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rockies
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# Posted: 18 Aug 2016 07:39pm
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New guidelines for particle emissions have come into effect. This site has a PDF listing the manufacturer's and model numbers of all govt approved wood stoves.
https://www.epa.gov/compliance/list-epa-certified-wood-stoves
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 18 Aug 2016 11:53pm
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Fact is, govt wants woodstoves gone and they wil be resisting off grid also. They can not stand it when you are not dependent upon them or someone else. They cant control you at all.
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Julie2Oregon
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 01:05am
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toyota_mdt_tech
Nah, it's all good. The stove manufacturers have been preparing for this for a while and, at least in Oregon, no one is going to take anyone's existing stove that's in use. If you go to sell your property and your wood stove isn't an approved model, you just can't transfer it to the new owners. You have to remove it when you move out. A cleaner burn is better, anyway.
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rmak
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 01:42am
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That's a pretty short list. What about all the other stoves?
When I was looking for a small stove for my small cabin I found a couple of guys in Pennsylvania making them. They were trying to get a stamp of approval and meet other government regulations. It seemed from their description the cards were stacked against them and meeting all the arbitrary conditions were close to impossible. They wound up selling the stoves as "outdoor use only" or something to avoid regulation. I believe their stoves were called Grey Stoves. Their whole story was on their facebook site. Makes you kind of believe government is controlling things too much. I thought the product was well thought out and well made, but I resisted. I wasn't sure about insurance and liability if something happened involving the stove. Sad story really.
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 08:50am
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There are many rural areas all over the US where air quality is severely harmed in winter due to woodstoves. Plenty of other areas where it isn't at all. If regulation was entirely removed, what about all the children and old people who suffer the health effects? The most vulnerable are usually the most powerless.
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rmak
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 09:45am - Edited by: rmak
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I'm sure you are absolutely correct, bldginsp. But my concern is who is regulating the regulators? If you would read the story of the guys in my first post it really sounds like the government is trying to suppress people trying to get in on the ground level of this business. Their explanation seemed to suggest that only established companies have the ability to jump through all the hoops and meet arbitrary demands imposed by regulatory agencies.
It seems like the old argument pitting more jobs, more U.S. made goods against protection of everyone and everything. On the one hand, I want things to be made with safety and health in mind. On the other hand, having worked for the government, I see a lot of people in the bureaucracy justifying their jobs and their turf by trying to dig up problems where none really exist.
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 01:57pm
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I see your point Rmak. To answer your question- who regulates the regulators- we the people, and democracy is messy by nature.
You're absolutely right that it's tough for a small business to jump the regulatory hoops, easier for large businesses with the money and facilities to do it. But I don't necessarily think the rules imposed on them are arbitrary, I haven't researched woodstove certification but I'll wager that the issues of what tests to pass and what smoke requirements to meet have been hotly contested by all involved. That's what happens with all new building materials, and what is required to test and approve them.
I doubt it's a big conspiracy (and I don't believe Oswald shot Kennedy) but it is certainly true that big business exerts unfair influence and pressure sometimes. Is that what is happening here? Is da gubmint just trying to make more work for themselves and save their jobs? It's easy to speculate, show me the proof.
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rmak
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 02:34pm
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I could show you at least anecdotal evidence from my experience. I worked for a county agency who received federal funding. This was years ago. Every time the quality control inspectors came out they'd find something wrong. It was expected and understood that this would be the case. This wasn't "someone was going to die wrong", this was stuff that had nothing to do with the safe and effective functioning of our operation. It was clear that the inspectors had a mandate to find things wrong. After all, if they didn't, and things were going good, why are they needed? Inspectors who were reasonable and would listen to a rational explanation on issues somehow didn't come back. You can believe it or not, but that's what happened.
I don't think it's a big conspiracy either. I think it's a series of small conspiracies. I also think that it's very possible that some of the people I dealt with had their heart in the right place. I know big bureaucracies can hide many small sins. That's my understanding of how they operate.
