TRUE/FALSE/DEPENDS (and explain/justify) WASHINGTON Last week, the EPA announced new rules to maintain federal soot pollution standards on Monday, despite a growing pile of evidence of soot's health risks and a recommendation by nonpartisan staff scientists that tightening the soot limits could save more than 12,000 lives a year. The rule will steer the agency away from considering the broader public benefits of new regulations, such as the value of fewer asthma attacks and respiratory ailments, directing the agency to include in the cost-benefit analysis a specific focus on what EPA is allowed to consider under the Clean Air Act. EPA staff members writing future rules will also have to explain how the rule affects the American public. "This new rule is a deliberate, targeted strike at the EPA's mission to protect human health and the environment," says Rachel Cleetus, policy director for the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. She is partly right and partly wrong, according to modern cost-benefit analysis.
