President Obama’s announced halt to the EPA’s proposal to strengthen ozone standards is problematic, but does not necessarily indicate (as some fear) that the administration is caving on its entire environmental agenda.

The move is, however, likely to bolster the “environment vs. jobs” rhetoric that has been used by many on the right against recent EPA public health protections. If other regulations fall under that political steamroller, the country stands to lose billions in public health benefits that can be achieved at minimal costs. The President needs to make sure that doesn’t happen.

The cost-benefit analysis of the proposed ozone standard provided a large range of costs and benefits, due in part to the structure of the Clean Air Act, which leaves implementation of the air quality standards to the states. EPA estimated that the cost of the rule would have been between $19 billion and $90 billion, while benefits would have been worth anywhere from $13 billion to $100 billion. Ultimately, the agency found that the benefits would likely have outweighed the costs.

EPA estimated that the rule would have prevented up to 34,000 premature deaths, 15,000 nonfatal heart attacks, 19,000 cases of acute bronchitis, 400,000 cases of aggravated asthma, and 1.8 million sick days per year, beginning in 2014. Many of those benefits would arise because actions to reduce smog will also reduce soot. Industry argues that these co-benefits shouldn’t count. But if we count secondary negative effects of pollution control—which of course, industry favors—we should count the positive secondary effects as well.

But there is another problem: anti-regulatory factions and their supporters in the GOP may view President Obama’s decision to back down on smog as a signal that their massive public relations push against stronger environmental protections is working. The environmental community has also become deeply disheartened, with some fearing that the President is walking away from his environmental commitments to please swing voters who are more focused on the economy.

If this political dynamic threatens other EPA rules, such as those controlling mercury emissions from power plants, it would be a massive loss for the American public. The cost-benefit analysis on ozone is a relatively close call; that is not the case with these other rules. Those rules together will generate benefits to public health and the environment that far exceed the costs. Failure to adopt them would be a massive waste of social resources—they represent the easy cases where environmental protection has massive bang for the buck.

After the President’s announcement, it was immediately clear that anti-regulatory forces have no intention to rest on their laurels—they have identified a hit list of major environmental rules that they want to take out. These efforts must be resisted strongly by the President.

Up to this point, President Obama’s most important environmental accomplishment has been to back an EPA Administrator who has used her powers to expand important public health protections. The ozone standard was, in many ways, an imperfect test of his support for EPA: the cost-benefit analysis margin was thin and uncertain, and there was an easy escape hatch with the 2013 re-evaluation, which limited the effect of this one decision. The case for other air quality rules that are in the pipeline is much easier. In the coming political fight, it will be his willingness and ability to protect these rules that will ultimately prove President Obama’s environmental mettle.

In a statement released this past Friday, President Obama announced his administration will not pursue an early revision of the Ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards. Rather, the President is instructing the EPA to take up ozone standards in 2013 on its normal 5-year timeline.If implemented, a new ozone rule would have placed hundreds of U.S. counties in danger of ozone non-attainment, limiting opportunities for economic growth and jeopardizing federal funding to those counties.

I applaud President Obama's decision to delay these rules, and his understanding that state and local governments should not be burdened with implementing a new standard that would be reconsidered in two years. The president's decision is in line with his January Executive Order to conduct regulatory review of rules that "place unreasonable burdens on business that have stifled innovation and have had a chilling effect on growth and jobs."

To be sure, in these tough economic times the delay of new EPA standards that could smother economic recovery is a victory for consumers and businesses. It is perhaps a signal that the voices of Americans concerned about EPA's overreach are being heard.

But in the vein of that same Executive Order, there is still much work to be done.

Despite frequent and outspoken criticism from consumer groups and manufacturers, the EPA continues to move forward with the most costly regulations in its history like the Cross State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) and Utility Maximum Achievable Control Technology (MACT).

In the wake of yet another bleak jobs report, the president and Congress will continue to debate ways to boost the economy and put hard-working Americans back to work. And yet the EPA continues to pass regulations that will stifle job creation, further cripple the economy, and threaten the reliability of our electricity capacity.

While improved public health is an admirable goal, it's important to pursue solutions that also foster economic health and job growth. Reconsidering excessive regulation is part of that solution, and I hope the president will move to repeal CSAPR and Utility MACT before it's too late.

This week, in advance of the president's highly anticipated jobs speech, the American Petroleum Institute released a statement estimating that the fossil fuel industry could create more than a million jobs if only the government would open public lands, beaches, oceans -- probably even our bathtubs, if we let them -- to unlimited oil drilling. That generous offer came on the heels of President Obama pulling the rug out from under the EPA and delaying desperately needed smog protections -- listing concern for the economy as his reason.

