"Job creators" and the government they've fixed
9-7-11
Counterpunch.com
Obama Has Betrayed Both
Workers and Environmentalists Unite!
by SHAMUS COOKE
http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/09/07/workers-and-environmentalists-unite/
When there are zero jobs available, any job will do. This fact has been exploited by corporations now re-labeling themselves ”job creators,” since being a job creator in a time of depression brings a religious status similar to a rain god during a drought. Democrats and Republicans have lavished eternal praise on the “job creators” and in consequence have created a political atmosphere that is rabidly pro-corporate “job creators” and anti-everything else.
In practice this means that ANY new law or regulation that hinders the power or profits of “job creating” corporations is instantly attacked as a “job killer.” This type of logic is good for bumper stickers and Tea Parties but bad for those who suffer under the giant power of corporations, including working people, the unemployed, the self-employed, and the environment.
For example, in Oregon a statewide measure was passed to increase taxes on corporations and the wealthy to deal with the state’s budget deficit. The tax money was to be used to save social services and prevent layoffs. Before it became law the measure was attacked viciously by a newborn, well-funded group calling itself “Oregonians Against Job-Killing Taxes.” The message was simple: if you tax the wealthy and corporations, they will punish you by leaving the state and taking their jobs with them; better to simply accept their absolute power and sing their praises while reducing their taxes and destroying environmental regulations that impede their profits.
Obama recently surrendered to this philosophy when he reneged on a promise to adopt stricter air quality standards around ozone pollution (against the recommendations of scientists from his own Environmental Protection Agency). Less ground-level smog would prevent thousands of deaths while reducing lung and health issues in general, cutting health care costs by billions. But the interests of the corporate “job creators” won out in the end. The Huffington Post reports:
“The White House has been under heavy pressure from GOP lawmakers and major industries, which have slammed the stricter standard as an unnecessary jobs killer…Obama said his decision was made in part to reduce regulatory burdens [on corporations] and uncertainty [for corporations] at a time of rampant questions about the strength of the U.S. economy.”
How did corporate America react?
“Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce [a giant corporate lobby group] said the move was “an enormous victory for America’s job creators, the right decision by the president and one that will help reduce the uncertainty facing businesses.” (September 2nd, 2011).
This dynamic is now the new normal. The same logic was used after the Gulf Coast BP disaster, when Obama temporarily banned offshore drilling in response. But this practical and necessary measure was instantly attacked as a “job killer” and Obama quickly changed his tune and ended the ban. Dangerous deep-sea drilling continues and politicians and the media alike have hushed-over the issues until the next disaster occurs. The incredible shock and outrage that working people voiced over the BP oil spill has been ignored in favor of the interests of the “Job Creators.”
Not only was the BP disaster ignored, but some corporations used it to their benefit. Since deep sea drilling was dangerous, some corporations admitted, better to focus on the ever-expanding realm of land drilling for natural gas. As the excellent documentary Gasland shows, drilling for natural gas (also called Liquefied natural gas, or LNG) is causing catastrophic environmental damage while the Obama administration has repeatedly encouraged its expansion as an alternative to “foreign oil.” The Environmental Protection Agency has virtually ignored this now-gigantic industry as corporations like Halliburton pump hundreds of poisonous chemicals into the ground and air for their personal profit.
Corporations also won out when it came to environmentally-sane logging strategies in the Pacific Northwest and the horrifically-destructive act of Mountain Removal for the mining industries. Yet another recent victim was the Canadian Tar Sands pipeline that Obama agreed to, which will run from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, carrying oil that was especially destructive to mine. In all these cases the corporate “Job Creators” attacked the so-called “Job Killers” for wanting to impose regulations that would help prevent environmental disasters.
In addition, corporations quietly sidelined Obama’s campaign promise to set the first-ever limits on the specific pollution blamed for global warming. At a time when most working people are educated and deathly afraid of the near-term effects of global warming, the President has simply stopped talking about the issue. Any respectable climate scientist will tell you that unless massive environmental changes are made very soon there will be unstoppable climate change that will have dire consequences for all humans, not just the ones most immediately effected in areas devastated by droughts, flooding, and other extreme weather patterns.
