EPA rejects challenges to climate report

WASHINGTON, July 29 (UPI) -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says it has denied 10 petitions challenging its 2009 determination that climate change is real and threatens humans.

Rejecting a series of critiques lodged by groups seeking to block federal regulation of greenhouse gas emissions, EPA officials declared that "climate science is credible, compelling and growing stronger," the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday.

Ten groups had petitioned to challenge that determination, which is known as the "endangerment finding," including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, coal giant Peabody and the states of Texas and Virginia, the Times reported.

The EPA said it found no evidence to support the petitions.

"The endangerment finding is based on years of science from the U.S. and around the world. These petitions -- based as they are on selectively edited, out-of-context data and a manufactured controversy -- provide no evidence to undermine our determination. Excess greenhouse gases are a threat to our health and welfare," EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said.

The petitioners said they would appeal. The Chamber said its efforts were based on the economic costs of regulating greenhouse gases and not climate science.

"The Chamber's petition challenged the wisdom of regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act," the organization said in a release, "which simply was never intended to regulate something as complex as the problem of climate change."