The "jobs versus environment" argument is a rhetorical crutch for polluters, but it's also pure economic nonsense. And a costly bit of nonsense at that: The damages aren't figurative but real -- had the EPA smog pollution regulations come into effect as anticipated, it would have prevented 12,000 deaths, 5,300 heart attacks, and tens of thousands asthma attacks. It is time we stop pitting the false promise of jobs from a desperate -- albeit wealthy and powerful -- industry against the best interests of the American people.

A report this week by Democratic staff of the House Natural Resources Committee clarifies Big Oil's role in our fragile economy:

• Despite generating $546 billion in profits between 2005 and 2010, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP combined reduced their U.S. workforce by 11,200 employees.
• Even with these job losses, the top five oil companies paid their senior executives a total of nearly $220 million in 2010.
• Meanwhile, taxpayers will hand out nearly $100 billion in tax breaks and loopholes to oil and gas companies in the coming decades.

The EPA estimates that it would have cost operators of polluting power plants $25 billion to implement the quashed smog rule, but the economic benefits would have been $37 billion -- a net gain of $12 billion for the American economy. But the dismal science of economics misses other benefits that hit closer to home -- for example, the American parents whose children with asthma would survive their next emergency room visit, or whose baby wouldn't have developed respiratory disease in the first place. We can quantify monetary savings, but we ultimately know that a just society cannot tolerate the poisoning of our children.

Big Oil is taking shots at the green economy because it threatens their unrivaled political and economic power. A report by the Brookings Institute -- which, unlike the API, doesn't exist solely lobby for the oil industry -- is anything by pessimistic about the green economy's potential for job creation. "Sizing the Clean Economy: A National and Regional Green Jobs Assessment" concludes that:

• Today the clean economy employs 2.7 million American workers across a diverse group of industries, which is greater than the number of people employed by the entire fossil fuel industry.
• Clean-tech has produced explosive job gains in the past year, outperforming the national rate of job creation during the recession.
• The clean economy offers more opportunities and better pay (13% higher) for low- and middle-skilled workers than the national economy as a whole.
• The green jobs revolution is at work around the nation -- the South has the largest number of clean economy jobs in total, while the West has the largest share relative to its population.

Our nation is poised to enter an era where we can take it for granted that protecting public health and providing stable, high-paying jobs are one and the same. Big Oil has recognized a threat to their domination of American economics and politics, and they have begun turning their attention to destroying the clean economy. And with actions like delaying smog standards, President Obama, unfortunately, is lending a hand.

Americans know better than to take the oil industry's word on the economy. Big Oil has been controlling gas prices while undercutting conservation and alternative energy projects for decades. We don't need to choose between public health and the environment on one hand and jobs and the economy on the other. We expect our president to reject Big Oil's poisonous rhetoric.

President Obama’s request to delay setting the ozone health standard until 2013 is beyond comprehension. His Administration just spent the past two years reconsidering the Bush era standard and now the President’s decision to ask the EPA to rescind their recommendation and wait another two years is not only disheartening, it’s reckless and puts the lives of millions of Americans in jeopardy.

The American Lung Association does not intend to take President Obama’s decision to maintain an out-of-date standard for an additional two years sitting down. Our organization remains committed to advocating on behalf of those that suffer from the severe physical consequences of unregulated pollution on a daily basis- particularly those most at risk including children, older adults, and people who suffer from chronic lung diseases. The profits reaped by corporate interests come at a huge cost- breathing smog-polluted air can lead to coughing and wheezing, restricted airways, hospitalization and even death. We intend to revive litigation with the Administration, which was suspended following numerous assurances that the Administration was going to complete this reconsideration and obey the law.

Despite scientific recommendations and court verdicts citing the ineffectiveness and illegality, a standard of 84 ppb, established in 1997, remains in place. Following a recommendation of 75 ppb in 2008 by the Bush Administration, the EPA spent several years “reconsidering” the ozone standard and determined that 75 ppb failed to protect public health, failed to follow the scientific community’s recommendations, and was legally indefensible. Furthermore, in reconsidering the 2008 decision, EPA had to limit its review of the standard to scientific evidence as it stood in 2006. Evidence accumulating since 2006 shows what scientists told this EPA and, by translation, the President that ozone is harmful at levels well below the current standard. Having reviewed the EPA proposal the president now knows that the current standard is not protective enough, but he is asking the EPA to cover that knowledge up.

