Trump eyes climate skeptic for key White House environmental post

>In an interview with POLITICO in September, White proposed establishing a "blue ribbon commission" to relitigate climate science, underscoring her unorthodox belief that the science showing human-induced climate change is unsettled.

>The commission, she said, would develop an "alternative scientific methodology" to the IPCC, whose usefulness she said has "reached its peak.”

>If nominated, White would likely be an advocate within the administration of reopening the foundation of Obama's climate change agenda: EPA’s 2009 “endangerment finding,” a scientific conclusion that greenhouse gases constitute a threat to public health or welfare.

>Trump told an industry-backed think tank last year that he will “review” the endangerment finding, a potentially difficult task given the scientific consensus on the issue. Any withdrawal of the finding would be challenged by environmentalists in court.

>Pruitt has so far declined to reopen the endangerment finding, a decision that has infuriated some of Trump's conservative supporters.

>White would be able to play a key role in shaping the Trump administration's overall approach to climate change, and she has been clear that she does not think the issue should be addressed by EPA. In 2015, she argued that Obama's rules to limit carbon emissions from power plants marked "an unprecedented expansion of federal administrative power" with "no measurable climate benefits.” And last May, she urged House Speaker Paul Ryan to pass a bill that would block EPA from regulating carbon dioxide, methane, hydrofluorocarbons or other greenhouse gases.

>At CEQ, White could direct other agencies to turn their attention away from climate change, and she would be in charge of implementing recent executive orders on energy development and regulatory streamlining. Last month, Trump ordered the council to revoke recently issued guidance directing all federal agencies to consider climate change when they conduct environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act, a decision that would be difficult to challenge in court. And in January, the president told CEQ to come up with a plan to expedite environmental reviews for major infrastructure projects.

>While environmentalists have long accused GOP officials of dragging their feet on climate change, White is by far the most outspoken critic of the underlying science — and the most ardent defender of fossil fuels — that Trump has considered to serve in his administration.

>In a 2014 blog post, White took aim at an article in The Nation by MSNBC host Chris Hayes, whose "recommendation to avert global warming, like most warmist policies, toys with the greatest advance made by mankind," she wrote. In White's view, there is a connection between “the abolition of slavery and humanity's first widespread use of energy from fossil fuels.” The rise of coal and oil, she argued, provided economic incentive to end the practice of slavery in the U.S. and elsewhere. (One critic fired back that the industrial revolution actually “exacerbated” slavery by increasing the demands for slave-produced goods such as cotton.)

>Putting a permanent CEQ chair in place would also raise the question of where Trump wants decision-making on environmental issues to happen — in the White House or at agencies.

>The Obama administration shifted major environmental responsibilities from CEQ to EPA and some other agencies as it sought aggressive action on climate change. It remains unclear whether Trump’s CEQ will continue in that vein or have a greater role in policymaking, though outside Republicans have encouraged Trump aides to grant the council wide latitude.

>The council was run from 2015 through the end of Obama's term by Christy Goldfuss, an unconfirmed managing director. Obama never nominated a replacement for his first CEQ chair, Nancy Sutley, who left in 2014.

>White’s criticisms of Obama environmental regulations go beyond climate change.

>She said in 2015 that EPA’s Waters of the U.S. rule, which determines which bodies of water are subject to federal oversight, “is about amending the definitions of well understood words into tortured versions of themselves so that the EPA can seize control of dry land where water may flow after heavy rains.”

>She also criticized the new ozone standard of 70 parts per billion, calling the rule’s scientific conclusions “a statistical house of cards” and predicting it “may be the straw that breaks the back of our struggling economy.”

>White, who received her bachelor's and master’s degrees from Stanford University, was a commissioner at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality from 2001 to 2007, serving as chairman for the last four years of that term. She previously sat on the Texas Water Development Board.

>Environmentalists do give White some credit for advances made during her tenure at TCEQ.

>Luke Metzger, director of Environment Texas, told POLITICO that she helped implement a legislative order to create an online reporting system for major emissions events, which is still used by green activists to track noncompliance by major energy companies. Metzger also credited her with a "slightly improved" enforcement policy, though he noted that she blocked an effort by a fellow TCEQ commissioner in 2006 to boost penalties.

>In 2008, White joined the Texas Public Policy Foundation, where she directs its Armstrong Center for Energy & the Environment.

Maybe she could prove how it's harmless by breathing CO2 for an hour

>>155955
You literally generate Co2

>>155997
I think the point is, there is a such thing as oversaturation of something that may still be beneficial in some concentrations. At which point one risks their life, and in the case of fossil fuel emissions, the continued existence of Earth's ecosystems.

>>155997
Oh good. Then maybe you should join her.

>>155997
And methane, and formaldehyde. So does that make sitting in a septic tank and drinking embalming chemicals fine too?

>>156044
I think we should test it by sending any politician who doesn't believe in any harmful effects of carbon emissions to sit in said septic tank for a few hours and see how they hold up

>>156057
By the same logic everyone that thinks Niggers are normal people must be air dropped into Mogadishu.

>>156059
That's what happens when feuding tribesmen are brought from archaic tech to modern tech in a couple generations.

Time to force climate change deniers to huff refrigerant fumes. They should be okay. Harmless.

>>156073
See also: US politics.

>>155997
>generation is the same as intake
You literally should drink bleach.