BY RACHEL CHEESEMAN
SALEM- Attorney General John Kroger joined with 12 other states Wednesday in an attempt to intervene to support the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulation of industrial greenhouse gas emissions.
“The science is clear. Global climate change harms public health, and the EPA is taking the right approach by focusing on the big sources of pollution,” Kroger said in a press release.
Kroger’s spokesman, Tony Green, said that Kroger felt it important to support the new administration’s approach to environmental policy.
“One of the significant frustrations of the previous administrations was their refusal to recognize the health threats of carbon emissions,” Green said.
The “big sources” to which Kroger refers are large industries like chemical, steel and coal plants that produce large amounts of pollutants like carbon dioxide because of their operations.
Several of these industries filed suit against the EPA, arguing that the Clean Air Act did not give the EPA the authority to regulate carbon emissions.
Other states joining Oregon include neighbors like California and New Mexico, as well as other states across the country like Illinois, Iowa, Maine and New York.
Green said that if the states that have joined in filing the motion to intervene – essentially asking to be a participant in the litigation – are granted their motion, then the states involved will be able to provide their own arguments and evidence in addition to those of the federal government.
“It’s a way of making sure that other views are brought to the court in a formal way rather than filing a friend of the court brief,” Green said.
The states joining together, Green explained, allows them to pool their resources and divide up the responsibilities involved in being a party to a case whether it be writing depositions or doing legal research.
“It makes things a lot more efficient and less expensive,” he said.