While the President may have deflected some criticism from the business community, his decision is not in line with the views of the public. A bipartisan poll of likely 2012 voters that we released in June 2011 found that an overwhelming majority support the EPA’s efforts to strengthen rules on ozone-causing pollution. The poll found that 75 percent of voters support stricter limits on ozone. The poll also found that 65 percent of the voters do not agree with the industry’s claim that the stricter smog standard will impact jobs. In fact, 54 percent rightly believe that a new standard will create jobs through innovation.

The failure to implement a more protective ozone health standard undoubtedly puts the lives and health of millions of Americans in question, and in doing so, is a violation of the Clean Air Act which requires the EPA to take measures to safeguard public health. We think President Obama’s decision was wrong, illegal and we intend to ask the courts to compel the Administration to set a protective health standard.

President Obama’s decision to delay revisions to federal ozone standards—a move which EPA’s own analysis priced between $20 and $90 billion—was one of self-preservation heading into a re-election campaign while job creation ranks as the top concern among voters. With unemployment above 9 percent and a tenuous short-term economic outlook from the Federal Reserve, it’s a political liability to institute rules which hamper the ability of American businesses to grow and generate new employment opportunities.

The EPA has been touting the proposed ozone rule and many of its other regulations as job creators. In fact, the agency recently released a cost-benefit analysis indicating that existing regulations under the Clean Air Act would add $1.75 trillion to the economy by 2020—nearly 10 percent of projected U.S. GDP. Any policy which could deliver such a boon to America’s economy would certainly be coveted amongst Presidential candidates. To date the American people haven’t bought the line that regulations are the key to 21st Century job creation.

That means the White House’s decision to delay the rule due to economic concerns (specifically, “the importance of reducing regulatory burdens and regulatory uncertainty, particularly as our economy continues to recover”) translates to a tacit rejection of the agency’s economic impact methodology. In short, the President doesn’t want to add $90 billion to the nation’s regulatory bill with his anemic record of job creation and bold record of regulatory overreach.

If President Obama is truly committed to reducing regulatory burdens and regulatory uncertainty, he shouldn’t stop at ozone. There are many more regulations by EPA, NLRB, FCC, etc. that need to be pulled.

Though regulations already cost businesses and consumers hundreds of billions of dollars, we’re trending toward increasing rather than ameliorating that burden. The Dodd-Frank financial legislation alone has added more than 24 million new paperwork hours to the burden faced by U.S. companies and individuals. A newly published NLRB final rule on union notification rights could easily impose more than $386 million in costs for businesses and more than 12 million compliance hours. And regulators have more than 4,000 new regulations pending at the federal level.

Perhaps the biggest takeaway from President Obama’s decision last Friday is the notable omission of all of the other pricey unfunded mandates that won’t create jobs or translate into the broader economic growth he so desperately needs for his reelection bid.

The fact that President Obama had to direct his Environmental Protection Agency to delay its proposed ozone NAAQS illustrates just how ideological and myopic the agency has become. Regulators lacked compelling reason or legal requirement to issue a new rule before 2013, when the ozone standard will come up for its 5-year review required by the Clean Air Act. Moreover, the proposed revision would have been the costliest environmental regulation ever issued.

EPA’s proposal would have tightened the federal standard for ozone, moving from its current level of 0.075 parts per million (ppm) to somewhere in the range of 0.060 to 0.070 ppm. According to the agency’s own calculation, 96 percent of U.S. counties would fail to meet such a threshold—including the pristine Yellowstone National Park. And when EPA deems a region in “non-attainment,” individuals face thousands of dollars in fines and states risk losing billions in federal funding.

What does it take for an area to reach the current threshold? Just consider Wichita. As John Merline over at Investor’s Business Daily reported:

Few would think of this south-central city in Kansas as having a big smog problem. But under current standards it’s now one day away from breaching the EPA’s standard for ozone, the main ingredient in smog.

That’s because the city’s 4th of July fireworks pushed its ozone levels over the EPA limit for the third day this year. One more violation and it could find itself forced to produce an EPA-approved smog-cutting plan that would, as the Wichita Eagle reported, “cost taxpayers and businesses millions of dollars.”

According to a Manufacturers Alliance (MAPI) study, EPA’s proposed standard would have cost over 7 million jobs in less than a decade and would have reduced GDP by $676.8 billion in 2020. Even if these impacts could be shown to be over stated by a factor of two, 3.5 million jobs and $500 billion annually are still very large numbers.

