Breaking: Obama asks EPA to withdraw proposed ozone rule

President Barack Obama has asked EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to withdraw the agency’s proposed toughened ozone standards, citing “the importance of reducing regulatory burdens and regulatory uncertainty, particularly as our economy continues to recover.” The President’s statement and EPA’s are below.

These are rules that would provide no health benefits but cost $1 trillion per year in compliance and kill 7.4 million jobs by 2020.

So this is a hugely important victory for American workers and the economy, as well as those of us who have been fighting the EPA’s proposed ozone standards.

In a separate statement, EPA administrator Lisa Jackson says the agency will “revisit” the ozone standard. But that won’t occur until at least 2013 — when, with any luck, she will be able to revisit it from an unemployment line. Continue reading Breaking: Obama asks EPA to withdraw proposed ozone rule

9-11 firefighters at greater cancer risk?

Nope. Despite news reports about this new study in The Lancet, there was no statistically significant association between cancer incidence and (hyper-studied) World Trade Center firefighters. Ten years after the 9-11 horror, it is time to move on from the 9-11 junk science.

Lancet editors miss bogus reference on Japanese longevity and salt intake

Is it too much to ask of medical journal editors to verify references for key claims? After all, just because a study author footnotes a claim, should that act automatically enshrine the claim with credibility? Continue reading Lancet editors miss bogus reference on Japanese longevity and salt intake

Flame retardants reduce infant birthweight?

UC-Berkeley’s anti-flame retardant crusader Brenda Eskenazi is back at it with a new study claiming to link maternal exposure to polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) with reduced infant birth weight. Continue reading Flame retardants reduce infant birthweight?

IBD: Perry vs. Gore

Editorial, Investor’s Business Daily
August 30, 2011

Junk Science: The governor of a state under assault by the EPA takes on the patron saint of climate change over whether “warmers” or “deniers” benefit financially from the debate. Meanwhile, the nation loses. Continue reading IBD: Perry vs. Gore

Conn Carroll: Flood of new EPA rules could drown economic growth

“Seven proposed rules pending before the agency are poised to inflict more than $125 billion in costs on the U.S. economy annually, according to EPA’s own estimates… [and] all of the EPA’s claimed health benefits from CAA regulations are, at best, bureaucratic guesses,” says Washington Examiner senior editorial writer Conn Carroll. Read Carroll’s commentary.

Ozone hurts crop production?

Satellite views of the Midwestern United States show that ozone levels above 50 parts per billion (ppb) along the ground could reduce soybean yields by at least 10 percent, costing more than $1 billion in lost crop production, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientists. Continue reading Ozone hurts crop production?