All working people have an interest in ensuring that their children and grandchildren can live a life without such carnage. Some, however, are tricked into thinking that the immediate need for jobs overrules any consideration for the environment, since not eating today is more important than a global environmental crisis that will strike tomorrow. In reality there is no such contradiction. Now is actually the perfect time to brush this corporate-created myth aside and demand what is sorely over-due for both working people and the environment.
It should be painfully clear to even the most reality-blind politicians that the private sector has no interest in creating jobs; they are quite content sitting on their mountains of cash until wages fall low enough — due to massive unemployment — for them to hire more labor. Working people cannot afford the patience or the low wages. The jobs’ crisis demands that governments on the city, state, and federal level create jobs’ programs similar to the programs enacted during the last great depression. But not just any jobs will do.
Given that our society is facing an energy crisis and a related environmental crisis, only a green job program will do. This means not only fixing dilapidated bridges and roads, but investing massive amounts of money in alternative energy — solar, wind, hydro, etc. — while improving and expanding alternative forms of transportation — high speed trains, buses, electric cars, etc. It also means massive investments in home and building weatherization, recycling infrastructure, public education campaigns, research and development for alternative energy, and a variety of other measures that will help fundamentally change our culture’s relation to the environment, all of which will create massive amounts of jobs.
Obama’s stubborn refusal to do anything of substance for labor, the unemployed, and environmentalists creates an opportunity for these groups to work closely together for a better world. Because politicians are refusing to respond to society’s most pressing needs, new tactics need to be employed. Lobbying politicians and organizing small rallies cannot have the same effects they once did.
Only a sustained campaign with massive mobilizations has the possibility of achieving the united goals of the labor and environmental movements. The demand for a federal jobs program that builds an alternative energy infrastructure and other green public works has the ability to inspire millions of people to act. To fund such a program demands must be made to drastically increase taxes on the wealthy and corporations, since they now have all the money, thanks to the expanding tax breaks for the rich and corporations over the past thirty years. The era of issue-based activism has come to a disappointing end. To properly address either the jobs or environmental crisis all working people must unite in huge numbers with inspiring demands.
Shamus Cooke is a social service worker, trade unionist and writer for Workers Action (www.workerscompass.org)
9-6-11
Orange Country Register
BK solar firm got $24.4 million in state tax breaks…Mary Ann Milbourn
http://economy.ocregister.com/2011/09/06/bk-solar-firm-got-24-4-million-in-state-tax-breaks/68265/
Solyndra, the Bay Area solar tech firm that declared bankruptcy last week and laid off 1,100 people without severance, got $24.4 million in state tax exemptions, reports the California Budget Project.
U.S. taxpayers may also be out more than $500 million that the U.S. Department of Energy loaned the company, which made solar panels for commercial rooftops.
Solyndra became the darling of Sacramento and venture capitalists with its next new thing solar technology. The technology, however, was too expensive and could not compete in a changing marketplace.
The California Budget Project said the state specifically designed the tax exemptions for the company. Solyndra got 80% of the $30.2 million in tax exemptions claimed as of Aug. 1, the Budget Project said.
Dan Primack at Fortune said the bankruptcy was one of the largest failures suffered by venture capitalists, who sank nearly $1 billion into the now bankrupt firm.
Pasadena Star-News
Relaxing of wildlands restrictions could set off new gold rush…Steve Scauzillo
http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/ci_18831463
A bill gathering steam in Congress would remove protections from more than 43 million acres of wildlands - including 48 acres in the Angeles National Forest - and could start a modern gold rush in the Eastern Sierra ghost town of Bodie.
The measure authored by Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, gathers together forest lands protected as Inventoried Roadless Areas (IRA) as well as Wilderness Study Areas designated by the Bureau of Land Management with the intention of releasing them for oil and gas development, logging, mining and recreational uses.
So far, the bill's biggest opponents come from the area around the ghost town of Bodie, which was once a gold rush town but was deserted after claims petered out in the late 19th century and has since become a state park.
