Ask Your Group to Support a National Pollution Cap For Greenhouse Gases

On December 2, 2009, The Center and 350.org took an historic step in the desperate fight against climate catastrophe: We petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency to establish a national pollution cap for greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. If you belong to a group, we need your organization to stand with us by signing on to the letter below. Email your group's name, along with a contact person and title, to Rose Braz, the Center’s climate campaign coordinator, at rbraz@biologicaldiversity.org.

Now is the time to enforce the Clean Air Act — not gut it. Together, we can save the Clean Air Act and put it to work to save our climate.

December 2009

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson
Environmental Protection Agency
Ariel Rios Building
1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20460

Dear Administrator Jackson,

We are writing in support of the petition filed by the Center for Biological Diversity and 350.org to cap greenhouse gas pollution under the Clean Air Act. Specifically, the petition seeks to have greenhouse gases designated as “criteria” air pollutants under the Clean Air Act and to cap atmospheric carbon dioxide levels at 350 parts per million (ppm) — the level leading scientists say is necessary to avoid the worst impacts of global warming — through the national ambient air quality (NAAQS) program.

For four decades, the Clean Air Act has protected the air we breathe through a proven, successful system of pollution control that saves lives and creates economic benefits exceeding its costs by many times. It’s time to fully use our strongest existing tool for reducing greenhouse gas pollution: the Clean Air Act.

Setting science-based national pollution caps for greenhouse gases would mark a critical step in the fight against global warming. And the scientific consensus is clear: We must reduce the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide to 350 parts per million or below to avoid global catastrophe.

Eighty percent of respondents to a survey by the Yale Project on Climate Change said the government should regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant. And the top two reasons cited for the need for government action were: providing a better life for our children and grandchildren (66 percent) and saving many plant and animal species from extinction (65 percent).

The Clean Air Act provides a comprehensive system of pollution control, with a track record of success that must now be employed to address the grave problem of carbon pollution and global warming. The Clean Air Act can work immediately without new climate legislation or in conjunction with new climate legislation. Now is the time to enforce the Clean Air Act, not gut it.

We urge you to move swiftly to grant the petition and enforce the Clean Air Act.

Sincerely,

Rose Braz
Center for Biological Diversity
351 California St., Suite 600
San Francisco, CA 94104
Phone: 415.436.9682 x 319
Cell: 510.435.6809
rbraz@biologicaldiversity.org
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org
www.twitter.com/CBD_Climate