Articles by Peter Altman

Pete is the Climate Campaign Director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

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Should kids be exposed to more or less toxic pollution?

Peter Altman Health

For some representatives, the health of schoolkids just doesn’t seem to be the priority.Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Some questions should be easy to answer. But, with Congress, some things are never easy. Fresh off the House vote to let polluters dump unlimited amounts of carbon pollution into the air, a House subcommittee under the jurisdiction of chair Fred Upton (R-Mich.) will start to consider letting polluters dump unsafe amounts of toxic pollution into the air.

You see, for years a lot of polluters have avoided having to reduce their emissions of toxic pollution — this is the hard-core stuff that causes cancers, birth defects, developmental disorders, etc. Power plants, cement kilns [PDF], and other industrial plants [PDF] have either never had to meet clean air safeguards for toxic pollution, or have not had to meet effective ones. By updating clean air safeguards on toxic pollution, the EPA will save over 25,000 lives per year.

The EPA’s stronger safeguards to protect against toxic air pollution will have profound benefits for health at the local level. As USA Today document... Read more

Peter Altman Health

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  • Fred Upton’s bizarre war on 24 million Americans with asthma

    Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council. Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) is teaming up with House Energy and Commerce Chair Fred Upton (R-Mich.) to introduce a bill to allow America’s biggest polluters to continue dumping unlimited amounts of carbon emissions into the air. It’s not that surprising that Inhofe is pushing this in the Senate. […]

    Peter Altman Energy

  • The people have spoken: let the EPA do its job

    Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council. Yesterday, members of Rep. Fred Upton’s (R-Mich.) House Energy and Commerce Committee held their first hearing on Chair Upton’s proposal to block the Environmental Protection Agency from updating Clean Air Act safeguards to protect our health from life-threatening carbon pollution. (Hat tip and bow to EPA chief Lisa […]

    Peter Altman Politics

  • Senators support polluters over asthmatic children

    National health organizations are not scoffing at the link between pollution and asthma.Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council. As my colleague David Doniger explained, there’s a new pollution promoter on the scene, and his name is Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.). Barrasso has introduced a bill (S. 228) that would allow unlimited carbon dioxide pollution […]

    Peter Altman Politics

  • Sen. Scott Brown: Stand up for clean air, not polluters

    A lot of people in Massachusetts suffer from asthma, the disease that makes it hard to breathe, sends kids gasping for breath to the emergency room and can saddle families with huge medical bills. In fact, estimates from the American Lung Association are that over 130,000 kids and nearly 500,000 adults in Massachusetts suffer from asthma.* One […]

    Peter Altman Climate & Energy