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Republicans to Investigate Environmental Group’s Influence on Carbon Rule

Congressional Republicans point to emails by Gina McCarthy, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.Credit...Win Mcnamee/Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Congressional Republicans are investigating whether the Obama administration improperly colluded with a prominent environmental advocacy group, the Natural Resources Defense Council, as the Environmental Protection Agency drafted major climate change regulations.

The investigation, begun by Representative Darrell Issa of California, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Senator David Vitter of Louisiana, the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, comes as Republicans continue a long-running effort to block President Obama’s climate change agenda.

Mr. Issa and Mr. Vitter contend that the environmental group’s influence on the Obama climate change rule was inappropriate. Their staff members are investigating whether in drafting the rule the E.P.A. broke the law, specifically the Administrative Procedure Act, which governs how agencies write regulations.

The proposed rule, now in a public comment period, would force American power plants to sharply curb carbon emissions, the chief cause of global warming. Mr. Obama announced the rule in June. If enacted, the rule could shutter hundreds of coal-fired power plants and stand as a defining element of Mr. Obama’s legacy on fighting climate change. Republicans and the coal industry have attacked it as a “war on coal” that will raise energy prices and destroy jobs.

“The E.P.A. appears to have a far cozier relationship with N.R.D.C. lobbyists on carbon emission rule-making than with any other stakeholders,” Mr. Issa said in a statement. “The N.R.D.C.’s influence on draft E.P.A. regulations raises substantial concerns about blurred lines and inappropriate influence.”

As evidence, the lawmakers point to a series of friendly emails between the E.P.A. administrator, Gina McCarthy, and employees of the Natural Resources Defense Council, a powerful advocacy group with a long history of using lobbying and lawsuits to shape government policy. The emails show that the environmental group and the E.P.A. worked together on a series of policy and messaging moves meant to advance Mr. Obama’s climate change agenda without action from Congress.

Republicans say the most vivid example of a cozy relationship is an email exchange between Ms. McCarthy and David Doniger, a lawyer for the environmental group, celebrating legal maneuvering that provided Mr. Obama with something both the E.P.A. and the environmental group wanted: a court-ordered deadline for release of a 2012 E.P.A. regulation curbing greenhouse gas emissions on future power plants — a precursor to Mr. Obama’s announcement in June. (The environmental group had joined with others to sue the E.P.A. to force the regulation, and the E.P.A. quickly settled.)

On Dec. 23, 2010, the day the settlement was announced, Mr. Doniger emailed Ms. McCarthy, “Thank you for today’s announcement. I know how hard you and your team are working to move us forward and keep us on the rails. This announcement is a major achievement.” He added, “We’ll be with you at every step in the year ahead.”

Ms. McCarthy responded, “Thanks David. I really appreciate your support and patience. Enjoy the holiday. The success is yours as much as mine.”

Reacting to the email exchange, Mr. Vitter said in a statement: “Who is working for whom? The key example in all of this is the settlement agreement on greenhouse gases when the N.R.D.C. sued the E.P.A., the E.P.A. settled, and the two celebrate the agreement. It doesn’t get any more blatantly obvious than that.”

The emails were provided to The New York Times by Republican staff members on the Senate environment committee. Mr. Vitter and Mr. Issa said their investigation was prompted by an article in The Times in July that detailed how the Natural Resources Defense Council influenced key elements of the June climate change regulation.

E.P.A. officials said that the environmental group did not wield outsize influence in shaping the regulation, and pointed out that the agency sought comments from hundreds of groups, including environmental advocates, state regulators, electric utilities, labor groups, tribes and the coal industry, when preparing the rule.

“To imply that one group had any undue influence on the proposal’s development is ridiculous and absurd,” Thomas Reynolds, an E.P.A. spokesman, said in an email. Ed Chen, the council’s communications director, said the group was simply doing its job. “If we weren’t trying to motivate the E.P.A., or the White House, to protect public health, we’d be guilty of malpractice,” Mr. Chen said in an email.

While the council was suing the Obama administration in order to create the legal requirement for the climate change rule, three of the group’s environmental experts were also drafting a proposal for what the rule should look like. The three — Mr. Doniger, David Hawkins and Daniel Lashof — produced a 110-page plan, with the explicit aim of offering it to the Obama administration. It was widely viewed by experts as the blueprint for Mr. Obama’s climate change rule.  

The men had been corresponding with Ms. McCarthy since she was named assistant administrator of the E.P.A. in the first months of the Obama administration. At one point Mr. Lashof, a climate scientist, asked her for a job.

“As the Obama administration seeks to make rapid progress on air pollution, climate and energy, I am uniquely positioned to help forge a workable and effective strategy that combines Clean Air Act implementation and new legislation,” Mr. Lashof wrote to Ms. McCarthy in March 2009.

Ms. McCarthy wrote back, “Dan — anyone who earns such praise from Dale gets on my radar screen.” She was referring to Dale Bryk, a council staff member. “It will be good to meet you.”

While Mr. Lashof did not take a job with the Obama administration, the work of his team did end up shaping the president’s climate change strategy. Over the following year, Mr. Doniger corresponded several times with Ms. McCarthy about the messaging and timing of the agency’s work on climate change regulations, including in March 2010, when he wrote to Ms. McCarthy criticizing the E.P.A.’s muted response to a Senate bill that could have blocked or delayed the agency’s authority to release climate change rules.

Ms. McCarthy wrote back, “Sorry David. We will clear this up. No one is supporting this bill.” Despite the criticism of Republicans, Ms. McCarthy has won praise throughout her tenure at the E.P.A. for meeting with or listening to a variety of groups, including those in industry, as she drafts major regulations.

 “If we ask for a call or a meeting, they’re receptive,” said John McManus, vice president of American Electric Power, an electric utility that operates in 11 states. “They do want to hear what industry thinks of this, what states think. E.P.A. got input from a lot of groups.”

However, Mr. McManus noted that N.R.D.C.’s proposals are strongly reflected in the E.P.A.’s plan.  “There are similarities with N.R.D.C’s concept,” he said. “N.R.D.C. provided a lot of input.”

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 17 of the New York edition with the headline: Republicans to Investigate Environmental Group’s Influence on Carbon Rule. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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