But I'll take your input and thank you for it. I don't have a dog in the hunt either way and I do have a tendency to ramble. I bought a Jotul 602 for my cabin and I'm happy with it. It's on the list of good stoves.
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 08:48pm
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Govt is clamping down on woodstoves. they are trying to phase them out.
They can go beyond just reducing stove mfg, they can just decide no woodstove permits will be allowed. I had a nice Quadrafire (made in my state about 30 miles from my cabin location I might add) Millennium 3100 flattop stove installed in my house back in 2002, added a ceiling fan in the room and a blower kits for it. I hardly use it, but its nice to have heat during an outage. I love it when I ah home, its snowing outside, nice and warm in the house.
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MtnDon
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 09:38pm
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I like clean air. With all the changes in rules that cover things from auto emmissions to the first round of wood burning stoves a few decades ago, and everything in between like allowable VOC's in paints, I can see a difference in the air quality where we have lived since 1985. No doubt if I can see the difference the difference can also be felt by my lungs.
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 10:10pm
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No one wants dirty air, an off grid cabin is hard to heat without a woodstove. Woolies and electric socks isnt going to cut it.
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MtnDon
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# Posted: 19 Aug 2016 11:57pm
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The cleaner air didn't happen by accident and, IMO would not have happened without government intervention. Car manufacturers, stove manufacturers, paint makers, etc. may have never voluntarily made the more environmentally friendly products they finally did on their own initiative.
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 09:20am - Edited by: bldginsp
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Quoting: MtnDon may have never voluntarily
Certainly would have never.
You can argue that they could not. Corporations are legally obligated to make a profit for their shareholders, while following the law. The only thing that can make them spend money for 'altruistic' purposes is legislation from government, otherwise they get sued by the shareholders. Talk to Ralph Nader. I think he drives a Corvair these days.
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 10:02am - Edited by: bldginsp
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Quoting: toyota_mdt_tech Govt is clamping down on woodstoves. they are trying to phase them out.
They are certainly clamping down on emissions from woodstoves, and therefore phasing out the old ones that burn dirty.
I see no evidence that they are trying to eliminate woodstoves altogether, because 'they can't stand it when you are not dependent on them'. Most state governments support energy independence such as residential solar with rebates.
I can certainly see why the coal, oil and gas industries want us to be dependent on them, and why they would do everything they can to influence government policy.
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 10:18am
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Did you see that plug in car in the editorial cartoon? Yes, it produces zero emissions from that vehicle. But where does that energy come from? Yes, its a coal fires power plant, maybe hydro electric car propane/natural gas. Its not emission free, its just moved emissions to another location and the lost energy transferring it to your home via heat from transformers, line loss....
Now disposal and mfg of the huge Lithium Ion battery is another deal...
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 03:00pm
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The car in the cartoon is charged by solar panels. Lots of people are doing that now. The technology is there, and it's cheaper than gasoline (in the long run). I've seen a lot of people put panels on their roof to charge their Nissan Leaf. Works great, cost is accessible to many people.
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MtnDon
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 03:27pm - Edited by: MtnDon
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I now have one neighbor who charges their Chevy Volt from their roof top grid tie solar. Been doing it for 5 months now and they have a fair sized surplus with the poco. Not bad considering the home has reefer A/C aswell.
As for whether or not the silcone wafers in the panels and the lithium & other rare earth metals in the batteries are more "costly" than burning coal or gas ... it gets too complicated for me.
I did see a study a short time ago that showed plug in electrics made sense in some parts of thd country... mostly western states and made no sense at all in most of the east.
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 03:52pm
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I am just seeing cabin life being squeezed. Lots of land handed over to conservation, sold, given up, or just confiscated either the land or the ability to build on it. Lots of areas now wont allow a cabin with a full septic, even with no water available. Face it, with each generation, the ability to own a cabin on some land is going to get tougher and tougher. We will be a group destined for extinction.
I guess I could just say "its OK, I got mine"... 
