DC Green Scene

In her first year atop the agency, Jackson ruled that greenhouse gases endanger public welfare, announced the Obama administration's clean cars program and laid out principles to reform the use of chemicals in consumer products and mad working on environmental justice a top priority for the EPA. The EPA's ruling in December that greenhouse gas emissions are a threat to public welfare paved the way for Jackson to regulate carbon emissions linked to climate change under the Clean Air Act and put her at the center of the debate over whether and how the U.S. would create a market for carbon trading. This week she announced that new rules on carbon emissions would be phased in gradually starting next year. Those rules would likely cut the amount of carbon dioxide that power plants, factories and oil refineries can release into the atmosphere. There are "lots of businesses who have been waiting for a clear signal as to whether or not the United States is on the road to clean energy and putting a price on carbon," Jackson said at the international conference on climate change in Copenhagen in December. This year, the EPA under Jackson has already set the first new national smog rules in 35 years. The administrator will highlight EPA's other top priorities, including taking action on climate change, protecting America's waters and strengthening the efforts of the Agency on expanding the conversation on environmentalism. Jackson is the first African-American to serve as EPA Administrator. Before leading EPA, she was chief of staff to New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine and Commissioner of that state's Department of Environmental Protection. She's a graduate of Tulane University in New Orleans and earned a master's degree in chemical engineering from Princeton University.

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