States Sue Over Global Warming

Associated Press 02:00 AM Apr, 27, 2006

WASHINGTON -- Ten states fired a new legal salvo at the federal government Thursday in a long-running court battle over global warming and pollution from power plants.

The states, joined by environmental groups, sued the Environmental Protection Agency over its decision not to regulate carbon dioxide pollution as a contributor to global warming.

New York, California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin filed the lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

The states, led by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, want the government to require tighter pollution controls on the newest generation of power plants.

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"We feel it's incumbent on EPA to regulate carbon emissions from those power plants now in order to help us get our arms around global warming," said Spitzer spokesman Marc Violette.

EPA spokeswoman Jennifer Wood said the agency "will review all options and make an informed decision on how to proceed. EPA's climate protection programs continue to exceed the agency's greenhouse gas emissions goals and are on target to meet the president's 18 percent goal to reduce greenhouse gas intensity by 2012."

Also suing the government are the cities of Washington and New York, as well as Environmental Defense, Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club.

New York and other states have fought with the Bush administration for years over carbon dioxide emissions.

In July 2005, a three-judge panel in the same court upheld the EPA's decision not to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from cars and trucks under the Clean Air Act. The agency argues the law does not authorize it to regulate emissions to reduce global warming, and maintains there is not enough scientific data to support such a move.

The new lawsuit was filed largely in response to the 2005 ruling, in the hopes that the courts will rule specifically whether the Clean Air Act can be used to fight global warming.

"We think this is the case that will decide that question," said Natural Resources Defense Council lawyer David Doniger.

Environmentalists say 40 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States come from power plants. Carbon dioxide is believed to be the greatest single contributor to global warming.

A growing number of scientific studies bolster the theory that increased levels of carbon dioxide, methane and other gases are accumulating in the atmosphere, where they trap heat and raise the earth's average temperature.

IMPEACH BUSH

CONGRESS SUBVERTS FEDERAL BUDGET PROCESS TO OPEN ARCTIC REFUGE TO OIL DRILLING

Statement by Heather Taylor, NRDC Deputy Legislative Director

WASHINGTON -- Unable to pass a plan to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling through normal legislative channels, congressional leaders today subverted the federal budget process to get their way, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The Senate Budget Committee led by Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) today approved a 'stand-alone' budget measure designed exclusively to allow drilling the Arctic Refuge. The vote was 11-10 along party lines with one Republican absent. A Senate budget resolution is the only bill cannot be filibustered.

This comes on the heels of an oil spill discovered over the weekend from a pipeline on Alaska's North Slope. Early estimates in news reports indicate that this may bill the largest spill to ever hit the region. (See "Alaska Oil Spill Could Be Area's Largest." )

Following is a statement by Heather Taylor, NRDC's deputy legislative director:

"The people who want to see oil companies drilling in the Arctic have failed time and again to make it happen through legitimate legislative means. Every time the answer has been no. Now they're breaking the rules so they can bypass the lawful democratic process altogether. We hope the full Senate has higher regard for its own integrity, and that members will put a stop to this lowdown ploy.

"The Arctic drilling measure is narrow, special interest politics at its very worst. It is not a cure for our energy addiction, or for our fiscal one. It's just one more quick fix for an oil junkie."

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AT&T Seeks to Hide Spy Docs
By Ryan Singel

AT&T is seeking the return of technical documents presented in a lawsuit that allegedly detail how the telecom giant helped the government set up a massive internet wiretap operation in its San Francisco facilities.

In papers filed late Monday, AT&T argued that confidential technical documents provided by an ex-AT&T technician to the Electronic Frontier Foundation shouldn't be used as evidence in the case and should be returned.

The documents, which the EFF filed under a temporary seal last Wednesday, purportedly detail how AT&T diverts internet traffic to the National Security Agency via a secret room in San Francisco and allege that such rooms exist in other AT&T switching centers.

The EFF filed the class-action lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Northern California in January, seeking damages from AT&T on behalf of AT&T customers for alleged violation of state and federal laws.

Mark Klein, a former technician who worked for AT&T for 22 years, provided three technical documents, totaling 140 pages, to the EFF and to The New York Times, which first reported last December that the Bush administration was eavesdropping on citizens' phone calls without obtaining warrants.

Klein issued a detailed public statement last week, saying he came forward because he believes the government's extrajudicial spying extended beyond wiretapping of phone calls between Americans and a party with suspected ties to terrorists, and included wholesale monitoring of the nation's internet communications.

AT&T built a secret room in its San Francisco switching station that funnels internet traffic data from AT&T Worldnet dialup customers and traffic from AT&T's massive internet backbone to the NSA, according to a statement from Klein.

