Office of the Attorney General: NJ Joins Notice of Intent to Sue EPA over Failure to Act on Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Marine Vessels, Aircraft, Non-Road Vehicles

FROM THE OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

July 31, 2008

TRENTON – Attorney General Anne Milgram announced today that New Jersey has joined with California and other jurisdictions in issuing a notice of intent to sue the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over EPA’s failure to act on petitions requesting it regulate greenhouse gas emissions from ocean-going vessels, aircraft and non-road vehicles and engines.

According to Milgram, New Jersey, California and the other jurisdictions have petitioned the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from large marine vessels, aircraft and non-road vehicles and engines in keeping with the federal Clean Air Act. In each case, the petitions asked EPA to find that greenhouse gas emissions from the particular source endanger public health and welfare, and that EPA propose and adopt regulations limiting such emissions. Each petition also requested a response within 180 days of its filing.

To date, said Milgram, the only response EPA has provided came in the form of a July 11, 2008 Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for regulating greenhouse gas emissions. The Advanced Notice for Rulemaking, however, did not make the endangerment determination sought in the states’ three petitions, nor did it trigger the rulemaking process for regulating greenhouse gases from marine vessels, aircraft or non-road vehicles and engines. Rather, it merely describes the three petitions submitted by the states and invites comment on them.

“New Jersey has been doing its part to address global warming, and it’s time for EPA to do the same,” said Milgram. “To date, EPA has been unresponsive to the states’ three petitions. Meanwhile, ocean-going vessels, aircraft and non-road vehicles continue to gain in significance as a source of harmful greenhouse gas emissions and, ultimately, as contributors to harmful climate change.”

“As a national leader in the battle against global warming, New Jersey has set ambitious goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions” said DEP Commissioner Lisa P. Jackson. ”To accomplish them, we must limit emissions from all sources.”

“Once again,” Commissioner Jackson said, “we call upon the federal government to set national standards that will aid, rather than undermine state efforts."

Attorney General Milgram, who testified before the EPA on this issue in 2007, noted that state-specific information contained in the states’ July 31, 2008 notice-of-intent-to-sue letter speaks of the potentially disastrous impact of climate-change-related rising seas in New Jersey.

The letter notes that New Jersey “has 130 miles of highly-populated coastline as well as thousands of acres of coastal salt marshes and tidal flats, coastal wetlands and tidal freshwater wetlands” that would be inundated and ultimately harmed by rising seas.

The letter also notes that, according to a July 2008 report by the Center for Integrative Environmental Research at the University of Maryland, the most significant economic and ecological impacts in the state associated with climate change will occur along New Jersey’s coastline.

Entitled Economic Impacts of Climate Change on New Jersey, the report explains that New Jersey’s economy is especially vulnerable because of coastal development and the high rate of coastal erosion and subsequent water elevation related to climate change. The notice-of-intent-to-sue letter to EPA cites information in the report that erosion and rising seas could impact New Jersey’s coastal shipping and transportation infrastructure, and could eventually result in billions of dollars in lost tourism revenue as well.

In addition to California and New Jersey, other jurisdictions joining the notice-of-intent-to-sue letter include Connecticut, Oregon, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and New York City.

Deputy Attorneys General Kevin Auerbacher and Jung Kim of the Division of Law are handling the matter on behalf of the state.