An Inconvenient Truth & Who Killed the Electric Car - Beyond Tiki

S Swanky Tiki Socialite Hapa Haole Hideaway, Knoxville, TN Joined: Apr 03, 2002 Posts: 5398	S Swanky Posted posted on Thu, Jul 20, 2006 10:04 AM On 2006-07-20 09:43, donhonyc wrote: I can pretty much guarantee that Karl Rove and people like him don't wake up in the morning and wonder what they can do to clean up the environment. Well as Al Franken says, the Bush Administration's 'Clear Skies Initiative' was enacted to "clear the sky of birds". Indeed. That initiative would have done several bad things. First, it would have rolled back the standards and allowed more polluting than now is in force. More importantly, a lot of the oldest, largest and most polluting plants have been allowed to continue without being retrofitted with scrubbers, etc. and thus they pollute like crazy. The Bush plan would have allowed these plants to never come up to standards. As things were, those plants had to come up to standards at some point, and if there had a major overhaul of the plant, the upgrades were required. The Bush plan would have ended that. Great for these big businesses. These are the top 1% of polluting plants in the US. Plants that measure their pollution in tons per hour. They had been given a ride to allow them time to make the changes over the last decade. The Bush plan would have given them no reason to ever change. It may cost lots of money to make the changes, but you know what, we all will have to have electricity and they can raise rates a few pennies and it'll get paid for. It's not as though I am going to opt out of the power grid over it. Bush also pushed to scrap plans to include Mercury and CO2 as pollutants that EPA would measure and require control of. They like to say something about how CO2 is what we breathe. Nice. And that Coke you are drinking has carbonates in it! Yikes!

On 2006-07-20 09:43, donhonyc wrote:

I can pretty much guarantee that Karl Rove and people like him don't wake up in the morning and wonder what they can do to clean up the environment.

Well as Al Franken says, the Bush Administration's 'Clear Skies Initiative' was enacted to "clear the sky of birds".

Indeed. That initiative would have done several bad things. First, it would have rolled back the standards and allowed more polluting than now is in force. More importantly, a lot of the oldest, largest and most polluting plants have been allowed to continue without being retrofitted with scrubbers, etc. and thus they pollute like crazy. The Bush plan would have allowed these plants to never come up to standards. As things were, those plants had to come up to standards at some point, and if there had a major overhaul of the plant, the upgrades were required. The Bush plan would have ended that. Great for these big businesses. These are the top 1% of polluting plants in the US. Plants that measure their pollution in tons per hour. They had been given a ride to allow them time to make the changes over the last decade. The Bush plan would have given them no reason to ever change. It may cost lots of money to make the changes, but you know what, we all will have to have electricity and they can raise rates a few pennies and it'll get paid for. It's not as though I am going to opt out of the power grid over it. Bush also pushed to scrap plans to include Mercury and CO2 as pollutants that EPA would measure and require control of. They like to say something about how CO2 is what we breathe. Nice. And that Coke you are drinking has carbonates in it! Yikes!

Post #244104 by Swanky on Thu, Jul 20, 2006 10:04 AM