Ozone Standards Implementation Act of 2016

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chair, I rise to offer an amendment to the Ozone Standards Implementation Act of 2016 that would ensure that the environment and human health aspects are protected. The amendment states that if the EPA Administrator, in consultation with the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, finds that application of any provision of this act could harm human health or the environment, the Ozone Standards Implementation Act shall cease to apply.

The Ozone Standards Implementation Act puts our children, communities, and environment at extreme risk simply to benefit private corporations rather than to look at what the act could do to people. It weakens implementation and enforcement of the Clean Air Act's essential air pollution health standards, further delays reductions in smog pollution, and expands the very definition of ``exceptional events'' to include high pollution days when communities exclude certain extreme events, like wildfires, in determining whether their air quality meets national standards. The bill also takes health and medical science out of the process.

My amendment ensures that we will fulfill the purpose of the Clean Air Act and continue the progress we have made over the past 46 years. One fact pointed out by the Statement of Administration Policy is that the ``emissions of key pollutants have decreased by nearly 70 percent while the economy has tripled in size.'' This proves that we can both improve the environment and still grow our domestic economy.

Right now, just to cite my own district as an example, 17,000 children in the District of Columbia have pediatric asthma and over 115,000 children and teens in the District are at risk of health implications from smog. Our health and future depend on the Clean Air Act, but the Ozone Standards Implementation Act will put us right back where we were before 1970.

I urge the adoption of my amendment.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, part of the problem is, perhaps, that EPA has never requested this particular advice from CASAC. My amendment would make it clear that Congress wants the EPA to do so. Yes, I made clear that there had been improvements in air quality, despite the fact that our own industry, our own economic growth has tripled. Would anybody say that we are now where we want to be?

We do not want, at this point of progress, to countermand the progress we have made. We should be building on that progress. No one, I think, in the world today--and certainly in the United States--would say we have finally reached where we want to be. The improvements are not nearly enough. We need to go much more rapidly. We certainly don't need to be retrograde at this point in history when the whole world now is looking at this very issue and seeking to improve.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. NORTON. Mr. Chairman, we should all be grateful to the authors of the Clean Air Act for the progress we have achieved. The way to express our gratitude is to use an occasion like this to expand, not to retract, that act.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source