Bush admin seeks boost in '04 environment spending
Date: 31-Jan-03
Country: USA
Author: Charles Abbott
The administration's so-called Clear Skies initiative is opposed by environmental groups and some Democrats, who say it would set weaker controls and push deadlines for cutting pollution farther into the future.
Proposed nearly one year ago, the administration's so-called Clear Skies initiative aims for a 70 percent reduction in mercury, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides over a decade, 35 million tons in all. It would allow companies to trade pollution rights to achieve their emission targets.
The proposal, which is supported by the power industry, stalled in Congress last year.
Whitman joined Interior Secretary Gale Norton and Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman in unveiling environmental initiatives that will be part of the president's fiscal 2004 budget request to Congress. The proposed budget was scheduled for release on Monday.
Some $7.7 in additional funding will be proposed for implementing the power plant emissions program, Whitman told reporters. The program would use a "cap and trade" system already employed to reduce acid rain pollutants.
"We know the cap-and-trade approach in Clear Skies works," she said.
Whitman said the program offers a shorter route to cleaner air than the delays that would come from protracted lawsuits over pollution or slow-moving regulatory changes.
Power companies will have "a very refined understanding of the targets they have to reach" under the Clear Skies initiative, she said, which would clear the way for investment in pollution control equipment.
Critics say the White House plan doesn't go far enough to curb emissions which can aggravate medical conditions such as asthma, chronic bronchitis and pneumonia.
"The president's plan would permit more pollution for longer periods of time than under current law," said Frank O'Donnell, executive director of the Clean Air Trust, an activist group. "It is really a plan crafted by the biggest polluters to help get them off the hook."
INCREASE IN FIRE BUDGET
At the Interior Department, Norton said a $45 million, or 7 percent, increase would be requested for its fire budget.
Norton linked the money to a White House proposal to thin tree stands in national forests to reduce fire risks. That plan is opposed by environmental groups as a way to open national forests to logging under the guise of fire prevention.
"Since entering office two years ago, President Bush has led a sustained assault on the solid framework that protects our air and water, safeguards national parks and improves public health," said Brent Blackwelder, president of Friends of the Earth.
Veneman said she would unveil key components of Agriculture Department soil and water stewardship programs during a speech to cattle producers yesterday. Funding should rise by about $500 million from 2003, according to estimates earlier this year by the Congressional Budget Office.
Last year's farm policy law called for a vast increase in USDA funding for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, which shares with farmers the cost of controlling manure and runoff from farm fields.
EQIP was earmarked for $800 million in fiscal 2004, compared to $200 million in 2002. Veneman said her speech would include release of new EQIP rules.