Editorial

By: Eve Lanark

California Air Resources Board Breaks its Own Rules in Political Oil Deal

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) claims to operate on the premise of reducing air pollution in California, protecting the public from toxic air contaminants, and providing innovative approaches to complying with air pollution regulations. However, since the state-funded board was formed in 1967, CARB seems to have spent most of its time involved in fraud scandals and squandering public money. As Kill CARB has proven through analysis of the board’s activities, CARB is a company without scruples, and this year they’ve taken it even further by getting into bed with their supposed enemy. The Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA), a trade oil group which includes oil giants such as BP PLC and Shell PLC, has long been against CARB and its initiatives. So why then, have CARB helped WSPA to insert language into Assembly and Senate bills that will prevent CARB from enforcing one of its own rules?

The ‘Clean Fuels Outlet’ Initiative

The CARB initiative that the deal with WSPA effects is the Clean Fuels Outlet, a measure aimed at providing fill-up stations for green vehicles throughout California. The Clean Fuels Outlet plan, as reported on E&E News, has existed for over two decades but mainly idled- though most likely spending a good chunk of public money in the process. The legislation, if approved, would mean that oil refiners and importers would have to help fund hydrogen fueling stations as soon as any region has up to 10,000 green vehicles.  

Making the Deal

Unsurprisingly the oil giants weren’t happy with this idea, and have made moves to cut the initiative down by going after the legislature, which CARB have kindly let them do. The legislation implemented by CARB at the behest of WSPA will prevent CARB from implementing the Clean Fuels Outlet for a decade. In exchange WSPA are supporting provisions that advance cleaner cars and trucks, and provide state funding for hydrogen vehicle fuel stations. Seems like a bit of a contradiction, right? It is not clear exactly how WSPA will be supporting such provisions, and what these provisions indeed are. CARB is insistent, however, that this deal is a positive step for them in introducing the green fuelling stations. The deal has also garnered outside support from green groups and government officials, with State Senate Fran Pavley, sponsor of the Senate bill, saying in an email; “I believe this bill will attract broad bipartisan support.”

Not everyone seems to agree. Many critics of the deal say that CARB’s move to change its own rules to keep the oil companies happy sets a precedent. Suggesting that it is likely that WSPA will continue to go after the legislature until it poses no threat to the oil companies at all. This theory is backed by the fact that in 2010 the oil industry funded an attempt to kill the states’ climate law. Their bid failed, but they are now focusing on weakening green rules. Kathryn Phillips, director of Sierra Club California, says that, “I see them going after individual regulations bit by bit… (it’s) like being nibbled to death by ducks.”

Why CARB Complied

CARB may claim to believe that this legislature will ultimately aid them in implanting their Clean Fuels Outlet initiative, but the reality of why they made the deal is far seamier than that. Oil companies have been widely acknowledged to dislike the Clean Fuels Outlet legislature since it began over two decades ago, and it was believed that they may sue CARB to cripple the initiative. Meaning that CARBS’ actions come down to nothing more than risk-avoidance and cost-saving.

Ask Questions

Unfortunately government initiatives to help the environment frequently amount to money-making schemes which accomplish little and cost tax payers a lot. This trend exists all over the world. Money.co.uk recently published an article questioning the validity of UK governments’ claim that a green housing scheme would save buyers money in the long run. The governments’ ‘Green Deal’ promises to help 14 million homeowners cut their energy bills in a ‘buy now, pay later’ scheme. The scheme is to implement improvements to homes which would make them more energy efficient. It is claimed by the government that this green scheme will save those who invest in it more in energy bills in the long run, and in the ‘worst case scenario’ homeowners will break even. Money.co.uk questioned this claim, inviting homeowners to investigate whether it really would be worth the cost. It is easy to be blinded by institutions purporting to aid the environment, as naturally we all recognize environmental damage as a big modern concern. Nevertheless it is important to ask questions. Look into what is actually being done, how the money is being spent, and whether it is quite so energy-efficient after all. 

Coalition of Energy Users Petition to Abolish CARB

WHEREAS: CARB is an unelected and unaccountable bureaucracy whose actions have killed jobs and harmed our economy.

WHEREAS: CARB has committed serious ethical lapses with its failure to terminate an employee with falsified credentials, failure to withdraw costly regulations based on this employee’s faulty research and failure to account for millions in funds designated for AB32 implementation.

