Posted on 12/02/2010 8:11:46 AM PST by Nachum
(CNSNews.com) - The Environmental Protection Agency, marking its 40th anniversary this week, announced that "sustainability concepts" will govern its programs from now on.
EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said her agency has commissioned a "groundbreaking" National Research Council study that will help the agency "incorporate sustainability into the way the agency approaches environmental protection."
The announcement signifies an important step toward building a society that can meet its needs while preserving the ability of future generations to meet their needs, the EPA said in a Nov. 30 news release.
Historically, environmental programs have focused on reducing air pollution and water pollution and identifying and monitoring chemical and environmental risks to human health and the environment. But, the EPA explained, today’s challenges involve the sustainable use of energy, water, materials and land – “and require solutions that stress the linkages between energy use, water use, environmental protection, human health, quality of life, and the global economy.”
What does that mean? The EPA gives an example of a sustainability solution – the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, a public-private international partnership that’s intended to improve the health of African women and at the same time protect the Third World environment.
In nations where women still cook over smoky fires, giving them inexpensive, clean-burning stoves will not only improve their health, the thinking goes – it also will reduce pressure on natural resources (wood for fires), protect women who will no longer have to forage for fuel, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. One solution solves a variety of health and environmental problems, in other words.
In 1983, the National Research Council conducted a study that helped the EPA incorporate "risk assessment" and "risk management" in its work. Twenty-seven years later, the EPA is asking the NRC do another study, to help the EPA shift its focus to "a sustainability framework."
WaterSense
Two weeks ago – in what could be construed as a “sustainability” move ahead of the “sustainability” study – the EPA announced the nation’s first “WaterSense” homes.
WaterSense is a partnership program sponsored by EPA that seeks to protect the nation’s water supply by offering people a simple way to use less water.
The program will help homebuyers cut their water and energy use while at the same time saving money on utility bills.
The EPA said four WaterSense-labeled new homes built by KB Home in Roseville, California, will help families save an average of 10,000 gallons of water and at least $100 on utility costs each year.
“The construction of the first WaterSense labeled homes, and the plans to build more, mark the beginning of an innovative approach that gives homeowners the chance to cut their water and energy bills and protect a vital environmental resource,” EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said.
WaterSense homes use about 20 percent less water than a typical new home, the EPA says. They include efficient plumbing fixtures and hot-water delivery systems, water-efficient landscape design, and other water and energy-efficient features.
As CNSNews.com has previously reported, the EPA administrator already has made “environmental justice” a priority for her agency.
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How did the earth get along all these billions of years without the EPA?
The House needs to defund and defang the EPA.
Looks like Agenda 21.
Is this why we have an EPA?
Education, EPA, Energy, NPR -- these are the first four parts of government that I would defund 100%.
Water does not get "used". It's borrowed and returned.
“sustainable use of energy, water, materials and land”
The ‘land’ part scares me to death.
Like the UN, the EPA has drifted so far from its original mission, it has become a monster.
Also like the UN, it has become the home of ideological bureaucrats with a constant stream of money, searching for a mission.
No good can come from this.
What is “sustainable” anyway? I have yet to see agency or anyone actually define it.
“We have an Environmental Justice court order here to bulldoze your property sir”- Six figure government clerk, 2021.
They won't. Congress likes these agencies because it allows them to play the almighty and powerful overseer.
This stuff is scary.
It's about Control. Ownership of land gives you too much of it.
It IS Agenda 21. Go to freedom21.org for the counter movement.
“Sustainable development” is nothing less than the state totally controlling everything about your life and property.
Requiring a definition usually ends any discussion with a leftist,
and it is the reason that they choose forums in which no questions can be asked.
don’t forget the FDA...
"Sustainability" means "whatever leftists think they want at the moment".
This is not to be confused with what leftists said they wanted yesterday or what they'll say they want tomorrow.
They want what they want, they want it now, and if they don't get it the world will end.
This is how things are to be forever.
Can I hear a “Soylent Green?”
Actually, seriously,
leftists DO derive their power from ambiguity and unequal application of law.
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