Now, the boom-bust cycle may be revived by the bill when combined with an active proposal to build a modern gold mine from Cougar Gold and its parent company, Electrum Ltd., which operates in many countries, according to environmental groups following the issue.
The Bodie Hills are a naturalists' dream, sprouting blankets of spring wildflowers as far as the eye can see and wild antelope roaming across golden landscapes. Many Southlanders escape to the Eastern Sierra hideaway to camp, hunt and fish in the area, which includes Bodie State Park, Mono Lake and Mammoth Lakes.
"This is a jaw-dropping scenic landscape," said Paul Spitler, senior regional conservation representative for The Wilderness Society in Washington, D.C. "If a gold mine was put in as pitched, it would destroy it. We'd have a network of new roads and huge pits."
"Even to this day, the creek coming out of Bodie is polluted. That's one of the concerns of any new gold mining proposal," said Annette Kondo, communications director for The Wilderness Society.
Likewise, environmental groups protective of the Angeles National Forest say McCarthy's bill opens up areas of the West Fork of the San Gabriel River, the upper Arroyo Seco above La Ca ada Flintridge and Pasadena, the Sheep Mountain and Cucamonga wilderness areas above Claremont and Upland, and Strawberry Peak in the back country near Mount Wilson, to development forces. However, there are no known plans to log or mine these remote Angeles forest lands.
representative for The Wilderness Society in Washington, D.C. "If a gold mine was put in as pitched, it would destroy it. We'd have a network of new roads and huge pits."
"Even to this day, the creek coming out of Bodie is polluted. That's one of the concerns of any new gold mining proposal," said Annette Kondo, communications director for The Wilderness Society.
Likewise, environmental groups protective of the Angeles National Forest say McCarthy's bill opens up areas of the West Fork of the San Gabriel River, the upper Arroyo Seco above La Ca ada Flintridge and Pasadena, the Sheep Mountain and Cucamonga wilderness areas above Claremont and Upland, and Strawberry Peak in the back country near Mount Wilson, to development forces. However, there are no known plans to log or mine these remote Angeles forest lands.
"I would hate to see more development encroaching in our national forests, especially in the Angeles Forest," said Bob Ota, owner of Johnny's Sport Shop in Pasadena on Lincoln Avenue.
Yet, Ota said he would like to see federal lands opened up for more recreational uses such as fishing and hunting.
The bill is a response to studies done by the U.S. Forest Service and the BLM more than three decades ago. These agencies concluded certain designated roadless areas and WSAs were not suitable for the more restrictive wilderness designation and therefore, should be released of protections, said the congressman's press secretary Andrea McCarthy, no relation.
Keeping them in limbo as "wildlands" is an example of "overly restrictive management ... that can restrict access, public enjoyment, and many other activities on these lands," McCarthy wrote in a prepared statement.
In part, McCarthy's bill is an attempt to settle a legal and political dispute dating back 10 years, when President Bill Clinton ordered "IRA" forest lands be protected, meaning no roads allowed. However, hiking, non-motorized biking and even off-roading is permitted.
The roadless ruling was struck down by the courts, prompting the administration of George W. Bush to issue a new order in 2005, which in turn was also struck down by the courts. H.R. 1581 would strip the lands of any federal protection by releasing them back to local communities.
"This bill is simple, straightforward and just plain good government," said McCarthy, the third-ranking Republican in the House. "It does not preclude this or any future Congress from designating these or any other lands as wilderness and most importantly, returns the management of these lands to the local communities who know best how to manage them."
Environmental groups say H.R. 1581 includes too many parcels and doesn't allow for local input.
"This bill affects 60 million acres coast-to-coast. This is a broad, vast, sweeping approach. It takes a one-size- fits-all solution," Spitler said.
Indeed, The Wilderness Society says McCarthy is using old maps and that the group's own calculations of the parcels in the bill add up to 62 million acres affected, not the 43 million acres McCarthy says are affected. They also say the studies done by the Forest Service and BLM were completed in 1979 and 1976 respectively, making them out of date.
"They (studies) do not reflect current values," Spitler said.
