Where Has The Other Senator Ayotte Gone? - Granite Grok

Where Has The Other Senator Ayotte Gone?

Obama’s war on coal is netting some unusual suspects as supporters.  New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte, who indicates that she has a history of preventing outside meddling with policy of this nature, voted against a resolution that would have overturned the EPA’s utility MACT rule.

From her Web Site

Continuing New Hampshire’s tradition of protecting the state’s environment through commonsense policies, U.S. Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) announced today that she voted against a Senate measure that would weaken national Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) for power plants aimed at reducing emissions of toxic air pollutants such as mercury, arsenic and metals.

There are a lot of things that are bad for us, and even if you agree that the DC should do something, there are other factors to consider–unless you happen to be a stooge for the Democrat party and the Green movement in which case adding to the bureaucracy is always job number one.

This rule will add costs and threaten the coal industry, which just happens to be at the top of President Obama kill list.  It will probably result in job cuts to that sector, increase energy costs for everyone, and add more hoops and administrative costs, all borne by rate payers, in the midst of a stagnant economy, and for what?

Not much if this is to be believed.

According to its own analysis, the EPA shows that over 99 percent of all benefits from the proposed Utility MACT rule are a product of reducing fine particular matter (PM2.5 ). The EPA has titled Utility MACT the “Mercury and Air Toxics” rule despite the fact that the health benefits will come from the reduction of PM not mercury or hazardous air pollutants (HAPs).

But wait a minute. Doesn’t the EPA already have the power to regulate PM emission levels? It certainly does. Section 108 of the Clean Air Act directs the EPA to set PM emission levels that are “requisite to protect the public health.” (The EPA reevaluates these standards every five years.) In fact, the EPA has already established a national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) for PM emissions. The EPA states that “[over 90 percent] of the PM2.5-related benefits associated with [Utility MACT] occur below the level of the [NAAQS].” The Utility MACT rule is trying to do a job that the Clean Air Act has already done rendering Utility MACT irresponsibly useless.

What Utility MACT does appear to do is give the EPA more authority it did not necessarily need while conveniently advancing the Obama/EPA war on coal.

But even even if it is not an attempt at regulatory overreach, even if it is not part of Obama’s war on coal, it will still weigh heavy on the energy sector, increase costs that affect ratepayers, and cost jobs during a struggling economy on the edge of a double dip.  If I can’t question the Senators judgement on the particulates, how about if I just question it as a matter of timing and priorities?

Even if it is worthwhile legislation, and I don’t think it is, now is not the best time for this.  Isn’t (Utility MACT) something that should have been stopped for the time being as a potential economy choking job killer that could add further costs to the already stressed wallets of Americans?  Couldn’t this wait another year or two until the economy, energy production, and energy costs in general where clearly more manageable for the Average American?  I’d like to think that the Senator Ayotte who went to the DC in 2011 would have agreed that this is not the time to broaden EPA authority for such small gain if it will cost jobs and add further pressure on household budgets.

So have we found the threshold for the infection known as the Georgetown Flu?  Has Senator Ayotte passed over to the Dark Side?  Where is the Kelly Ayotte from 2011?  What has DC done to her?  Or was that other Ayotte just a ruse?

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