WHEREAS: CARB has abused its power by levying millions of dollars in disproportionate fines on business owners who have not violated existing laws or who have committed only minor technical oversights.

WHEREAS: CARB has proposed or implemented policies that infringe on our right to make our own decisions and run our own lives. Examples include proposed taxeson vehicles CARB does not approve of, mandatory programmable thermostats, imprisonment for not inflating our tires and penalties for dissent.

WHEREAS: CARB continues to move forward with plans to mandate increased ethanol usage despite overwhelming evidence that ethanol will significantly raise fuel costs without improving the environment.

WHEREAS: CARB has promised its actions will lead to a prosperous new green economy that has failed to materialize but that have instead turned California into a national leader in high unemployment.

BE IT RESOLVED: CARB should be abolished! We need jobs and a healthy economy, not punitive and unfair regulations!

We need to get started now. The first step is making contact with your Representatives and asking them to support this effort. If they agree, they will be praised here.  If they do not they will be exposed. We are asking that you write a letter, send an e-mail or fax to your representative in the State Assembly and State Senate, then send us both your letter and the reply that you get. Those will be posted here. You will remain anonymous if you state that is what you want. To get started, click on the link to the lists of Members of the State Assembly and Members of the State Senate.  Next, find your representatives and make contact. It is important that you act now!

Your tax dollars fund CARB. In fiscal year 2007-08 they got $722 million for 1172 employees. In fiscal year 2008-09 they got $650 million for 1272 employees, and in fiscal year 2009-10, your state legislators and the governor fired over  8500 teachers in the state in order to give $857 million to this outrageously corrupt state agency and its 1280 employees.    Why?  Easy.  Follow the money.  The  CARB payroll is loaded with political friends of the legislators.    Hundreds of these worthless so-called public servants  collect hundred thousand dollar salaries and  pension  benefits that working families can never expect.  CARB is also in bed with organizations that  steer  many millions to the campaign coffers of the legislators.    Why  otherwise would the legislature  keep CARB alive and growing --- and rob the youth of California of the education they deserve?   When the state is bankrupt, teachers are losing their jobs,  millions are out of work,  and the legislature gives CARB billions of dollars to waste on its fraudulent  campaigns and regulate the working people  as if they are criminals spoiling the environment.  Of course,  CARB must manufacture a new "health crisis"  every year to justify its existence.

Here are some other CARB highlights:

• Reformulated Diesel Fuel:  Do you remember when CARB mandated that Diesel Fuel be reformulated without adequate testing in the 1990's? The new fuel  damaged  thousands of  diesel engines in the state and over  ten million  dollars of state funds were used to replace many of the damaged engines.  You the taxpayers and working people paid for this.  Bet your  legislators never told you about this.   But they fired  20,000 teachers in the state recently because they wasted your  tax dollars on fraud agencies  like CARB where they have placed their friends and political cronies on the payroll until the next election. 
• MTBE: Over $30 million paid out by working families over ten years for extra 20 to 30 cents a gallon.  Estimated $20 billion dollars more to clean up ground water around the state that is contaminated with MTBE.  CARB  has an army of  professional liar  "public information officers"  who spread the CARB propaganda  to keep the CARB  agency budget  growing every year.   They spent ten years lying to both the legislature and the public about the "benefits" of  MTBE in your gasoline.   Finally, the legislature had to ban MTBE in your gas when scientists proved that it was a poison to our environment and you.  The average working family was forced to pay out over eight thousand dollars over ten years for the MTBE poison in their gasoline in California.  (They would have over $12,000 in the bank today for their childrens' education if that money had been saved and invested). 
• Electric Car mandate: CARB set the American automotive industry back by ten years in developing hybrid cars because CARB would not allow them as zero emission or low emission cars while CARB insisted on demanding that 5% of cars in California had to be electric cars.   Only after they were forced to admit that the  electric cars were a fraud, did they allow hybrid cars. By that time the Japanese manufacturers were way ahead of America.  That has cost the American  workers in the auto industry over 200.000 jobs and crushed the industry.
• Hien Tran Fraud:  Hien Tran lied about having a PHD from U.C. Davis but really purchased his degree at a diploma mill. Tran was the project coordinator and lead author of a report entitled “Methodology for Estimating Premature Deaths Associated with Long-term Exposure to Fine Airborne Particulate Matter in California.” This report was the main support document of a draconian regulation proposed by the CARB that would cost California diesel users billions of dollars, a cost that eventually the consumer would pay for in higher food, construction and transportation costs. These costs would be incurred in the retrofitting of almost all diesel engines for on- or off-road, even relatively new ones, with new pollution controls for the sole purpose of limiting particulate matter as small as 2.5 microns (PM2.5). Although there have been some epidemiological studies in the past that claim there is a health risk, those studies were highly speculative and done with poor data. In fact, there is a significant study that says that PM2.5 is not a health risk in California.

