The EPA: Out of control policing

July 25, 2011: Alaskans have learned to expect consistent behavior from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) when it comes to resource development; consistently bad.

The EPA has single-handedly shutdown offshore oil exploration off Alaska's North Slope while forcing Shell Oil to endure costly delays and they've sidelined efforts to explore for oil in the National Petroleum Reserve Alaska by preventing Conoco Phillips from building a bridge over the Colville River to access oil leases they own.

As they say, things can only get worse.

The EPA will soon decide on whether to unilaterally impose a more stringent national standard for air quality, despite concerns that doing so will violate our own federal Clean Air Act. In 2008, the Bush administration lowered the ozone standard to 75 parts per billion (ppb), down from 84 ppb. The current proposal from the EPA would lower the standard to 60 to 70 ppb.

According to the EPA's own estimates, the change in policy could cost the economy as much as $90 billion annually by 2020. In addition to forcing companies to install new emission equipment and burn costlier fuel, some critics argue the EPA's estimate is actually too conservative because it is predicated on technology that hasn't been invented yet.

The regulation change regarding ozone would kill domestic jobs and stunt economic growth, immediately placing large swaths of the country into non-compliance with the new standard, without producing any real improvement in air quality, according to experts.

In fact, the private sector wouldn't be the only one impacted. State and local governments that find themselves out of compliance, would be forced to shift the costs of bringing government owned facilities into compliance to taxpayers. 

With unemployment at 9.2% and an economy on the verge of stumbling back into recession, President Obama needs to think twice about enacting senseless, punitive regulations that cost Americans jobs and hurt the economy. 

Alaska's Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Sen. Mark Begich have called EPA on the carpet for wreaking havoc on Alaska's economy and have urged them to reconsider these proposed changes. 

An open and transparent discussion over air quality is important, however a government agency unilaterally changing standards without regards for the economy is a huge mistake and will harm Alaska's resource development dependent economy.