Klein's duties included connecting new fiber-optic circuits to that room, which housed data-mining equipment built by a company called Narus, according to his statement.

Narus' promotional materials boast that its equipment can scan billions of bits of internet traffic per second, including analyzing the contents of e-mails and e-mail attachments and even allowing playback of internet phone calls.

While AT&T's open filings did not confirm the details of Klein's statement, they did not dispute the legitimacy of his claims, and the company's filing included a sealed affidavit attesting to the sensitivity of the documents.

The company asked for a hearing Thursday to determine whether the documents could be used in the class-action lawsuit, whether they would be unsealed or whether the EFF would have to return them. The EFF filed a rebuttal, calling that time frame unworkable and accusing AT&T of not following normal court rules.

AT&T's lawyers also told the court that intense press coverage surrounding the case, including Wired News' publication of Klein's statement, was revealing the company's trade secrets, "causing grave injury to AT&T." The lawyers argued that unsealing the documents "would cause AT&T great harm and potentially jeopardize AT&T's network, making it vulnerable to hackers, and worse."

The EFF filed the documents last week under a temporary seal when it asked the judge to force AT&T to stop the alleged internet spying until the case goes to trial.

Klein's statement and documents are the only direct evidence filed so far by the EFF, and without them its case could be weakened.

It is not clear whether AT&T has served legal papers to Klein.

As of last week, Klein was represented by Miles Ehrlich, who until January served as a U.S. attorney in San Francisco, prosecuting white-collar crime. Klein is now also represented by two lawyers from the powerhouse law firm Morrison & Foerster, including James J. Brosnahan, who is best known for representing John Walker Lindh, the Marin County, California, man found fighting for the Taliban in Afghanistan.

The EFF declined to comment on the filing, while AT&T did not return a call seeking comment. The case is Hepting v. AT&T.

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The number of people with medical problems linked to the 9/11 attacks on New York has risen to at least 15,000.

The figure, put together for the BBC, counts those receiving treatment for problems related to breathing in dust.

Many of the victims say the government offered false reassurances that the Manhattan air was safe and are now pursuing a class-action lawsuit.

On Tuesday, a coroner said the death of a policeman who developed a respiratory disease was "directly linked" to 9/11.

James Zadroga - who worked at Ground Zero - died in January. The New Jersey coroner's ruling was the first of its kind.

WTC 'cough'

Jeff Endean used to be the macho leader of a police Swat firearms team. Now, he has trouble breathing and survives on the cocktail of drugs he takes every day.

Kelly Colangelo, an IT specialist, used to have good health but now endures a range of problems including asthma and sinus pain.

"It worried me that I've been damaging my health just being in my home," she told the BBC News website. "It also worries me that I see the health impact on the [the emergency crews at the scene]. We were also exposed and I wonder if in 10-15 years from now, am I going to be another victim?"

Both are victims of what used to be called "World Trade Center cough", an innocuous sounding condition that many thought would pass once the dust that rose from the attacks of 9/11 had blown away.

But the medical problems have not merely intensified; the list of victims has grown alarmingly at the same time.

The apparent cause? The long line of contaminants carried by the dust into the lungs of many of those at, or near, the scene on that fateful day.

'Real' figure

One list of sufferers has been compiled at the Mount Sinai Medical Center. Its World Trade Center Screening Programme has 16,000 people on its books, of whom about half - 8,000 - require treatment.


A further 7,000 firefighters are recorded as having a wide range of medical problems, producing a total of 15,000. But the overall numbers affected could easily be far higher.
As the US government's newly appointed "health czar" John Howard confirmed to the BBC, there were between 30,000 and 50,000 people at or near Ground Zero who might have been exposed to the hazardous dust and no one really knows how many are suffering problems now.

Consisting of billions of microscopic particles, the dust was especially toxic because of its contents.

A grim list includes lead from 50,000 computers, asbestos from the twin towers' structures and dangerously high levels of alkalinity from the concrete.

Long time

Many of the people now suffering were sent to Ground Zero to help search for survivors. Others volunteered. Still more just happened to be living or working in the area.

The latter feel particularly aggrieved, even betrayed.

In the days following the attacks, the head of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) declared that monitoring operations had proved the "air was safe to breathe". And with that reassurance, the authorities reopened the globally important financial hub of Wall Street.

At the time it was seen as a critical morale-booster to a wounded nation.

Yet now the federal courts have allowed a class-action lawsuit to be filed against those very authorities.

Last month, a judge described the EPA's reassurances as "misleading" and "shocking the conscience". The legal process could last years.


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