  Tran's problems started with the completion of the first draft report when Dr. S. Stanley Young, the assistant director of Bioinformatics at the National Institute of Statistical Sciences, came to his attention. Dr. Young fired off a letter to Gov. Schwarzenegger, writing in part, “I note that none of the authors are professional statisticians. Some are trained in epidemiology. It is useful to know that the track record of epidemiologists in the use of statistics to make claims that are reproducible is very poor. Their claims fail to replicate 80-90 percent of the time (Ioannidis, JAMA, 2005). Their recommendations, most likely wrong, are projected to be very costly.
  
  As punishment for his lie, Tran was suspended for 60 days and took a pay cut.  He still works at CARB.

• CARB's "Forbidden Speech" regulation: Sounding like something from George Orwell, CARB was poised to adopt a regulation that literally “forbids” and “penalizes” opposing views.   The resolution, which CARB dubs, “prohibition on false statements,” is frightening in that it would actually sanction communications to the agency during hearings or in the presentation of studies that CARB disagrees with.  Apparently, CARB’s legal staff missed that whole bit on the First Amendment. The first hearing on CARB’s proposed regulation was scheduled for December 1st, 2010.  According to CARB’s website, the hearing has now been postponed until next year.  Moreover, the proposed regulation providing for “penalties” for false information has been removed from CARB’s website.
• CARB's 340% Overestimation:  The California Air Resources Board went above and beyond in screwing up their diesel regulations based upon “grossly  miscalculated pollution levels” of 340% over reality. Yes, you read right, 340%. Was this stupidity? Gross negligence? Gross incompetence? Outright fraud? All of the aforementioned? Read and decide for yourself.

A Speech by Tom McClintock

Links to more information about CARB:

• Stupid CARB Member Tricks
• Sacramento CH13 KOVR Reporter Exposes More CARB Junk Science
  
• FORBIDDEN SPEECH
• Construction Industry Air Quality Coalition letter to CARB re: Proposed "Prohibition of False Statements" regulation
• Was Dr. Enstrom fired for exposing Mary Nichols, John Froines & UC in fraud cover-up at CARB?
• Truck rule based on flawed data, ARB staff admits
• San Francisco Chronicle Article: Overestimate fueled state's landmark diesel law
• Betty Plowman Report: A Closer Look at PM2.5 Statistics
• The Symposium on PM2.5: "The Science is not Settled"
• Dr. John Telles' Letter to CARB Chief Legal Counsel Ellen Peter Regarding the Hien Tran Fraud
• CARB Lawyer Ellen Peter Tells Dr. John Telles "No Rules Were Broken"
• Mary Nichols Apologizes for her Role in the Hien Tran Cover up
• Ron Roberts, CARB member exposes AB 32 as a job-killing fraud!
• Cost of AB32 by California Small Businesses by Sanjay B. Varshney, Ph.D. & Dennis H. Tootelian, Ph.D.
• Article: Chris Reed: Still shameful / Air board’s response to scandal is appalling
• Article: LOIS HENRY: Arrogance pollutes air board
  
• Article: The air board’s shame / Staff never revealed internal scandal before crucial vote
• Article: LOIS HENRY: CARB can't ignore credibility problems
• Article: Sacramento Bee: Fiscal impact of state climate law disputed
• Article: Chris Reed: Jobless? Too bad
• Article: John Dale Dunn M.D.: California Ignores Scientific Protests, Passes New Diesel Regulations
• Article: The air board’s shame / Staff never revealed internal scandal before crucial vote
• Article: Leslie Eastman: California’s eco-bureaucrats hurt businesses (Part 1 of a 2 part series)
• Article: Leslie Eastman: CARB rules don’t address the real problems (Part 2 of a 2 part series)
• Article: Lois Henry: California Air Resources Board admits its lead researcher lied
• Article: Lois Henry: Dodgy science strangles industry