McCarthy says the bill would create jobs if oil, gas and other mining activities were allowed. It also allows for more roads, including fire roads, which will facilitate the clearing of dead trees and reduce the threat of "catastrophic wildfires."
Many see the fire road reasoning as disingenuous. They say the bill is really an attack on protected federal lands.
"These lands should keep the protections they have and not lose it," said Erik Counseller, 41, a resident of east Pasadena, a health care budget analyst and avid local hiker.
He said there's no need for more fire roads since too many in the forest are cut but never used.
High Country News
Mega myths of the Keystone XL pipeline… Heather Hansen, Red Lodge Clearing. Heather Hansen is an environmental journalist working with the Red Lodge Clearinghouse /Natural Resources Law Center at CU Boulder, to help raise awareness of natural resource issues
http://www.hcn.org/blogs/range/mega-myths-of-the-keystone-xl-pipeline
Among hundreds of protestors who spent three days in jail in Washington D.C. for publicly opposing the Keystone XL pipeline, a 1,700-mile-long conduit planned to carry crude oil from Canada’s tar sands to Gulf Coast refineries, was Bill McKibben, author and founder of 350.org.
When he was released from the D.C. cell block, I asked McKibben why opposing this particular project is so important to him. “Keystone is a greatest hits of environmental disaster. You get leaks and spills, climate change and utter destruction at the source,” he says. (Read more on the pipeline protests and see a map of the proposed route here)
A Canadian energy company, TransCanada, wants to build the XL to supplement the existing Keystone pipeline—which began pumping 435,000 barrels of oil from Alberta to Illinois last year—to transport an additional 500,000 barrels through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.
Pipeline proponents say the XL will create jobs and lessen U.S. dependency on oil from hostile sources, while hardly disrupting the environment. In weighing whether the risks of the pipeline are worth the rewards, two questions arise: Who will it help? Who will it hurt? When answering them, several myths about the pipeline emerge.
XL myth #1: The pipeline will greatly reduce our reliance on crude from antagonistic nations. This is blatantly false. The U.S. imports 10 million barrels per day (bpd) of petroleum. The Keystone XL would have the capacity to transport 700,000 bpd. Even if every drop of that raw crude was refined in Texas and made it into U.S. fuel coffers—which, given the number of diesel-hungry nations in the world, ishighly unlikely—demand would not be significantly impacted. TransCanada’s literature itself says, “When completed, the Keystone Pipeline System is expected to provide five per cent of current U.S. petroleum-consumption needs.” Five percent does not security make.
XL myth #2: This new crude supply will precipitate a price drop at the pumps. A fuel supply of this size would barely alter consumer prices in the U.S. To the contrary, this project is vulnerable to two things that disrupt supply and cause cost spikes—hurricanes in the Gulf and leaks from the lengthy pipeline.
XL myth #3: This project means a huge number of American jobs. Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) recently told the New York Times that, “Instead of coming to the table with constructive ideas, environmentalists are using a 2010 pipeline spill…to foment opposition to the Canadian Keystone [XL] Pipeline project, which promises to create 100,000 jobs.”
Unfortunately, that’s a cruel exaggeration. In its literature selling the supposed benefits of Keystone XL, TransCanada talks about the number of “person years of employment” that the project will create – not the number of jobs. Montana, for instance, is supposed to see 5,500 person years of employment. That means if the XL lives a projected 50 years, and each person employed works on the project for 10 years, for example, 550 jobs would have been created.
The total “person years of employment” for all six states the pipeline would cut through is 89,500. If all the people employed worked for five years, 17,900 jobs would have been created – not an insignificant number, but certainly a fraction of what Rep. Upton is using to justify the pipeline.
XL myth #4: The pipeline and the environment would be simpatico. This is multi-faceted fallacy.
The Department of State’s (DOS) recently-released report on the pipeline—the Final Environmental Impact Statement—says it would “have no significant impacts on most resources.” It’s a perplexing conclusion given some of the major weaknesses the report itself highlights. For example, the DOS notes that the existing Keystone pipeline has failed 14 times since it began operation last year. During each incident corrosive crude was spewed into the environment; 21,000 gallons of it during one incident. The agency estimates that the XL will fail from 1.78 to 2.51 per year.