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 05:23pm - Edited by: bldginsp
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Well we've pretty much filled up North America, except for the inaccessible locations. In 1932 my grandfather bought a choice lake front property in northern Idaho, for $300. He and his family had the whole place to themselves, no regulations, no nothing. Now it's basically a suburb with houses everywhere, the lake is polluted from too many septic systems, people buzzing around on noisy jet skis, the county health dept. is threatening to shut the cabins down unless they get a sewer system in, etc.
Things ain't what they used to be.
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MtnDon
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 06:24pm
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Quoting: bldginsp Things ain't what they used to be.
And we have more people than there used to be.
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rockies
Member
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 07:24pm
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I find it interesting that people applaud the govt for forcing manufacturers to produce better and better energy star appliances but feel that the govt is interfering in their lives by forcing them to buy more energy efficient wood stoves. Is it because with an appliance they have to factor in the ongoing operating costs while with a wood stove it's simply "wood in, heat out"?
When you are living off grid the selection of your appliances is critical because you have to buy and install the solar power system to run them. Nobody is going to buy a 1500 kWh fridge to run on a solar power system if a 400 kWh fridge is available, and I don't think a manufacturer would bother building a better fridge if the govt hadn't forced them to improve.
I think it's unfortunate that people who live in the city or who never use a solar powered electrical system don't put more thought into the efficiency of the products they buy. Think of the resources saved if everyone only lived off of the energy they personally produced. Hopefully in time wood stoves, appliances, cars and electronics will become even more energy efficient and if that takes a little govt "encouragement" then I'm glad.
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MtnDon
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 08:20pm
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One of the national sellers of grid tie solar PPA's, a lease more or less, has sold 8 systems to others on my short block. At about a 30% saturation quite an amazing number I think. The homes are more or less the same and the family sizes similar. What is a revelation is the number of panels installed. Almost twice as many on some homes. One of the larger arrays is on a 2 person household. The array size is directly tied to the amount of energy used. I see outdoor lights on 24/7 on some of the ones with the largest arrays. I guess they have trouble understanding conservation and how to achieve it.
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 08:51pm - Edited by: bldginsp
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Is conservation necessary if the resource is free and clean? Some people like the lights on at night cause it makes them feel safe.
I agree completely with the idea of conservation given our overall energy situation. But remember that the reasons we started conserving all had to do with the limitations and problems with fossil fuels- dependence on hostile foreign countries, shrinking domestic supply, pollution and now global warming.
If, or when, we implement "the new energy economy" your energy use will be limited only to your ability to buy the machinery involved, and thoughts of pollution, Saudi Arabia, and global warming, hopefully, will be things of the past.
I wonder if we will see a time when people do choose the less efficient refrigerator because it's cheaper, but they don't care because the electricity is free and plentiful. Reminds me of the old gas furnaces- grossly inefficient because gas was dirt cheap. And how about gas swimming pool heaters! Huge amounts of energy to satisfy our personal comfort. Off the soapbox, bldginsp....
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 10:18pm - Edited by: toyota_mdt_tech
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bldg_insp, you are talking to the guy who doesnt have AC in his house, drives cars till they are worn out, but never allowed to develop an oil leak, still have 2 cathode ray tube TV's in house, my cell phone is over 10 yrs old, I fix my appliances vs replacing them. Commute in my 06 Corolla to work vs my RAM 2500 diesel. The Corolla has 230K miles, wife drives an 04 Corolla Sport, about 230K miles too. She barely drivers her Highlander. I always conserve energy like it is expensive.
I am frugal, wont do without, but when I do buy, I do get the best, highest quality. I find that buying the higher quality, higher priced in the beginning vs buying inferior low quality low priced items and trashing them a few years down the road to be less expensive long term. 
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 20 Aug 2016 11:00pm
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I have recently decided to hate plastic. I'm sick of broken plastic. Now I look far and wide for things made of metal. Recently had an old cheap box fan literally crumble in my hands as I removed it from the window it sat in for 10 years. Got a metal one, 3 times as expensive, will last 6 times as long.
