Disapproval of EPA Emission Standards Rule--Motion to Proceed--

Floor Speech

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Mr. LIEBERMAN. Madam President, I rise today in strong opposition to Senator Inhofe's resolution of disapproval concerning the Environmental Protection Agency's mercury and air toxics rule. If passed, this resolution would have a devastating impact on our decades-long effort to clean up the air Americans breathe, and it would betray the responsible utility managers who have already taken steps to reduce the mercury and air toxics entering our atmosphere.

As I approach the end of my Senate career, I have spent some time reflecting on my past votes and the legacy I hope to leave behind. The debate before us today brings me back to my very first years in the Senate and an effort that has continued throughout my entire time here.

In 1990, I was part of the group of members of the Senate EPW Committee and the administration of President George H.W. Bush who negotiated and passed the Clean Air Act Amendments. At the time, the need for this legislation was painfully clear--acid rain was eating paint off of cars, and thick, visible smog blanketed too many of our cities. Some wanted Congress to turn a blind eye, but we did not. We acted, and we acted together.

During those many weeks, we met daily to reach a bipartisan agreement that would put our country on the path to cleaner air. It was the leadership of majority leader George Mitchell and President Bush's representatives, including Boyden Gray, that led us to a grand bargain. Because all of the parties negotiated in good faith toward a common goal, the Clean Air Act Amendments were adopted in an October 1990 vote by an 89-to-10 margin. Think about that: 89 votes in favor of one of the most significant environmental law changes in our history. I regret that such a broad bipartisan agreement in support of our environment will not be repeated this week.

Now, in the final year of my Senate career, we are debating a resolution that seeks to undo one of the provisions that we worked so hard to pass as part of the Clean Air Act Amendments in my first term in office--a requirement that EPA issue standards to reduce emissions of air toxics from stationary sources. That was 22 years ago, but it was only February of this year that EPA finally published the rule that would implement these standards. Administrator Lisa Jackson and Assistant Administrator Gina McCarthy, who served so ably as Connecticut's commissioner of the Department of Environmental Protection, have brought us a rule that will finally put in place the mercury and air toxics restrictions we have been waiting for.

This resolution would roll back that rule, the first-ever national limits on powerplant emissions of air toxics, including mercury. Without this rule, powerplant operators can continue pumping dozens of tons of mercury and hundreds of thousands of tons of other toxic air pollutants into our air each year.

Many of my colleagues have spoken to the extensive health and environmental rationale behind the mercury and air toxics rule, so I will just highlight a few of the most startling statistics. One in twelve American women of childbearing age has mercury blood levels that would put their fetuses at risk for impaired development. These developmental impairments are a human tragedy, denying children their full intellectual and psychological potential.

With respect to the environment, just look at Connecticut. We are blessed by natural beauty--rolling hills, beautiful beaches, vast forests, and flowing streams and rivers. Unfortunately, every single body of water--every lake, stream, river, and pond--in the State of Connecticut has a mercury advisory in place. Where do we think this came from? It was not here before the advent of polluting powerplants spewing mercury into the air. We are blessed by plentiful fresh water, but that gift has been tainted by the mercury that has been spewed into the air over generations. Even in Long Island Sound, one of America's greatest estuaries, we are faced with a restriction on which seafood we can eat. One of the best fish in the sound--the bluefish--is off limits to us because of mercury. Is this the legacy we want to leave our children?

Of course, this debate should not be about which fish we can or cannot eat, it should be about following through on a promise we made to the American people in 1990, by a margin of 89 to 10, that we would move forward on efforts to reduce air toxics being emitted by powerplants. If we pass this resolution, we would break that promise.

Some of my colleagues may claim that the mercury rule is an attack on coal. To them I would say: This is nothing of the sort. This rule would actually save money and save lives. It would save between $37 billion and $90 billion a year in health benefits while creating 54,000 jobs. It would prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths and 130,000 cases of childhood asthma attacks each year. This is a case of government protecting its citizens with a commonsense rule to require widely available pollution control systems be installed at our powerplants.

I want to close by once again urging my colleagues not to break our promise we made to the American people in 1990 that the U.S. Government would do everything in its power to ensure the American people had clean air to breathe and to reduce dangerous pollutants in order to give our children the chance to grow up healthy. I urge my colleagues to vote no on this resolution.

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