Read more about EPA's proposed rule and mercury emissions.

The nanomaterials pose serious risks:

Measuring three-billionths of an inch or less, they are small enough to enter the lungs and perhaps even be absorbed through the skin. Experiments in animals have shown that once in the body, they can travel to the brain and other organs.

Scott Walsh, a project manager at Washington-based Environmental Defense, called the EPA grants "a great start" but decried the federal government's failure to invest more in the effort.

"Government is not yet investing enough to ensure that the risks are discovered in the laboratory instead of in our bodies, our back yards and our workplaces," Walsh said. "We're probably $90 million shy of what we need to be spending to do the job right...."

[C]ompared to the federal investment in nanotech's "applications," the investment in the field's "implications" remains far too small, said Hope Shand, research director for ETC Group, an Ottawa-based research and advocacy organization that has called for a moratorium on commercializing nanotech products until governments adopt stricter oversight programs.

"Hundreds of nano products are on the market today, and there is no regulatory oversight to ensure that new manufactured nanomaterials are safe for human health and the environment," Shand said. "The U.S. government is spending nearly a billion dollars per year to promote nanotech. In comparison, EPA's new funding is like a nanodrop in the bucket."

• Enforcement of the Clean Air Act has come to an almost complete stop. Only 9 lawsuits were filed from January 19, 2001 through January 18, 2004, compared to 61 in the three years ending on January 18, 2001.
• Clean Water Act enforcement has met a similar fate, as lawsuits declined from 56 in the three years ending January 18, 2001, to only 22 in the three years ending January 18, 2004.
• Only last week, the Washington Post headlined extensive efforts by some water utilities to hide evidence that drinking water standards for lead are not being met. But the Justice Department filed only one civil lawsuit for violation of Safe Drinking Water Act standards in the first three years of the Bush Administration.
• Lawsuits for violation of federal hazardous waste law (the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act) have dropped from 19 to only 5 over comparable three year time periods.
• The nation’s largest energy companies (and biggest polluters) seem to be enjoying an extended vacation from enforcement actions. While the Justice Department has continued to litigate the cases it inherited from the previous Administration, it has filed new lawsuits against only three energy companies between January 19, 2001, and January 18 of 2004. That represents almost a 90% percent decline when compared to the twenty-eight lawsuits filed against power companies, oil companies, and pipelines in the three years before the Bush Administration took office. While refineries and coal-fired power plants appear virtually immune from prosecution, the Justice Department did find time to take a dry cleaner to federal court for failure to pay an administrative penalty.
• Enforcement has dwindled even where the Agency has clear evidence of serious and ongoing violations of environmental law. EPA has referred fourteen Clean Air Act cases against power plants to the Justice Department with a recommendation that a complaint be filed. But these and other enforcement actions have been stopped at the political level, because they involve violations of “New Source Review” regulations the Administration has sought to undo.

Environmental Integrity Project, Polluters Breathe Easier-Environmental Court Action Declines, October 12, 2004

1. Weakening air pollution controls. "The administration initiative known as Clear Skies, which generated lukewarm support in Congress during Mr. Bush's first term, is about to come out of mothballs.*** Clear Skies establishes lower emission standards for pollutants like nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide and mercury, but environmental groups complain that it does not reduce them as much or as soon as levels set forth in a competing bill or by enforcement of the Clean Air Act."
2. Allowing global warming. "For now, the Bush administration has no intention of regulating the heat-trapping gases, like carbon dioxide, which scientists believe contribute to global warming."
3. Eviscerating the Endangered Species Act. "A top priority of powerful Congressional Republicans is the 31-year-old Endangered Species Act. Representative Richard W. Pombo of California, chairman of the Committee on Resources, has made efforts to raise the hurdles that scientists must clear to ensure a government determination that a species is endangered and cut back the amount of critical habitat required. Habitat designations pave the way for land use controls."
4. Destroying public lands for oil and gas drilling. "The energy bill will pass, [Richard W. Pombo (R-CA)] said, adding that any bill produced in the House would open 2,000 acres of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for energy exploration.*** Several pending actions to open up wild areas of the West to energy development could be made final in the coming weeks, touching on areas like Roan Plateau in Colorado and Otero Mesa in New Mexico."
5. Disrupting ocean ecosystems. "[Another] priority, Mr. Pombo said, is a package of legislation dealing with ocean resources, including issues like the controls appropriate for commercial and sport fisheries, the protection of endangered marine mammals and the mandate of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration."

The raging Western wildfires of recent years have often been blamed on management practices that promoted dense, overpacked forests. But a new study indicates global warming may be the main culprit.

Challenging the conventional wisdom that today's severe wildfires are unnatural and unprecedented, researchers have found that parts of the West experienced destructive blazes during a warm, drought-plagued period in the Middle Ages.

The linkage suggests that as the climate warms, damaging wildfires will continue to strike the West. "If we are just at the beginning of dramatic warming … we can simply expect larger, more severe fires," said Grant A. Meyer, a co-author of the study, published in today's journal Nature.

The Washington Post reported today on the Bush administration's efforts to suppress the conclusions of an eight-nation report that endorses broad policies aimed at mitigating global warming. The 1,200 page report, leaked to reporters last week, chronicles historic increases in Arctic temperatures due in part to human-generated greenhouse gas emissions. The State Department argued that the report, which represents the work of over 300 scientists, "lacks the evidence to prepare detailed policy proposals," according to the Post.

An early draft of the policy statement -- which is set to be issued two weeks after the 144-page scientific overview is released Monday -- included a paragraph saying that to achieve the goals set under a 1992 international climate change treaty known as the Rio Accord, the "Arctic Council urges the member states to individually and when appropriate, jointly, adopt climate change strategies across relevant sectors. These strategies should aim at the reduction of the emission of greenhouse gases."

The administration has pushed to drop that section. As one senior State Department official who asked not to be identified put it, "We're bound by the administration's position. We're not going to make global climate policy at the Arctic Council."

And what's at stake if the U.S. government doesn't seek to curb global-warming?

Those changes are already having practical impacts, including a reduction in the number of days each year that the tundra is hard enough to be driven on or drilled safely for oil. They can be expected to have even greater impact in the near future, the report predicts, in terms of agriculture, wildlife ranges for terrestrial and marine plants and animals, and global shoreline flooding because of increases in sea level caused by melting ice.

Read both Washington Post articles: Juliet Eilperin and Rick Weiss, Report Sounds Alarm on the Pace of Global Climate Change Oct. 31, 2004 page A08; Juliet Eilperin, U.S. Wants No Warming Proposal Washington Nov. 4, 2004 page A13.