WATCHING WASHINGTON ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES TAKE CENTER STAGE

With Patrick Crow These are heady days for environmentalists in Washington, now that a "greener" Clinton administration is in office. The Senate government affairs committee has reported out a bill to raise the Environmental Protection Agency to cabinet status. The proposed Department of the Environment would be the 15th cabinet department. The House of Representatives has begun hearings on a similar bill. Although EPA is a quasicabinet agency now, proponents say the change would increase its

April 5, 1993

2 min read

These are heady days for environmentalists in Washington, now that a "greener" Clinton administration is in office.

The Senate government affairs committee has reported out a bill to raise the Environmental Protection Agency to cabinet status. The proposed Department of the Environment would be the 15th cabinet department.

The House of Representatives has begun hearings on a similar bill. Although EPA is a quasicabinet agency now, proponents say the change would increase its effectiveness in the U.S. and abroad.

The Senate bill also would abolish the Council on Environmental Quality, a White House panel that often thwarted EPA initiatives during the Bush administration. And it would create a Bureau of Environmental Statistics that green groups want.

OTHER MOVES

Separately, last week a group of scientists and educators proposed establishing a National Institute for the Environment (NIE) to improve the scientific basis for making decisions on environmental problems.

NIE would be an independent, nonregulatory agency focusing only on environmental research, information, assessment, and education regarding U.S. and global environmental issues.

Supporters said, "The present federal environmental R&D system is not working well enough to address the enormous challenges posed by problems such as global climate change, deforestation, mass species extinction and ecosystem destruction, depletion of the ozone layer, resource exhaustion, and rapid population growth."

Meanwhile, the Wilderness Society challenged the oil industry's stance that exploration of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge east of Alaska's Prudhoe Bay field could create 735,000 jobs nationwide.

The issue is moot anyway because the Clinton administration opposes ANWR drilling. The Wilderness Society said 24 senators and 51 House members have endorsed a bill to permanently close ANWR's Coastal Plain to drilling.

OFFSHORE STUDIES

Last week the National Ocean Industries Association urged the House interior appropriations subcommittee to give the Minerals Management Service more funds for environmental studies.

Aston Hinds, Baroid Drilling Fluids Inc. vice-president for environmental operations, testified for NOIA.

He said, "We suspect that a large number of (environmental) concerns could be addressed with adequate funding of Outer Continental Shelf studies.

"Recent budgetary decisions have hampered the program by reducing funding in the face of increasing demands that the OCS environmental studies program meet its mandates."