Here’s how enviros plan to push for stronger EPA climate rules

http://grist.org/climate-energy/heres-how-enviros-plan-to-push-for-stronger-epa-climate-rules/

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It’s not often that environmentalists are in the position of defending the government. Usually they’re trying to stop something bad — a pipeline, a terminal for exporting coal or liquefied natural gas — rather than cheering on something good. The defensive playbook is well-established. Offense is a little more tricky, especially when the plan you’re promoting isn’t even as strong as you want it to be.

But that’s the position green groups are in with the Obama administration’s proposal for regulating carbon emissions from existing power plants under the Clean Air Act. The EPA’s emission-reduction targets fall a little bit short of what environmentalists hoped for, and well short of what is technologically feasible and what will ultimately be needed to actually avert climate catastrophe. But Republican politicians, conservative activists, the coal lobby, and some coal-state Democrats are already attacking the proposal. So environmentalists are speaking up in support of the rules (and will call for them to be strengthened), lest the EPA only hear criticism during the 120-day public-comment period and the rest of the year before the rules are finalized.

Environmentalists have an advantage over their conservative opponents: The public agrees with them. Several recent polls have found public support running roughly 2-to-1 in favor of regulating CO2 from power plants, even if it means higher electricity prices.

National numbers can fail to capture the politics of coal-heavy swing states. Conservative groups and the coal lobby are targeting their pitches in states that produce coal or rely heavily on it for power, and saying it will not just raise electricity prices but lead to job losses.