Back on topic, I wonder what energy infrastructure is going to look like as all this efficient stuff starts to fail. Solar panels might be good for 50 years, but the roofs they sit on won't be in many cases. Is it worth re-mounting 30 year old solar panels when the roof has to be re-done? Inverters don't last more than 7-10 years, but when they need to be replaced will the new ones still be compatible with the rest of the old solar system? Will the clean burning wood stoves of today still burn as cleanly 20 years from now as their specialized air passageways get clogged up, or catalysts fail and can't be replaced?
More efficient stuff is more complicated and therefore more prone to failure, and often not repairable by the homeowner. If it has to be replaced frequently, to what extent does that offset the advantages of its greater efficiency?
Ok I'll stop ranting now.
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rockies
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# Posted: 21 Aug 2016 07:03pm - Edited by: rockies
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My turn!
Is conservation necessary if the resource is free and clean? I guess that depends on the resource. What resources are free and clean? The ones I can think of are sunlight, wind power and micro hydro. Cutting your own firewood may be free but it's not really clean (at least to the air). But are sunlight, wind power and micro hydro really free and clean?
Taking into account the factories, manufacturing processes, raw building materials and transportation costs necessary to build the equipment to harness those "free" resources amounts to a lot of pollution and cost. The sun can shine forever but if you need 5 to 20 thousand dollars to use that free resource it's not really free.
What I find interesting are the choices people make about what they think they "need" and what they merely want. As mentioned earlier, some people "need" a tremendous number of things and are willing to pay the price to buy and operate them and others don't. The two people with the huge solar array probably feel that everything they own they really need and therefore they really "need" that array. It would probably never occur to them to conserve energy by buying more efficient appliances or using motion sensing lights at night because their energy is "free" from the sun.
Recently I became interested in an article about EMP's (electrical magnetic pulses). These occur naturally during huge solar flares from the sun. Scientists seem to think that the earth could be hit by an EMP one day and it would destroy the world's electrical grid and fry all the electronics. It might happen, it might not, but it did get me thinking about ways of living without electricity. Has anyone built in backup systems at their cabin so that they could comfortably live there without using any electricity at all?
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 21 Aug 2016 09:10pm
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I think the dinosaurs had no backup when the EMPs fried their electronics, poor lizards. Well they had a 200 million year run. Can't feel too sorry for them. And we have their descendants fluttering around singing to us.
Can you see a tyrannosaur with a busted iPhone? Poor baby.
Maybe we are about to go their way...
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 21 Aug 2016 09:27pm
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Quoting: bldginsp Maybe we are about to go their way...
As long as we have veered off into silly land, maybe mfg another hoax/crisis. We used to have oxygen content in the range of 35%, now we are at a suffocating 21%, maybe an oxygen consumption tax. Wont do squat to bring up O2 content, but would work great at taxing you and robbing some more of your liberties. We could ban all internal combustion engines or tax anything that uses oxygen, and tax them again if they produce CO2, ding them twice.
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Atlincabin
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# Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:06am
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Quoting: bldginsp Most state governments support energy independence such as residential solar with rebates.
Well, come to Nevada (with probably the most solar potential in the USA) where the local power company lobbied the PUC (that's a misnomer) to effectively eliminate residential solar energy. The system I put in a few years ago will now phase in to produce almost free energy for NVEnergy. For every 10 watts I produce, they will give me back about 2. No grandfathering of residential solar producers that, on good faith, installed rooftop solar at the pleas of the energy industry just a few years ago. I'm considering taking my system off the roof and moving it elsewhere (out of state)!
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shall
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# Posted: 22 Aug 2016 01:43pm
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there are two types of people.
Those who want to live their lives and not bother anyone and those who are never satisfied unless they are controlling others.
Were these regs passed by our elected officials in Congress or are they the result of yet another extra-democratic fiat ruling by unelected EPA bureaucrats? My guess is the latter.
Every regulation in the name of clean air and water is not necessarily a good idea.
In my opinion, any regulation that is not the result of the legislative process is a horrible idea because there is no accountability or recourse for the citizens. The citizens cannot fire an EPA regulator who decides that the ditch on your land is a wetland.
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