) ) 

PETITION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF ENDANGERMENT AND 

CAUSE OR CONTRIBUTE FINDING FOR GREENHOUSE GASES 

UNDER SECTION 202(A) OF THE CLEAN AIR ACT BY THE 

COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA, EX REL. 

KENNETH T. CUCCINELLI, II, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA 

Pursuant to Section 307(d) of the Clean Air Act, 42 U.S.C. § 7607(d), and based 

upon new information of central relevance not available during the public comment 

period, the Commonwealth of Virginia ex rel. Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, II, hereby petitions 

the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to convene a proceeding for 

the reconsideration of the "Endangerment and Cause or Contribute Finding for 

Greenhouse Gases Under Section 202(a) of the Clean Air Act" (Endangerment Finding) 

published by EPA on December 15, 2009, 74 Fed. Reg. 66,496 (Dec. 15, 2009). The new 

information raises questions with respect to the validity and integrity of a substantial 

segment of the data upon which the Endangerment Finding rests, a matter which is of 

central relevance to the Endangerment Finding. Consequently, in response to this 

petition under 307( d), EPA must: (1) reconvene the regulatory proceeding, (2) provide 

the public with the opportunity to comment on the newly available information, and (3) 
proposed Endangerment Finding, internal e-mails and documents from the Climate 

Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia were released to the public. The 

e-mails and documents, many of which were apparently authored by the CRU scientists 

working at CRU on the project (CRU scientists), discuss the manner in which CRU's 

global warming data (CRU Data) were developed, analyzed, and handled. Specifically, 

the e-mails and documents suggest that the CRU scientists questioned the reliability of 

their own data, the methodologies used in developing and analyzing such data, and the 

conclusions based thereon. 

CRU and other organizations studying global climate change and its causes all use 

the same raw data, and scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 

Administration (NOAA) have acknowledged that the three surface temperature data sets 

from NOAA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and CRU are 

not independent but are based on a common set of underlying raw data. 

If NASA and NOAA used the same raw data as CRU, and if they have reached 

conclusions similar to those of CRU, then a finding of data unreliability with regard to 

the CRU Data may indicate systemic problems with all three of the data sets upon which 

EPA relied in promulgating its Endangerment Finding. Because these issues are of 

central relevance to the Endangerment Finding, they must be addressed by EPA, the 

public, and SAB in a proceeding for the reconsideration of the finding. 

2 
y 

o the CAA and the Information Quality Act (

IQA

) 

, EPA substantially ceded 

its obligation to make a judgment whether GHGs may endanger public health and welfare 

to the IPCC, an international body that is not subject to U.S. data quality and 

transparency standards and whose reports were prepared in total disregard to those 

standards. Therefore, EPA is about to begin regulating GHG emissions based on a 

scientific process that was conducted without those procedural safeguards contained in 

American law. These safeguards are what ensure the reliability and accuracy of the 

scientific conclusions underlying the Agency's Endangerment Finding. As an agency of 

the United States, however, whose regulatory actions will have far-reaching 

consequences for the citizens of Virginia and the nation, EPA must abide by U.S. 

standards and not the standards of international bodies whose actions are governed by 

different standards and requirements. 

Finally, EPA's remote findings of endangerment of health and welfare fail to 

consider and properly weigh the offsetting harms to health and welfare necessarily 

flowing from economically destructive regulation. 

Standard for Granting the Petition 

The CAA provides that EPA's Administrator shall convene a proceeding for 

reconsideration of the Endangerment Finding where a person: (1) objects, (2) within the 

1 The IQA was enacted as the Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2001 § 515,44 U.S.C. 3504(d)(l) and 3516 (2000). 

3 
Virginia is a person within the meaning of the Clean Air Act, 42 U.S.C. § 

7602(e), and its Petition is timely as falling within the sixty day period for judicial 

review. EPA's improper delegation, its failure to follow American law regarding the 

method and quality of analysis, its reliance upon invalid data of now widely questioned 

integrity, and its failure to properly weigh remote and speculative harm from GHGs 

against the virtual certainty of damage to health and welfare from the Endangerment 

Finding itself are of central relevance. Furthermore, the massive and disturbing evidence 

giving rise to the Petition became known only after the time for public comment had 

expired. Because that evidence is in the public domain and has been exhaustively 

discussed in other Petitions, including those of the Pacific Legal Foundation and Peabody 

Energy Company, it is not set forth here again in detail. Instead, it should be the subject 

of further evidentiary proceedings. The methodological and substantive errors of EPA 

became apparent only on December 15, 2009 with the promulgation of the Endangerment 

Finding. 

Conclusion 

Wherefore, the EPA should reconvene regulatory proceedings, provide for public 

notice and comment, conduct evidentiary proceedings, and provide all information to the 

SAB for review and comment. 

4 
Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, II 

Attorney General ofVirginia 

E. Duncan Getchell, Jr. (14156) 

State Solicitor General 

dgetchell@oag.state. va. us 

Stephen R. McCullough ( 41699) 

Senior Appellate Counsel 

smccullough@oag.state.va.us 

February 16, 201 0 

BY: e~nfi>Ms. 

~~ t. 

Counsel 

5 

Charles E. James, Jr. 

Chief Deputy Attorney General 

Office of the Attorney General 

900 East Main Street 

Richmond, Virginia 23219 

Telephone: (804) 786-2436 

Facsimile: (804) 786-1991 

Counsel for the Commonwealth 

Ex Rel. Kenneth T Cuccinelli, II