On Thursday, Lisa P. Jackson, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, announced that she would be leaving her post after President Barack Obama makes his State of the Union address in January. Here are some of the reactions from energy and environmental associations across the country to the news.
* "Administrator Jackson put into action the Obama administration's commitment to ethanol and other biofuels," stated Bob Dinneen, President and CEO of the Renewable Fuels Association, adding that Jackson's work with making E15 more available at the gas pump "protected the progress that has been made in reducing our dependence on foreign oil."
* Carol M. Browner, a former EPA administrator, former director of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy and Distinguished Senior Fellow from the Center for American Progress, stated that Jackson had directed several successes at the EPA, including new standards for fuel efficiency, protections against mercury pollution and proposed standards to limit carbon pollution from new power plants.
* Michael Brune, the Sierra Club executive director, stated that he wanted to express gratitude to Jackson on behalf of the club's 2.1 million members and supporters. Brune called the administrator "a steadfast advocate for clean air, clean water, a stable climate and public health -- often in the face of very vocal and forceful detractors."
* The Charleston (W.Va.) Gazette reported that Bill Raney, president of the West Virginia Coal Association said that Jackson's resignation is good news for his state and that Jackson's policies are to blame for coal's decline in Appalachia.
* Raney stated in a report from the Bluefield (W.Va.) Daily Telegraph that he hopes Obama's new pick to lead the EPA will have respect for coal miners in the eastern United States and that "for the past four years, our coal miners have had no respectful recognition for all they have done to provide Americans with the quality of life we now enjoy."
* According to an Associated Press report , Scott Segal, the director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, stated that Jackson's tenure featured some of the most expensive environmental rules in the agency's history and that those rules were used "as blunt attempts to marginalize coal and other solid fossil fuels and to make motor fuels more costly at the expense of industrial jobs, energy security, and economic recovery."
* Frank O'Donnell of Clean Air Watch stated that the news of Jackson's resignation had long been expected but that she would be missed by environmental and health advocates. According to O'Donnell, one of Jackson's most significant successes at the EPA was that she "reversed the findings of the Bush administration and declared that climate change poses a real threat to health and the environment."
