The Non-Endangerment Finding: What the Climate Activists Don’t Know or Don’t Want You to Know
by CO2 Coalition member Stephen Einhorn
Introduction
This is a booklet about the Endangerment Finding (EF) which is the decision made by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2009 that carbon dioxide (CO₂) endangers public health and welfare and therefore must be regulated.
Almost half of all Americans believe that it is the continual increase in atmospheric CO₂ which is causing global warming, climate change and more extreme climate events.
Today, virtually all of the professors in the Climate Departments at liberal universities teach that atmospheric CO₂ causes significant climate change for which all of us are guilty contributors. Many think that a climate catastrophe is imminent. As a result, many Americans believe the atmosphere is already destructive, and that huge numbers of Americans die each year from heat, hurricanes or tornadoes; or are moving to higher land because of the rapid sea-level rise.
Actually, since the Clean Air Act (CAA) was passed, there are 80% less toxic gases and particles in our atmosphere, and such a small number of Americans are dying from weather events that humanity has a much larger chance of being struck by lightning than Americans dying from a weather event.
That fact will come as a surprise for many readers, so let me provide some details: Yearly, around the world, about 24,000 people are killed from lightning strikes, but fewer than 800 Americans are killed by weather events, which is equal to two in one million. This is why the Endangerment Finding which claims in its Technical Support Document (TSD) that CO₂ causes “Increased heat stroke and cardiovascular stress” with “Higher mortality among elderly and vulnerable populations” and more “Extreme weather” are mostly nonsense.
Certainly, heart disease which kills 700,000 Americans and cancer which kills 900,000 Americans each year should be of far greater concern than the two people out of a million who die yearly from weather events in the U.S. In total, the U.S Government spends in total about $50 billion yearly on heart disease and cancer. Yet the Inflation Reduction Act (2022) commits the U.S. Government to spend over $1 Trillion on climate change. Of this 98% was scheduled to address atmospheric CO₂.
This $1 Trillion spent on climate change will not reduce temperatures by 1/10 of one degree by 2050. This misallocation of resources is a major reason why the Endangerment Finding which justified this large, misallocated spending should be rescinded.
To a great extent, the Endangerment Finding is a scientific claim, and the author has concentrated on scientific evidence, most of which comes from studies by the U.S. Government and has tried to avoid the political aspects of this issue.
The purpose of this booklet is to explain how faulty science, misinterpretations of the U.S. Constitution and confusing and contradictory legal decisions resulted in an attack on atmospheric CO2. The Endangerment Finding significantly increased our costs of living, reduced our purchasing flexibilities, and interfered with our liberties.
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