Over the past 22 years, regulators have reduced the ozone standard by nearly 40 percent, from 0.12 ppm to the current level of 0.075 ppm. We’ve witnessed dramatic reductions in air pollution in that time, with ozone falling by more than 20 percent. With each reduction, subsequent ones become more difficult and more expensive.

It’s a classic case of diminishing returns. For example, ozone is a byproduct of nitrogen oxides (NOx). While it took a more than 400,000 ton drop in NOx to lower ozone levels from 0.084 to 0.075 ppm, it will take nearly 8 times that to go from 0.075 to 0.06 ppm.

The currently available science on the health effects of exposure to ozone does not support the allegations EPA uses to justify its agenda. In their book “Air Quality in America: A Dose of Reality on Air Pollution Levels, Trends, and Health Risks,” American Enterprise Institute fellows Joel Schwartz and Steve Hayward provides compelling evidence that special interest lobbies have grossly inflated the risks of ozone at today’s levels. In contrast to EPA’s claims regarding asthmatic children and people with respiratory problems, the incidence of asthma in the U.S. has been increasing as ozone levels have been going down.

Our environmental regulations are decades old. They have been revised from time to time through a patchwork process. What is needed now, especially since we are likely to face years of a weak economy, is a total re-examination of pollution and waste issues and legislation that deals with them more effectively and reflects both what has worked in the past and what hasn’t. Most pollution problems today are not national. They are state and regional specific. The best way to use our nation’s scarce resources better is through approaches that are state and regionally focused. Everything good does not have to be handed down from Washington.

Environmental values are deeply ingrained in society. The time has come to foster citizen environmentalism and devolve authority and responsibility.

When it comes to President Obama’s disgraceful decision on smog, it is pretty hard to top the opening of this commentary, so I gratefully repeat it:

In an astounding political blunder solidifying his place in US history as a one-termer, Barack Obama announced Friday proposed restrictions on smog and the health of Americans are not as important as corporate polluters and bickering Republicans.

With Obama’s feet stuck in cement and his head in a quagmire, he announced on Friday “regulatory burdens and regulatory uncertainty” helped him in ordering the EPA to forget about proposed regulations on smog in the US.

Insulting Americans’ intelligence, some of them, anyhow, the president added: “I will continue to stand with the hardworking men and women at the EPA as they strive every day to hold polluters accountable and protect our families from harmful pollution.” http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/311092

So, in answer to the first question, he was wrong.

In a single, ill-considered act of political pandering, the President also managed to:

• Condemn many millions of Americans to dirty air – smog that will send thousands of children to hospital emergency rooms and shorten the lives of thousands of senior citizens.

• Usurp the authority of the EPA, possibly illegally. (Note these brilliant blog posts by Lisa Heinzerling and http://gulcfac.typepad.com/georgetown_university_law/2011/09/ozone-madness.html and Thomas McGarity http://www.progressivereform.org/CPRBlog.cfm?idBlog=3ED51649-A8E1-1298-9F9EC9845F8660B7 )

• Order the EPA to lie to the public about the quality of the air we breathe.

• Fail to understand that cleaner air equals job creation. As the Newark Star-Ledger so accurately put it, “Pollution control products are a multibillion-dollar industry. Scrubbers that clean smokestacks, diesel filters that trap smoke from trucks and catalytic converters that filter out harmful auto exhaust are all made by workers right here in the United States. http://blog.nj.com/njv_editorial_page/2011/09/president_obama_caved_on_safer.html

• Further erode confidence in the federal government, thereby bolsteri ng the Tea Party.

Oh, and guess what: in a move that was driven solely by political miscalculation, the President didn’t win a single vote in the process – and he has merely emboldened EPA’s opponents to press ahead with their anti-regulatory agenda.

The implications of this mind-boggling blunder are still unfolding. For example, what is the current national smog standard – the one set by the Bush administration in defiance of EPA’s science advisers – or the even less strict standard set in 1997? (EPA has never fully implemented the Bush standards because from the earliest days of the Obama administration, it expected to set tougher standards that reflect modern science.)

Does this mean nothing positive will come out of the EPA before the elections? Not necessarily. In fact, I fully expect EPA will be permitted to move forward with new standards to limit mercury and other toxic pollutants from electric power plants. (The cost-benefit ratio in that case is overwhelming, and the corporate-inspired opposition is less comprehensive.)

