A visit by Christie Whitman, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, to the UW-Madison Children's Hospital to discuss the hospital's asthma research programs yesterday was surrounded by controversy concerning President Bush's newest environmental proposals.
A number of activists gathered outside the building to protest Bush's Clear Skies proposal which will supplement the Clean Air Act of 1990, and sets hard caps on sulfur dioxide, nitrous oxide and mercury emissions from power plants.
\We don't agree with Bush's energy plan. It's several steps in the wrong direction and we just want to make sure we send a clear message that we're not in support of it,"" UW-Madison senior Rebecca Knuffke said.
The limits proposals must be reached within 10 years and companies will be able to trade pollution credits, which, according to Whitman, will result in a 70 percent decrease in the amount of pollutants.
""The Clear Sky initiative is really the boldest proposal to address the cleanliness of our air we have seen in over a decade,"" Whitman said. ""Outdoor air factors are very real in triggering asthma attacks.""
Brett Hulsey, Midwest senior representative for the Sierra Club, said he disagreed with the assertion that the proposal would help clean up the nation's air, adding that if passed into law, the proposal would allow twice as much mercury and an additional 1 million tons of sulfur dioxide to be emitted, as compared to the Clean Air Acts proposal. The plan also allows for an additional 450,000 tons of nitrous oxide, a contributing factor to asthma-causing smog, to be emitted, according to Hulsey.
""The Bush Clear Sky plan is really a clear sham plan,"" he said. ""They want to build 13,000 more power plants and weaken health standards.""
The policy of allowing utilities to trade emissions generally has a net positive effect on the reduction of pollutants, according to UW-Madison Agriculture and Applied Economics Professor Bill Provencher.
""By letting firms trade their emissions quota, it allows firms that are cleaner to sell their emissions to firms that are having trouble obtaining their emissions cheaply, and it's pretty cost-effective,"" he said.
However, Hulsey said the market-based program would result in areas of very high contamination as utilities would simply buy their way out of pollution reduction.
""The problem with pollution trading is it creates cancer hot spots,"" he said.
Despite the argument surrounding the effectiveness of the policy, Dr. Bill Busse, Academic Program Director of the Asthma Research at UW-Madison, acknowledged that asthma sufferers would benefit from cleaner air no matter how it came about.
""People are born with a general predisposition to have asthma, but it is environmental factors that lead to the expression of that disease,"" he said.
