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For 37 farm workers in the Central Valley of California, the US policy of Scott Pruitt, head of the Environmental Protection Agency, became personal soon after May 2017. [19659002] deriving from a neighboring orchard. Mouths and lips tingled or became numb. The gorges have become dry. Soon, some workers were vomiting and collapsing.
Officials in Kern County, where the workers became ill, concluded that fishermen were reacting to a pesticide, chlorpyrifos, poorly applied in the neighboring orchard
. In one of his first acts at the EPA, Pruitt had overturned an Obama-era initiative to ban all food crops from the pesticide, which damages the brain and nervous system of fetuses and young children and was banned as a killer of critters. since 2001.
Although the new prohibition did not come into effect at the time of the Central Valley incident, the action of Pruitt has delayed any further consideration aimed at prohibiting the killer of critters on food crops at least until 2022. Chlorpyrifos is crucial for agriculture, and the farms that use it need "regulatory certainty," said the government. Pruitt's EPA announcing its decision of March 2017, using an expression that would become a word of order for its business-friendly environment.
In all, the Trump administration targeted at least 45 environmental rules, including 25 at the EPA, according to a trackback tracker from the Harvard Law School's Energy and Environment Program. The changes to the EPA rules would affect the regulation of air, water and climate change, and transform the way EPA makes its regulatory decisions.
Pruitt, who resigned Thursday after months of ethical scandals officials and the environmental group predict that his proposed cuts will be vulnerable to court challenges.
"The world is focusing on Pruitt and his indiscretions, but they are tiny when we look at the impact of this change" on decision-making, said Chris Zarba, who resigned this year as coordinator of two scientific advisory committees of the agency.
He was referring to allegations, now subject to several federal investigations, regarding Pruitt's travel and security expenses, including a $ 43,000 soundproof phone. and claims that he abused his office for personal gain, including looking for a fast food franchise for his wife.
"These are not phone booths and Chick-wire-A questions," Zarba said. Lincoln Ferguson, spokesman for the EPA, defended the agency's work under Pruitt's leadership, although some of Ferguson's work has been largely done in previous administrations.
Superfund sites are being cleaned up at a higher rate than under President Obama, and the federal government is investing more money to improve water infrastructure than ever before, "said the spokesman. EPA word in a statement The EPA has refused to make an official available to speak directly about Pruitt's policy initiatives
Among Pruitt's actions and proposals:
Change
Donald Trump, who called climate change an "expensive hoax" before his election, said last summer that the United States would pull out of the global Paris deal on reducing climate change emissions from coal-fired power plants and other sources
Pruitt, for his part, said I believe humans are one of the main causes of climate change. [19659002] Pruitt a offic it was proposed in October the repeal of an Obama era rule aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired power plants and other fossil fuels. coal and gas policies. "The war on coal is over," Pruitt told Kentucky coal miners
. The Obama rule would have reduced emissions from power stations by a third. The Obama administration has forecast that it would prevent up to 6,600 premature deaths a year from air pollution.
Clean Air
Pruitt's other proposals regarding clean air include allowing body builders with older diesel engines that were built before the more severe pollution standards. He described the ban by the Obama administration on dirty truck engines of over-regulation that "threatened to end a whole industry of specialized truck manufacturers."
refitted trucks would be responsible for up to 1,600 premature deaths each year because of soot alone
Clean Water
Pruitt has suspended a version of the l & # 39; Obama's era of a rule that ultimately governs farmers, ranchers and business people must do to protect the water flowing through their property to lakes, oceans and bays.
The United States Waters Rule has an impact on the water supply for people and wildlife. Pruitt, who had not yet publicly released his rewritten version of the rule when he resigned, told Nebraska farmers that his version would bring clarity and regulatory reform. "That's how you save $ 1 billion," he added.
Americans are already living with slowdowns and cuts in environmental regulations, said Elizabeth Southerland, who resigned last year.
"Everyone in the country is now exposed to continuing pollution, future environmental crises, because many of them are being repealed," said Southerland
Science
Industrial and commercial representation on panels that advise the EPA. Other changes Pruitt have called for better consideration of the costs of environmental rules. And a major change in Pruitt would allow EPA policy makers to consider only studies for which all underlying data is available.
Proponents say these changes broaden the decision making of the EPA and make it more transparent. the change could throw the kind of public health studies of several decades, using confidential information about patients, which led to a historical regulation of air pollutants and other threats.
Pesticides
Pruitt also suspended or slowed action on other regulations that were started but not completed during the Obama administration, as with chlorpyrifos.
Chlorpyrifos used as a steer provides "wide margins of protection for human health and safety," said Gregg M. Schmidt, spokesperson for DowDupont Inc., the pesticide manufacturer.
Industries stated that the Pruitt EPA gives commercial and economic impacts the consideration and input that past administrations have long denied them.
"It's all about finding the right balance, where we can continue to make significant progress in protecting the environment and health while continuing to benefit from the Economy, "said Mike Walls, vice president of regulatory and technical affairs. "The fact that the industry has more adversaries in its government, and especially at the EPA, is a huge step forward in common sense regulation," he said. Ashley Burke of the National Mining Association. Members of the mining group include coal companies, which are expected to benefit from Pruitt's proposed setbacks of Obama-era initiatives on fossil fuel power plants and the disposal of toxic coal ash.
A Retreat
Pruitt put on hold the Obama administration's attempt to ban the consumer sales of paint strippers containing the methylene chloride compound. But he changed course in May after meeting dead families after using a paint stripper.
Brian Wynne, brother of Drew, 31, is grateful. But if Pruitt's EPA had never followed the rule, Brian Wynne think methylene chloride was perhaps already out of the stores in the fall of 2017, when his brother went into a housewares store in South Carolina to buy strippers. the floor of his cold coffee company. Drew Wynne was found dead last October, killed by methylene chloride, according to the coroners.
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