Huffington Magazine Issue 33 | Page 82

OBAMA 2.O / ENVIRONMENT But even after a year of recordbreaking heat, Obama embarks on his second term against the backdrop of a Congress that remains stubbornly divided on questions of climate and conservation, leaving little hope these issues will be addressed through broad-based legislation, which the administration has long said was the preferred route for such measures. That will leave the president with a long list of demands and expectations from his environmental base and only the comparatively narrow corridors of his own regulatory authority through which to pursue any of it — should he choose to do so. Earlier this month, leaders of more than three dozen prominent environmental and conservation organizations issued a letter to Obama, calling on him to use the bully pulpit of his presidency to, among other things, place global warming front and center in the national discourse. Clark Stevens, a White House spokesman, said the administration has climate change squarely in its sights. “The president has made clear that he believes that climate change is real, that it is impacted by human activity and HUFFINGTON 01.27.13 that we must continue to take steps to confront this threat,” Stevens said, ticking off the accomplishments of Obama’s first term. The administration, he added, “will continue to build on this progress and climate change will be a priority in his second term.” That assertion — and a number of other environmentally contentious issues — will be closely watched over the next four years. Among the hot spots: POWER PLANT EMISSIONS Back in 2007, the Supreme Court ruled that if the EPA determined that greenhouse gases were a threat to human health, those “A host of additional environmental issues will confront the president over the next four years. “ emissions must be regulated by the agency under the Clean Air Act. Two years later, the EPA under administrator Lisa Jackson determined just that: carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are a public health threat. In the months and years that followed, the agency issued new curbs on emissions from cars and light trucks, as well as from any new power plant.