Perhaps, but he exposed the NRDC as a fanatical pack of sanctimonious Luddites. He also demonstrated that CNN is worthless as a news organization. And, finally, we learned from him that environmentalists are often full of crap and that we shouldn't trust a damn thing they say. So he has all of that going for him.

There's trade-offs to everything. The death of a few animals is not a problem unless it has population level effects.

So killing some animals is ok as long as you offset their deaths with cleaner processes. The deaths of animals has NO effect on the amount of carbon credits that you earn and can sell to the highest bidder so that they can continue to pollute... killing more animals...

Ok, thats good to know, I learned something...

It creates a market based incentive to invest by putting a price tag on pollution. There's money to be made in offsets.

So the money is NOT slated IN ANY WAY slated to be invested in alternate energy and the money is in no way slated to be used to prepare in any way for the day when Fossil fuels are scarce...

Thats what I said to 3rdworld.

So we agree here, with carbon credits you can pollute as long as you want to and the Govment lets you. If it is more profitable to pollute than to fix it, you are allowed to keep doing that. AND I guess I can pollute the hell out of Florida as long as I have either bought carbon credits OR created carbon credits someplace else.

Spankit's piece demomizing CNN shows that depths to which the GOP geriatrics are willing to sell out.

"But Pruitt didn't require opinions from scientists."

He's the head of the EPA for pete's sake! He's got scientists he could have consulted with.  He didn't because he is an a-hole.

Face it, Trump brought the swamp with him and put it on top of the current one.  Trump's supporters are pretty much the swamp.

Please explain why Pruitt needs to consult with scientists for the EPA to accept an application.

I didn't write that.

Are there population level effects? You know, population mortality rate and recruitment rate?

Is it a species that is vulnerable to the deaths such that the population size or reproductive rate is too low to absorb the deaths without a population reduction?

Are there population level effects?

I said EIS and ESA would still be in effect. What part of that isn't clear?

The goal is total reduction in pollution load without the complete shock that would come from just banning X pollutant.

Are you telling us that you are in favor of just capping pollution with no flexibiity built into the regulation to allow markets to adapt? That's pretty extreme.

Have you researched the success of cap and

If the environmental benefit offsets the deaths then there is a net positive. Not sure why you can't wrap your head around that either.

If you kill X birds per year with the alternative but recruitment improves by 2X per year because the environment is less contaminated then the alternative is better than the status quo.

So you want a Soviet style command and control approach instead of one based on market incentives?

The fossil fuel companies certainly aren't forced to invest in alternative energy. A market that rewards the alternatives that are developed to sell pollution credits definitely does more to prepare for a scarce oil future than the Pruitt method.

Right now a lot of the oil and coal money is spent blocking alternatives.

No.

You haven't researched any of the other cap and trade programs have you?

Credits can be restricted to within air shed.

Or analogues to pollution credits like mitigation banking that can be written to require mitigation wetlands to occur within the same watershed as impaired wetlands.

I had a boss that used to say,

"There are two kinds of people,

the kind that knows how a refrigerator works,

and all the rest of them. "

(< for Sniper)

Cali... once again leading the way , and  taking it over. 

----------------------------

Under Governor Jerry Brown, California is not only leading a coalition that includes New York and Washington in reaffirming existing emission standards, it has also signed separate agreements to work with Germany on supporting the Paris pact and with China on boosting sales of zero-emission vehicles.

It becomes less profitable with time as the less polluting technologies become cheaper. Your clean competitors get their costs down to your level and don't have the added expense of having to pay the pollution bill.

But hey, we could do it your way and just ban the pollution and shut down the polluters straight away rather than phase in the change over time. The Earth Liberation Front folks have your back on that idea.

Is that deliberate misdirection or is Stossel just stupidly repeating a talking point fed to him by API or Heritage?

Where are those salmon harvested in Bristol Bay hatched and spend their juvenile life stages?

Stuff that happens 100 miles upstream is pretty critical to the Bristol Bay fishery. Surely Stossel knows this and it just a weasel shill at this point.

If he misrepresents the most basic science in this matter, how honest do you think is his representation of the EPA action or NRDC up to this point?

He mentioned that because CNN showed the bay and thereby suggested that the mine would screw up the bay. Now, tell us how the mine - which hasn't been approved - would affect salmon.

Dry up some streams with water use or contaminate a whole bunch with acid mine drainage and heavy metals and you could seriously cut back the productivity of a >400 million dollar per year fishery.

Thing is, wild salmon are about gone except for a few robust runs. Why threaten one of those good runs?

The history of hard rock mining is that it makes somebody some money, then when the deposit plays out they declare bankruptcy and leave the cleanup for the government to worry about.

So we are supposed to risk this sustainable fishery that should last a long time for the one shot deal of mining?

How likely is it that the EIS will be done properly and adequately assess risk/benefit under the current administration?

If the mine wrecks the spawning grounds with a huge spill of mining waste, are they going to pay to run hatchery to replace the lost fish as long as it takes to restore the wild production? (and once you go hatchery you pretty much never go back so they'd have to run it forever).

No. Stossel said

He specified salmon.

CNN specified salmon fisheries as being at risk.

Where is the mine? Where do salmon spawn?

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54976.Encounters_with_the_Archdruid

Here's a good book on the age old debate between environmentalists and industry.

I am not for ruining streams where salmon spawn. I am very much against that, as a matter of fact. I know for a fact that the EPA's acceptance of an application will in no way hurt salmon. The question is whether the mine would. I have heard nothing about that.

The company says it won't hurt salmon.

Experience with hard rock mining says it will.

Valley fill and dammed up streams are generally bad for salmon spawning habitat.

A failed waste reservoir would nuke many miles of water.

EPA is proposing to withdraw proposed Clean Water Act restrictions on the placement of dredge or fill material.

That's a pretty big sticking point for just about any biologist.

Digging a hole in the ground a mile deep and 30 square miles in area is one thing. Placing all the fill is another.

Then there are the roads and other infrastructure needed in the watershed to support a mine of the size proposed by Pebble Limit Partnership.

Just about everything in the proposal is a known threat to salmon spawning the rearing habitat.

https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2014-07/documents/pebble_es_pd_071714_final.pdf

Here is the executive summary of the 2014 proposal by the 'extremist' EPA to restrict the placement of dredge or fill material.