Which areas (of the many with sensitive ecology) would be spoiled by these events is impossible to predict, but some places would be particularly undesirable. For example, the XL would cross the Yellowstone River in Montana, which has yet to recover from its last tainting, in which 42,000 gallons of ExxonMobil crude contaminated hundreds of miles of river.
The pipeline would also run over a massive Midwestern underground water source called the Ogallala Aquifer, which waters America’s breadbasket (accounting for about one-fifth the annual U.S. agricultural harvest and $20 billion worth of food on the world market). In a letter to the DOS, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) expressed concern about the Ogallala saying, “If a spill did occur, the potential for oil to reach groundwater in these areas is relatively high given shallow water table depths and the high penneability of the soils overlying the aquifer. In addition, we are concerned that crude oil can remain in the subsurface for decades, despite efforts to remove the oil and natural microbial remediation.” However, in its report the DOS says, “In no spill incident scenario would the entire...aquifer system be adversely affected.” That’s not exactly a reassuring statement.
Even some XL supporters in high-impact states are damning of the DOS analysis. The Northern Plains Resource Council, which is working to help landowners in the pipeline’s proposed path to protect local interests, says the DOS blatantly ignored their request for both emergency response plans and a blueprint for what will happen to the abandoned pipeline when it’s lost profitability.
Another major concern for XL opponents is what happens at the source of the crude mining, which has global implications. In addition to being a water-consumptive and energy-intensive process, the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from drawing petroleum from tar sands are much higher than with conventional extraction. Per barrel of crude sands oil, the amount of carbon dioxide released is 15 to 40 percent higher.
In its letter of concern, the EPA also urged the DOS to press Canada on how it will mitigate GHGs (after which Canadian Environment Minister Peter Kent said his government won’t release even draft regulations for new tar sands plants until the end of 2012).
But in its obfuscating treatment of the GHG issue, the DOS actually compliments the oil sands industry for being less filthy than it used to be. And yet, it estimates the annual CO2 emissions from the XL would be from 3 to 21 million metric tons. “This range is equivalent to annual greenhouse gas emissions from the combustion of fuels in 588,000 to 4,061,000 passenger vehicles,” it says. Adding the equivalent of 4 million vehicles’ worth of climate-altering gases to the atmosphere per year is hardly something to pat a company on the back for, nor is it the environmental albatross we want to hang heavily from our children’s necks.
I share the concerns of XL opponents—including the grandmothers, farmers and tribal chiefs that McKibben stood elbow-to-elbow with in D.C. A “keystone” is a heart, a linchpin, a guiding principle. To the contrary, the Keystone XL should not be central to our energy or environmental future. It’s a project that will likely hurt many more people than it helps.
In his examination of the pipeline plan, President Obama should not be deceptively drawn into XL mythology. The public can comment on the XL until October 9. A final decision on the pipeline is expected by year’s end.
Wall Street Journal
Jobs Focus for Regulations .Article Stock Quotes Comments (50) more in Business
By DEBORAH SOLOMON, CAROL E. LEE and THOMAS CATAN
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903648204576552942759170496.html?KEYWORDS=Deborah+Solomon
President Barack Obama is expected to use his jobs speech to Congress on Thursday to blunt business and Republican criticism that his administration is engaged in regulatory overreach.
In the run-up to the speech, Mr. Obama on Friday abandoned a proposed Environmental Protection Agency rule tightening air-quality standards. The administration also says a regulatory review will save businesses more than $10 billion over five years, and it eased offshore drilling restrictions in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska.
President Obama spoke on Labor Day to a union audience outside General Motors' headquarters in Detroit.
.But the president's pushback has limits. Last week, for example, the federal government sued to block AT&T Corp. from acquiring wireless carrier T-Mobile USA and filed suit against 17 of the world's biggest financial institutions for not adequately disclosing the risks of home loans they sold. The White House also isn't backing away from the Dodd-Frank financial-regulatory overhaul and the health care law.