Indeed, the White House cited this rule last week as part of its CYA for the lousy ozone decision. http://m.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/09/02/zichal-blog-post-cleaner-air-and-stronger-economy-record-success

To inflate its clean air “record of achievement,” the White House did erroneously claim complete credit for the so-called “cross-state” rule to limit power plant pollution that drifts from one state to another. (In fact, two-thirds of the “body count” credit should rightly be given to the Bush administration , for emssion reductions already achieved in response to Bush EPA rules.) And it touted fuel economy achievements as if they were the same as public health standards, which we all know they aren’t.

What the President and political flunkies didn’t say publicly is what everyone in DC knows was their real thinking: You environmentalists have nowhere to go and no one else to support. You’re stuck with me. Because you’re not going to support Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann or even Mitt Romney.

President Obama acted in the best interests of the American people last Friday when he blocked the Environmental Protection Agency from imposing unrealistic, unjustified and unneeded new ozone standards on our nation.

The president should now follow up by stopping EPA from imposing other extreme regulations that will cost our economy billions of dollars and wipe out millions of American jobs, without providing any significant environmental benefits. These regulations include new limits on greenhouse gas emissions and on sulfur in gasoline.

America has done a remarkable job of cleaning up the environment over the last few decades. For example, fuel manufacturers alone have spent nearly $50 billion to remove sulfur from gasoline and diesel fuel, and to manufacture reformulated gasoline.

Overall, total emissions of the six principal air pollutants in the United States have been reduced by 54 percent since 1980 and our nation’s citizens have experienced falling ozone levels across the country for two decades.

No one is suggesting we turn back the clock. But we need to do a cost-benefit assessment before moving forward in ways that would cause tremendous harm and bring little or no benefit to our nation.

With the official unemployment rate stuck at 9.1 percent, 14 million Americans remain unable to find jobs. Another 8.8 million men and women working in part-time jobs are unable to find full-time work. And an uncounted number of discouraged workers have simply stopped looking for jobs.

It takes seconds to read these numbers – but they are not just statistics. There is a person and a family behind every number in this unacceptably high jobless rate. Our unemployment rate is a national tragedy and a human tragedy and is also a threat to America’s economic and national security.

If the Labor Day speeches we heard from politicians Monday are to be anything more than empty rhetoric, our leaders need to focus on creating jobs. Speeches don’t put bread on the table.

Stopping overregulation can help reverse the loss of manufacturing jobs to foreign nations, and make America more competitive with other countries. A strong manufacturing base is vital to our nation’s economic health, and this includes preserving the jobs of the men and women employed by America’s fuel and petrochemical manufacturers.

The most ardent federal regulators need to understand that they can’t change the laws of physics, chemistry and economics. They can’t regulate every microscopic particle they dislike out of existence or outlaw even the slightest risk without regard to how many billions or trillions of dollars it would cost and no matter how many millions of Americans it would hurt.

President Obama has taken a significant first step in telling EPA to cease and desist on its extreme ozone regulations. The American people will benefit if Mr. Obama follows up and reexamines other environmental overregulation that is acting as a roadblock on the road to economic recovery and job creation.

The disastrous EPA proposal for unreasonably low ozone standards would have destroyed over seven million jobs and ground industrial activity to a halt. Nearly the whole country would have been out of attainment.

Obama said that he would pause the regulations “at this time.” He went on to explain: “Work is already underway to update a 2006 review of the science that will result in the reconsideration of the ozone standard in 2013.” In other words, Obama still plans to pursue this disastrous regulation, but not until after the next election.

Most likely, that was always the plan. The out-of-cycle ozone reproposal never made much sense from a political or practical standpoint, given the weak economy, the impending election, and regularly-scheduled review in 2013.

In fact, the gratuitous ozone reproposal may have been a diversionary tactic from the beginning, giving Democratic lobbyists and fundraisers an opportunity to shake the trees and delivery a "victory" while allowing the president to look balanced while his EPA continues its multi-trillion-dollar regulatory agenda.

The day after the 2010 election, President Obama said: “Cap and trade was just one way of skinning the cat; it was not the only way. It was a means, not an end.”

While the left feigns outrage over ozone – distracting the public and trying to make Obama look like a centrist – the EPA will move forward with its MACT rules and its NSPS for greenhouse gases. And unless Congress steps in and stops the EPA, the cat that will get skinned is an American economy simply can’t afford steeply higher energy prices and hundreds of thousands of lost jobs.

(Of course, if Obama is re-elected his disastrous ozone proposal will still have to be defeated in 2013.)