美國眾議院大砍預算 環境保護工作受限

Early this morning, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a funding bill that environmentalists say amounts to the biggest attack on clean air and clean water in recent history.

H.R. 1, the continuing resolution offered by House Republicans to keep the government funded for the rest of the fiscal year, passed by a vote of 235-189. Only three Republicans joined all the Democrats in voting no.

H.R. 1 slashes the budget of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency by one-third and prevents the agency from acting to reduce carbon dioxide and other global warming pollutants from coal-fired power plants and oil refineries, a regulatory program that began January 2.

The bill also blocks EPA from restoring Clean Water Act protections for many of the nation's most vulnerable waterways, including those that feed into drinking water supplies for more than 117 million Americans.

To the Republican House leadership, the bill is all about spending cuts. In a statement today House Speaker John Boehner said, "This week, for the first time in many years, the People's House was allowed to work its will - and the result was one of the largest spending cuts in American history. For the good of our economy and our democracy, I call on Senate Majority Leader Reid to allow it to come to an immediate vote."

The House Republicans have threatened to shut down the federal government if their bill is not enacted into law, which would halt Social Security payments to seniors, as well as payments to members of the armed forces, veterans, border guards and other federal government employees.

Daniel Lashof, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's climate center, said, "the House is deaf, dumb and blind on climate change." He notes that H.R. 1 would prevent EPA from collecting basic data on who is pumping how much carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping pollutants into the air; and would prevent EPA from setting any limits on emissions of the greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, sulfur hexafluoride, hydrofluorocarbons, or perfluorocarbons for any reason.

The continuing resolution would also prevent the United States from contributing to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC, which won a Nobel Prize for its work in 2007, was established with the support of the George H.W. Bush administration to provide authoritative international assessments of climate change.

The Republican leadership claims to have the support of the American people for these measures, but environmentalists who are also Republicans expressed dismay today at the extent of the cuts.

"House Republicans fell prey to anti-environmental extremism on February 19, passing a 2011 spending plan loaded with attacks on public health standards and conservation that have little to do with reducing the nation's debt," said Republicans for Environmental Protection, a national grassroots organization of "stewardship-minded" Republicans.

"The continuing resolution that the House passed fulfills many items on the wish list of anti-environmental radicalsm," said David Jenkins, REP vice president for government and political affairs. " The resolution includes non-budgetary policy mandates that would prevent EPA from limiting carbon pollution and protecting water quality, bar the Interior Department from protecting wilderness-quality lands, and decree, without regard to scientific evidence, that northern gray wolves are no longer endangered."