From Reuters:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has sent its final proposal on whether carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions pose a danger to human health and welfare to the White House for review, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson told Reuters on Monday.

The EPA’s final finding, if it follows the agency’s earlier assessment and is approved by the Office of Management and Budget, would allow the EPA to issue rules later to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, even if Congress fails to pass legislation to cut U.S. emissions of the heat-trapping gases that contribute to global warming.

This finding was first proposed back in April, and has already undergone a 60-day public comment period during which the Agency reports receiving over 300,000 comments.  The OMB now has 90 days to review the proposal, though Jackson has stated she anticipates their review will go more quickly than that.  Reuters reports that along with the endangerment finding, the EPA also sent the White House a separate final proposed finding on whether emissions from cars and trucks contribute to the endangerment, which may allow the Agency to begin implementing auto emissions regulations in addition to regulating emissions from power plants and other major emitters.

As we’ve reported extensively here at Warming Law, the long-awaited endangerment finding stems from the Supreme Court’s landmark 2007 decision in Massachusetts v. EPA, in which the Court ruled in favor of a coalition of states, cities, and environmental groups arguing that CO₂ is an air pollutant within the meaning of the Clean Air Act. The Court held that the EPA therefore had the authority to regulate CO₂ as a pollutant, effectively creating a mandate that the Agency conduct a formal study to determine if greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare.

Stay tuned to Warming Law for further developments in the EPA’s progress toward regulating CO₂.