial burden on two companies that make a variety of diesel-powered engines, Cummins and Caterpillar. But because one company, Cummins, is based in Indiana, a state Mr. Bush is sure to win in the November election, and the other in Illinois, which Mr. Bush will probably lose, Mr. Bush is not likely to suffer any adverse consequences, Mr. Clapp said.

Further, he predicted, the new standards will become "the poster child to create the image that the administration is strongly pursuing dangerous air pollutants."<snip>

The only decent environmental proposal ChimpCo has offered in 3.5 years.

It's a good idea, but we'll see what happens when the campaign contributors put in their two cents' worth. I smell "administrative delays" and "temporary suspensions" in the air, along with the diesel fumes.

Say, in the case of a national emergency, like another war or two, another terrorist attack or two.

Go ahead. Re-elect him. See what happens.

Then, the media will latch onto those, and completely ignore the thousand ways in which they've raped our environmental policies. Anyone who tries to point this out will be accused of blatant liberal bias, being a tree-hugger, and maybe of aiding terrorism for good measure.

Once we have low sulfur diesel fuel (2006), diesel vehicles can be built with modern emissions treatments (like Europe has been doing for years). These treatment systems can reduce NOx emissions by 90 percent on their own, without having to monkey with the fuel at the refinery. Such systems will also allow for increased biodiesel usage (lower emissions rates for *every* other tailpipe pollutant except NOx, compared to petrodiesel), with no net increase in NOx emissions from diesels.

I'd be more impressed if he did *anything* to help relieve pollution in more populated areas (not much off-road diesel use in the city). I realize any step in the right direction is worthwhile, but for a journey of a thousand miles, this is only one step. There's a *long* way yet to go...

suggesting that the increase in particulate matter in the air might be responsible for about 20% of the disappearance of snow and ice at high latitudes and altitudes.

The theory is that particulate precipitation on white snow and ice darkens the surface of those substances, thus increasing the heat trapped on the surface and not reflected back into the atmosphere. The analogy would be the big difference in temperature in the summer sun between black asphalt and any light-colored surface.

If NASA is right, this could be the start of a helpful trend. Now if it could be spread to those other nasty heavy-duty diesels on the road, like long-distance trucks and noxious city buses, and to the world at large, we might really have something positive going on several fronts.