Mr. Obama applauded the new financial regulations in a Labor Day speech in Detroit, saying "working folks shouldn't be taken advantage of—so we passed tough financial reform." And he touted a new law to stop pay discrimination and regulations to promote worker safety.
Journal Community
..Mr. Obama may also talk Thursday about giving industry more time to comply with other regulations, including environmental rules that businesses have complained are coming too quickly, according to people familiar with the matter.
Mr. Obama has made an effort to appeal to business in the second half of his first term after two initial years of frayed relations. The political goal is to show that Mr. Obama is pro-regulation on some key fronts, but is generally friendly to business.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable have accused the White House of undercutting the economic recovery by imposing new and onerous regulations.
Republicans in Congress say they are causing businesses to delay investments and hiring. On Friday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) said the president's reversal on the air-quality rule "alone will prevent more job losses than any speech the president has given."
Mr. Obama personally said he would jettison the EPA rule that would have reduced smog-forming ozone levels. He said the EPA would consider the rule again in 2013. The decision came after an aggressive industry-led push to oppose the rule, which the EPA estimated would cost as much as $90 billion per year. Chief of Staff William Daley, who was brought in to help smooth relations with business, and Cass Sunstein, who heads the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, are said to have been sympathetic to the industry point of view that the rule was unnecessary and could impose too many costs in the midst of a struggling economy, according to people familiar with the matter. Central to their thinking was that EPA is to reconsider ozone standards again in 2013. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, who proposed the tighter standard, pushed for its implementation.
Mr. Obama's decision infuriated many Democrats and environmental groups, who say he sided with polluters over public health. But White House officials say the president has come to agree that regulations such as the EPA rule hurt job growth. Industry-funded studies said the rule would cost millions of jobs.
On a call Friday with supporters of the rule, a White House official said the EPA is "under unprecedented assault right now" and that Republicans have made the agency "the focus of their efforts." The official referenced a letter from House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia to GOP members vowing to fight 10 "job-destroying regulations" including seven EPA rules. Some Republican presidential candidates have talked about shuttering the EPA, a line that often draws applause.
Jared Bernstein, the former top economic adviser to Vice President Joe Biden now at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, said Mr. Obama's decision on ozone had little to do with creating jobs. "The president is correctly committed to getting rid of outdated and harmful regulations. But to tie it to jobs and economic growth is misguided," he said
In other areas, such as antitrust, the administration has had to juggle the competing demands. In 2009, Mr. Obama vowed to "reinvigorate" antitrust enforcement. Since then, the Obama Justice Department has trod a careful middle path. The administration recently stepped-up challenges to mergers, including Nasdaq OMX Group's offer for NYSE Euronext. Even so, it has disappointed some who thought it would more consistently place the interests of consumers above those of big business.The administration has also resisted efforts to unwind financial rules put in place to prevent a repeat of the 2008 financial crisis. Business groups and Republicans have attacked the rules as onerous but the administration has so far defended the Dodd-Frank law and continued to call for swift implementation.
"The Obama administration has certainly been more aggressive in its merger enforcement than Bush 43," said Melissa Maxman, an antitrust lawyer at Cozen O'Connor law firm in Washington. "But it's come under criticism from consumer and antitrust groups for not being as aggressive as it had promised."
Another EPA Rule Comes Under Attack... Deborah Solomon
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2011/09/06/another-epa-rule-comes-under-attack/
Just ahead of President Barack Obama’s big jobs speech, the American Forest & Paper Association says a pending environmental rule could cost 20,500 jobs or 18% of the industry’s workforce.
In a study to be released Wednesday, the group is taking aim at an Environmental Protection Agency rule to cut pollution from factory boilers, saying the regulation will cause 36 U.S. paper and pulp mills to close. The study comes on the heels of a decision by Mr. Obama to jettison another EPA air quality rule related to ozone that industry complained would kill millions of jobs.
The so-called boiler rule has come under sharp attack from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers, as well as industry, which say the regulations would be too costly and difficult to implement. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor included the rule in his list of 10 “job-destroying regulations” that he has vowed to fight.
