Statistics Suggest EPA Regs Not Actually Job Killers
Public News Service-WV
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(05/17/12) CHARLESTON, W.Va. - Employment figures suggest that new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) air pollution rules that cut carbon, mercury, and soot are not the job killers they are accused of being. The EPA has been rolling out new air pollution limits under the Clean Air Act. Many of West Virginia's political leaders have attacked the regulations as bad for the economy, but job numbers show that employment has not gone away, it has just moved around.
Joe Mendelsen, policy director of the National Wildlife Federation Climate & Energy program, says Americans can actually have it both ways - if the powers-that-be will allow it. He explains that the Clean Air Act and EPA policies that help the nation transition from dirty energy to clean energy actually do create jobs.
"Just recently, the Bureau of Labor Statistics put out a study that showed that over 3.1 million new jobs have been created through our 'environmental economy,' if you will, and it's growing."
The EPA has been attacked for what the coal industry calls a "war on coal," although the EPA argues the new limits on soot alone will save more than 8,000 lives a year.
A whole host of American jobs go along with clean energy - jobs that cannot be outsourced, he adds - such as those associated with wind turbines. It's not only about making the turbines themselves, he says. Just like the car industry, a vast supply chain is necessary to make the parts that come together to create the turbine.
"Wind-energy facilities don't emit carbon pollution and are good for our climate. There is steel that needs to be made to go into those; there are tool-and-die manufacturers in other facilities that are making the parts that go into those wind turbines; there are people on the ground who are doing the construction jobs."
Employment figures show that Americans can create jobs while also cleaning up the air, making it safer to breathe and improving the health of people and animals for generations to come, Mendelsen says.
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