Inspector General: EPA Could Be Relying On Fraudulent Data
By: Marc Morano - Climate DepotJune 1, 2014 8:01 AM
Inspector General: EPA Could Be Relying On Fraudulent Data
http://www.thegwpf.org/inspector-general-epa-could-be-relying-on-fraudulent-data/
Inspector general warns agency lacks process for uncovering fraud in pollution data
As the Environmental Protection Agency prepares major new regulations on carbon emissions, the agency’s top watchdog is warning that fraudulent environmental data may be influencing its work.
The findings could provide fodder for critics of the new regulation, who warn that it could cost the U.S. economy billions and cause hundreds of thousands of Americans to lose their jobs.
“The EPA lacks a due diligence process for potential fraudulent environmental data,” the agency’s inspector general warned in a report released on Thursday. Existing processes for weeding out such data, the report said, are “out of date or unimplemented.”
“Our survey of EPA regional staff on their knowledge and use of the EPA’s fraudulent data policies and procedures found that a majority of respondents were unaware there was a policy, and approximately 50 percent expressed the need for such policies and procedures,” the report said.
The EPA relies in large measure on federal contractors to gather environmental data on which the agency bases its regulatory decisions. However, a lack of communication with those contractors and clear guidelines on investigative procedures has created confusion with respect to the processes by which fraudulent data is rooted out and corrected.
Similar problems plague interactions between EPA and state environmental regulators, the report found.
“The agency lacks policy on communicating case information with the states and other regulating parties during investigations,” the IG wrote. As a result, “potentially negative consequences for human health and environmental protection may be not be communicated or addressed.”
The EPA said it would initiate a number of corrective actions to remedy the problems. The IG was satisfied with the actions, saying “recommendations are considered resolved and open with corrective actions ongoing.”
Without those corrective actions, the report warned, the agency risks undermining public confidence in its regulatory work.
A lack of public confidence could be troublesome for the agency as it rolls out new regulations on existing coal-fired power plants that are sure to stoke controversy in Washington and around the country.
Full story
Recent Articles
- SEC’s Climate Falsehood Threatens American Economy
- Watch: Morano on OAN TV: Talks ‘farting’ cows & how climate activists want meat limited & expensive as they use food crisis to push fake meat
- The next climate change target: Cement
- Recent Greenland Cooling And Only ‘Limited Retreat’ Of Glaciers Since The Little Ice Age
- Biden Climate Czar John Kerry says by ‘2035’ the U.S. will ‘only be producing electric vehicles’
- Let Them Eat Bugs: Scientists Urge Africans to Eat Baked Goods Made of Insects – Meatloaf made out of flies
- More Sea Level Porn: Claims of 200,000 homes underwater due to climate change debunked
- Joe Bastardi: ‘We are marching straight into communist economic policies of USSR & China — using a phony climate war to do so’
- The Biden agenda ‘succeeding’ at doing harm
- Energy shortages & inflation the new norm as refinery closures outpace construction
- Energy Crisis Is A Taste Of What The IEA Has In Store For Us – IEA’s 2021 net-zero Roadmap plan: ‘No Investment in new fossil fuel supply projects’
- Newly-discovered SE Greenland polar bear subpopulation: another assumption proven false – Polar bear numbers increased despite ‘impending doom based on implausible climate models’
- Purchase of prime North Dakota farmland tied to Bill Gates sparks outrage – May violate the ‘state’s anti-corporate farming law’ – Gates is largest private owner of farmland in USA
- Paper co-authored by UAH’s Dr. Christy on climate model warming bias is a top 10 download
- UN chief warns of ‘catastrophe’ from global food shortage – ‘Multiple famines will be declared in 2022’
- Biden Ahead of Schedule in Destroying US Offshore Oil Production
- US Navy to Hold Table-Top Climate Change War Game
- Everyone’s Burning Coal Except America – The Country That Has The Most
- Leonardo DiCaprio touts Time Mag. article: ‘If we want to have a planet that is still livable, oil production needs to drop 75% by 2050’
- Morano: Biden Shuts Down U.S. energy, which has the ‘highest environmental standards’ & exchanges it for reliance on China & their ‘lax environmental regs’