EPA Postpones Toxic Pollution Regulations

The Environmental Protection Agency or EPA for short has decided to indefinitely delay regulations to reduce the amount of toxic pollution from both boilers and incinerators. This move comes in response to a request from industry groups, which claim it would be too expensive. What price do we put on human lives these days, or I suppose profits are more important, at least in Washington.

The announcement came on Monday and was another setback for a new rule that the EPA claims will help in averting thousands of heart attacks and asthma cases each and every year. In February of this, the EPA had announced changes it had made to make it much cheaper to comply with the new standards without any diminishing of the public health benefits. However, both Industry groups, and congressional representatives from both the Republican and Democratic parties had been critical of the rule because of its expense and scope.

According to the new EPA rule, more than 13,000 large boilers across the nation would have to install pollution controls within three years of the new regulation taking effect. The EPA could not say when that would be now since the postponement. It said it would work as expeditiously as possible.