EPA has duty to act

Barack,

Why not direct federal departments and agencies to start reducing emissions for each type of pollutant now, such as 10% cuts annually for each greenhouse gas and larger cuts for soot, mercury, etc.

And why not direct states to each make the same cuts. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) could monitor progress by states; where a state looks set to miss one or more targets, the EPA could step in by imposing federal fees on applicable polluting products sold in the respective state, with revenues used for federal projects that do reduce pollution.

As the Supreme Court confirmed, greenhouse gases are air pollutants covered by the Clean Air Act, and the EPA has the statutory authority to regulate such emissions.
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/06pdf/05-1120.pdf

Similarly, greenhouse gases are water pollutants and should be acted upon under the Clean Water Act.

The EPA has the authority and the duty to act. Surely, by deciding to share some of this authority and duty with states, the EPA does not overstep its authority. It can and it should do so on condition that states take effective action; such delegation should be withdrawn where states fail to make progress, in which case the duty to act reverts back to the EPA.

Sam Carana

Post by Sam Carana.

Climate Action Plan

President Obama: I am open to all sorts of new ideas,
 maybe better ideas, to make sure that we deal with
 climate change in a way that promotes jobs and growth. 

June 25, 2013. Sam Carana:

The Climate Action Plan set out below could be implemented immediately in any country, without the need for an international agreement to be reached first. This avoids complicated negotiations and verifying implementation and progress in other nations.

In nations with both federal and state governments, such as the United States of America, the Climate Action Plan could be implemented as follows:

1. The President directs federal departments and agencies to reduce their emissions for each type of pollutant annually by a set percentage, say, CO2 and CH4 by 10%, and HFCs, N2O and soot by higher percentages.
2. The President demands states to each make the same cuts.  
3. The President directs the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to monitor implementation by states and to act step in where a state looks set to miss one or more targets, by imposing (federal) fees on applicable polluting products sold in the respective state, with revenues used for federal benefits.

Federal benefits (under 3 above) could include building interstate High-Speed Rail tracks, adaptation and conservation measures, management of national parks, R&D into batteries, ways to vegetate deserts and other land use measurements, all at the discretion of the EPA. The fees can be roughly calculated as the average of fees that other states impose in successful efforts to meet their targets.

This way, the decision how to reduce targets is largely delegated to state level, while states can similarly delegate decisions to local communities. While feebates, preferably implemented locally, are recommended as the most effective way to reach targets, each state and even each local community can largely decide how to implement things, provided that each of the targets are reached.

Similar targets could be adopted elsewhere in the world, and each nation could similarly delegate responsibilities to local communities. Additionally, it makes sense to agree internationally to impose extra fees on international commercial aviation, with revenues used to develop ways to cool the Arctic.

See also: Climate Plan