Today President Obama unveiled a major new proposal to clean up pollution from the trucking industry – the latest move by his EPA to fight climate change by tightening emissions standards and lowering greenhouse gases.

Without any help from Congress, the Obama administration is largely on track to achieve the near-term reductions we attempted to reach through the Waxman-Markey climate bill, which made it through the House six years ago but was never taken up by the Senate. The President has been waging his cleanup campaign almost singlehandedly, using his authority under the Clean Air Act, which also lies behind the landmark Clean Power Plan coming this summer, his biggest climate achievement to date.

But there’s still a lot to do. The math tells us that we don’t have a choice. The domestic emissions cuts that countries are expected to pledge before the Paris climate talks in December will not deliver the emission reductions needed through 2030 to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. In the most optimistic scenario, we can get about halfway there. We need to do more – and there is more the President can do, under his existing authority, and without Congress.

The Clean Power Plan is the beginning, not the end, of what the Clean Air Act can deliver. This landmark legislation provides numerous paths forward – some of which I helped shape when I was in Congress.

What follows is a blueprint for how this White House, or a future ambitious president, could use the Act to continue the path President Obama has forged.

AVIATION

Airplanes are now one of the fastest-growing carbon pollution sectors and a longstanding sticking point in global discussions. If left unchecked, aviation pollution is expected to double by 2020 and quadruple by 2050. Just this month, EPA confirmed that greenhouse gases from aviation are harmful to public health and welfare.

Unfortunately, in its announcement EPA said it would not move forward with its own policy but instead follow the lead of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the intergovernmental body charged with setting global aviation policy. To date ICAO has been the FIFA of climate negotiations, delaying action to address airlines’ growing greenhouse gas emissions for nearly two decades.

In fact, the best chance for global action is for the U.S. to lead, not follow ICAO – and the Clean Air Act explicitly provides the President with the authority to promulgate a rule to address this pollution in Section 231, which concerns establishment of standards for aircraft emissions.

CARS AND TRUCKS

In addition to aviation, California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard provides a model for dramatically reducing emissions from cars and trucks. California’s standard was announced in 2007 and implemented beginning in 2011, and requires oil refiners and distributers to reduce the carbon intensity of the fuel they sell in California 10 percent by 2020.

The standard can be implemented through the development of low carbon fuel products or buying credits from other companies that produce and sell low carbon fuels. Between 2016 and 2020, it’s estimated that California’s program will cut emission as much as taking over 7.3 million cars off the road. Under the same Clean Air Act provisions that could address aviation pollution, the president could extend this sort of standard across the country. Standards for fuel would work together with the current average fuel economy standards for cars, and today’s actions for trucks, to help transform the ground transportation sector.

INDUSTRY

The Clean Air Act also contains enormous untapped potential in lowering emissions from additional industrial sources – in effect, expanding the goals of the President’s Clean Power Plan outside the electricity generating sector.

Under the Clean Air Act’s existing authority, EPA could pursue regulations that would reduce emissions from fossil fuel combustion at industrial sites such as cement, oil refineries, pulp and paper mills and steel mills. These account for 55 percent of all industrial emissions, and could be addressed in a number of ways. Similar to the flexible implementation options under the Clean Power Plan, these units could be required to cut emissions to a set goal with varying implementation options.

And there are several paths for getting those reductions. One exciting opportunity to reduce industrial emissions is to increase the deployment of combined heat and power (CHP). In traditional systems, a customer purchases electricity from a utility and generates heat on site, which results in the loss of energy during two separate processes. CHP systems allow facilities to generate both power and heat within one system, thereby significantly reducing energy losses and lowering wasteful emissions from unnecessary fossil fuel combustion. The difference is enormous: CHP can reach efficiencies of 75%, while the separate systems can only achieve about 45%. The CHP potential in the US is underdeveloped, representing about 8% of total generation here vs. 30 percent in a bunch of places in Europe.

ONGOING REGULATIONS

To take full advantage of existing executive authority, EPA should set bold and ambitious standards for regulations that are in progress or already under discussion. In November 2014, EPA proposed to lower the ozone limit from 75 parts per billion (ppb) to between 65 – 70 ppb. EPA’s scientific advisory committee recommended lowering it further, to 60-70, to protect public health. A stronger limit would have dramatic public health benefits, but – less well known – would also actually increase the ability of forests to capture and hold carbon by more than 329 million metric tons of in 2030.

In addition, EPA could look hard at the true climate impact of burning biomass as a fuel, which many scientists say when done badly is actually dirtier than coal; and require methane capture from existing oil wells and pipeline, as well as new ones.

And there are other actions the Administration could take. As a new report from the World Resources Institute demonstrates, the Clean Air Act provides powerful authority to reduce emissions from other greenhouse gases, including HFCs, methane, nitric acid, and others.

LOOKING ABROAD

Just through these domestic actions, the United States could exceed the President’s pledge to reduce emissions 26 to 28 percent by 2025. Yet, the fact is that nations can only do so much if they go it alone. The unilateral pledges nations are making for Paris are crucial, but if the world can find a way to truly work together to cut climate pollution, the potential for progress is enormous. Just as the Clean Air Act provides more authority for action than generally understood inside the Beltway, the President has significant authority to negotiate an ambitious global climate agreement and deliver international cooperation.

For example, the President could pledge in Paris that the United States will help developing nations reduce 1 billion tons of climate pollution per year outside U.S. borders by no later than 2020. That is something the President and Secretary of State John Kerry could deliver through bilateral trade, investment and emissions reduction partnerships with strategic allies. These partnerships would create good U.S. jobs and increase exports, while also alleviating international poverty and spurring comparable climate action abroad.

Overall, the President has shown great leadership and a willingness to act unilaterally to create his climate legacy, but there is more that can be done. In this administration and the next, the White House must do everything possible to start closing the massive gap between science and action on climate change.

Executive authority, especially under the Clean Air Act, provides numerous paths for meaningful climate action. It can deliver popular, pro-growth, business-friendly pollution reductions that today are not possible through legislation. That is the legacy of one of our most important laws, and it can shape the legacy of this administration and the next.

Henry A. Waxman spent 40 years serving in the House of Representatives. He served as Chairman and Ranking Member of the Energy & Commerce Committee, and was a lead author of the landmark Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990.



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