The House Science, Space and Technology Committee held a hearing on Thursday and heard testimony from Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Gina McCarthy regarding recent regulatory actions.
Major topics of the hearing included the Clean Power Plan, which the committee surmised would cause more harm than good.
“Over the last year, the Environmental Protection Agency has released some of the most expensive and expansive regulations in its history," U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), the committee's chairman, said. "A glaring example is the president’s Power Plan. This plan is nothing more than a power grab to give the government more control over Americans’ daily lives. Even EPA data shows that this regulation would reduce sea-level rise by only 1/100th of an inch, the thickness of three sheets of paper. This rule represents massive costs without significant benefits. In other words, it’s all pain and no gain.”
In response, McCarthy said the value of the regulation was not utilizing the measurement of decreasing sea or temperature levels. Rather, the aim for the regulation was to show strong domestic action against carbon emissions and to spur global action on climate change.
Later in the hearing, committee members asked why the EPA would not release data that they had used to issue Clean Air Act regulations. McCarthy said privacy concerns necessitated the secrecy of the data.
Alerts Sign-up