The boiler rule would affect paper mills, refineries, chemical factories and other facilities that use boilers, such as universities, hospitals and apartment buildings. Boilers are on-site generators that can provide energy for facilities and factories. Bipartisan legislation is now pending in the House and Senate to delay implementation of the rule, with the aim of having EPA reconsider the regulation.
The AF&PA study, conducted by Fisher International, looked at how many mills would be in danger of closing if they had to comply with the new air quality regulations and install new pollution controls. The study found 36 mills would have to close, impacting 18% of the industry’s workforce.
Supporters of the rule say the benefits far outweigh the costs and counter job loss claims by saying the new controls being required could provide an economic boost.
“Industry is trying to leverage fears about the economic impact and jobs and ignoring that pollution controls are made and installed here in the U.S.,” said Paul G. Billings, vice president of national policy and advocacy for the American Lung Association.
Gina McCarthy, a top EPA official, is expected to testify Thursday before a U.S. House subcommittee about the rule. The agency, which has touted the health benefits of the rule, has delayed issuing final regulations, saying it needs more time for public input. That’s frustrated environmental and public-health groups, which say the rules would save lives and help avoid thousands of heart and asthma attacks.
John Walke, clean air director at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the boiler rule is critical because it will cut mercury and other toxic air emissions from incinerators and boilers at industrial facilities. “The the reason it’s important is those sectors are one of only a handful that still have not had lawful toxic emission standards adopted for them under the 1990 clean air act amendments,” he said.
Donna Harman, president and CEO of AF&PA, said the rule will hurt an already hard-hit sector and said lawmakers and regulators should give the industry more time and impose a less stringent standard.
“We’re not asking to not be regulated. We’re asking to have a regulation that can be achieved based on the technology that’s currently available,” she said.
Contra Costa Times
Solyndra files for bankruptcy, listing nearly $784 million in debt…George Avalos, Oakland Tribune
http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_18834927?nclick_check=1
Solyndra filed for bankruptcy on Tuesday, listing $783.8 million in secured debts that included $527.8 million that it owes to the U.S. government, court papers show.
The Fremont-based solar manufacturer listed assets valued at $859 million, according to U.S. Bankruptcy Court records in Delaware. The filing included Solyndra and its principal owner, 360 Degree Solar Holdings.
In the weeks leading up to the company's shutdown, Solyndra scrambled to find a bridge loan to stay afloat, court records show. Despite intense negotiations with lenders, the company failed to cobble together a new financing package to rescue itself.
The company, which received $535 million in loan guarantees from the U.S. Department of Energy and $1.1 billion from private venture capitalists, says it will scout for a buyer in the coming weeks. If it can't find a buyer, it will then attempt to sell its assets in chunks
Solyndra's meltdown has sparked an economic and political debate about the viability of the solar energy industry and why the federal government picked Solyndra to receive the loan guarantees.
In a May 2010 visit to Solyndra's Fremont operations, President Barack Obama touted the company as a shining example of how the green energy sector could be a major part of the nation's energy future. House Republicans have criticized the Obama administration's loan guarantee for the company.
Solyndra abruptly closed its doors last week and jettisoned about 1,100 workers with scant notice.
During 2010, Solyndra lost $329 million on sales of $142 million, according to the bankruptcy filing.
Solyndra plans to use the coming four weeks to seek buyers before undertaking a liquidation of its assets, W.G. Stover, the company's chief financial officer, stated in a court filing. The company has obtained $4 million in short-term financing to tide it over for September.
"The debtors intend to pursue all potential turnkey buyers, specifically interested parties in both the United States and overseas who may have a particular interest in acquiring the debtors' business," Stover told the court.
When the last-minute gambits to rescue Solyndra fell through on Aug. 30, company executives determined they had little choice but to pull the plug on the once-sparkling business.
"Without the bridge financing, Solyndra was unable to continue operations," Stover stated in the court filing. "As a result, on August 31, 2011, Solyndra suspended its manufacturing operations and terminated the vast majority of its workforce." "Without the bridge financing, Solyndra was unable to continue operations," Stover stated in the court filing. "As a result, on August 31, 2011, Solyndra suspended its manufacturing operations and terminated the vast majority of its workforce."