The EPA isn’t satisfied with applying ridiculous, expensive regulation on the sectors they already infest. Now they want to regulate pretty much everything else.

They just released a 564 page document that lays out their plan to get their claws into every sector of everything, all the time. (Note: The link loads a ridiculously large file.)

Coverage of all key vehicle, engine, and equipment sub-sectors in the entire transportation sector so that GHG emission standards are set not only for cars and light trucks, but for heavy-duty vehicles, non-road engines and equipment, including locomotive and marine engines, and aircraft as well.

If it rolls, floats or flies they want to control it. Hell, even if it’s stationary and has any kind of engine, they get to determine how it works. Because they’re such good engineers and all.

Or maybe not. This is one of many passages that highlights their ignorance:

Locomotives, as an example, have significant potential to recover energy otherwise dissipated as heat during braking. An 8,000-ton coal train descending through 5,000 feet of elevation converts 30 MW-hrs of potential energy to frictional and dynamic braking energy. Storing that energy onboard quickly enough to keep up with the energy generation rate presents a challenge, but may provide a major viable GHG emissions reduction strategy even if only partially effective.

Ahem. That’s the way diesel locomotives already work, and have for quite some time. The diesel engines don’t directly power the wheels. Instead, they’re tuned to operate at their peak efficiency and generate electricity for electric motors that run the wheels. When breaking, those motors become generators and the electricity is captured in a battery.

Any first year engineering student could have told them that. Perhaps they should hire one.

Considering how many planes we have in the air at any given moment, the controllers do a damn fine job of keeping them from crashing into each other. They appear to know what they’re doing, and how to do it. But the EPA thinks it knows better:

Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum (RSVM) allows air traffic controllers and pilots to reduce the standard required vertical separation from 2,000 feet to 1,000 feet for aircraft flying at altitudes between 29,000 and 41,000 feet. This increases the number of flight altitudes at which aircraft maximize fuel and time efficiency. RSVM has led to about a 2 percent decrease in fuel burn. Continuous Descent Approach is a procedure that enables continuous descent of the aircraft on a constant slope toward landing, as opposed to a staggered or staged approach, thus allowing for a more efficient speed requiring less fuel and reducing GHG emissions.

So they want to move planes closer together in mid air to save a miniscule amount of fuel. Brilliant.

They also included a blurb about contrails, which should give the tin-foil-hat crowd more to blather about:

Petitioners contend that aircraft emissions contribute to climate change also by modifying cloud cover patterns. Aircraft engines emit water vapor, which petitioners identify as a GHG that can form condensation trails, or “contrails,” when released at high altitude. Contrails are visible line shaped clouds composed of ice crystals that form in cold, humid atmospheres. Persistent contrails often evolve and spread into extensive cirrus cloud cover that is indistinguishable from naturally occurring cirrus clouds. The petitioners state that over the long term this contributes to climate change.

No proof, of course, they simply “contend” this contributes to climate change.

Two stroke engines are an inexpensive and simple way to provide power for lawnmowers, snow blowers, chain saws and the like. Four stoke engines burn cleaner and more efficent, but they are heavier, more complex and more expensive. Guess what the EPA is recommending. Yep.

I have a big lawn, and my lawnmower has a standard two stroke engine. It’s loud and manly sounding and tells everyone within a block and a half “Hey, I’m Mowing My Lawn.” In the entire course of a summer I go through about a gallon of gasoline. When it finally conks out, will I be forced to spend a couple of hundred dollars extra to replace it with a four stroke? Even if it lasts ten years it’s not a cost effective way to reduce the emissions of ten gallons of gas. But that won’t matter to the EPA. It’s not coming out of their pockets.

They also discuss requiring automatic transmissions for off road equipment.

They provide this example of just how far reaching their tendrils will be:

For example, consider a hypothetical 500 MW electric utility boiler firing a bituminous coal that is well-controlled for traditional pollutants. Such a boiler, operating more than 7000 hours per year (out of a possible 8760), can emit approximately 4 million tons of CO2 per year, or more than 580 tons per hour. Assuming a 100 tpy significance level (rather than the current zero level for GHGs), any change resulting in just 10 additional minutes of utilization over the course of a year at such a source would be enough to result in an increase of 100 tons and potentially subject the change to PSD. By contrast, to be considered a modification for NOx, the same change would require approximately 36 additional hours of operation assuming that the hypothetical source had a low-NOx burner, and 90 additional hours of operation assuming that the source also employed a selective catalytic reduction add-on control device.

They want to control a boiler down to the minute. Amazing.

There are 70 categories and subcategories they want to regulate.

EPA has already promulgated NSPS for more than 70 source categories and subcategories and we could add GHG emission standards, as appropriate, to the standards for existing source
categories.

And just in case they feel like it, they can change what is and isn’t considered a global warming gas on a whim:

EPA can add or delete pollutants from the list consistent with certain criteria described
below.

They want to regulate anything that emits a total of 10 tons of global warming gasses per year. A single Taco Bell generates that much methane just from burrito farts. Expect them to add burrito farts to their list.

It’s interesting to note they’ve nearly abandoned the phrase “global warming” and replaced it with “climate change.” They use “global warming” a mere 27 times in 564 pages. “Climate Change” appears 212 times.

This is yet another example of a government agency run amok. If they get their way expect everything to be more expensive, more complicated, and more of a pain in the ass.

For more examples of EPA incompetence, psudo-science, and downright fraud, check these past articles on The Hittman Chronicle and The Facts:

Bottom Fishing

The EPA Report