Air Act History

Osha is the Occupational Safety and Health Administration  an agency of the United States Department of Labor. Osha requires employers to provide their employees with safety from all known dangers. Osha was created December 29, 1970, and it was signed by president Richard M. Nixon.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency or EPA was initially proposed in 1970 by then President Richard Nixon. The agency was created to build on other environmental regulations enacted by the federal government and to consolidate those efforts to be managed by one government agency. It was also a reaction to the public’s growing concern over pollution and other environmental issues. Chemical waste was commonly released into bodies of water creating unsafe drinking water and rivers catching fire. Industrial air pollution, such as acid rain and smog, was also affecting manufacturing cities with coal-powered plants. There was little serious regulation on pollution until major environment laws started being passed by Congress in the early sixties.

The 1955 Air Pollution Control Act was the first U.S federal legislation that pertained to air pollution; it also provided funds for federal government research of air pollution.[4] The first federal legislation to actually pertain to "controlling" air

The clean Air Act deals with solving air pollution problems through science and new information. The purpose for this act is to decrease the amount of pollution that we give off, and work towards making the air cleaner for everyone. Although progress has been made to lower pollution levels, it still is a threat to people’s lives. A goal that was set in the year 1975 was going to try and achieve National Ambient Air Quality Standards in every state to keep people healthy.

The EPA is the agency responsible for setting all of the regulations and rules for drinking water. These regulations apply to individuals, businesses, state and local governments, non-profit institutions etc. Congress passes laws to govern the U.S but they have authorized the EPA and other federal agencies to help them put the laws into effect and to make sure they are as effective as possible. The first two steps in this process consists of Congress writing and the president approving a bill. Then the act must be “codified” by applying it to the United States Code. The United States Code is basically a list of permanent laws for the U.S. As soon as the law has been made official, agencies like the EPA begin to create regulations for the specific law to make it apply to individuals, businesses, and local governments; all of this to make the law work for everyone every day. The regulations set standards for each aspect of daily life that go along with the law. For example, the EPA will come up with specific levels of sulfur dioxide that is allowed in our air to coincide with the Clean Air Act to protect human health and the environment. The regulations in this example would tell industries and businesses exactly how much sulfur dioxide they can emit into the air

The federal government realizes that lead and other contaminants pose a real threat too drinking water so they began to pass acts and amendments that restricts or prevents lead and other contaminants from affecting the drinking water. The clean water act and the safe drinking water act are major examples of what the federal government implemented. Lead still continued to be a problem due to the aging pipelines leading to the Flint, Michigan water crisis caused by improper care of corrosion control thus concluding the history of public water

On June 7, 1991, EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) published a regulation to control lead and copper in drinking water. This regulation is known as the Lead and Copper Rule. 40 C.F.R § 141 (1991). This rule states that lead concentrations cannot exceed a level of 15 ppb or copper concentrations exceed an action level of 1.3 ppm in more than 10% of customer’s taps. If the level for lead is exceeded, the water authorities must correct the problem and must also inform the public about steps they should take to protect their health and may have to replace lead service lines under their control.

Improved air quality wasn’t a subject of national concern until the mid 1900s. After decades of coal burning, unregulated gas emissions from cars and the excessive burning of fossil fuels, people started noticing bad air quality as a hazard to their lives. Over several decades, after seeing the costly effects air pollution was having on the environment and people’s health, interest groups like the Friends of The Earth club and the influences of Theodore Roosevelt and Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring finally came together to persuade the government to enforce legislation that would reduce air pollution. Because of these efforts, the policies of the Clean Air Act of 1963 and the Motor Vehicle Pollution Control Act of 1965, that aimed to control air pollution and raise air quality standards, helped create the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on December 2, 1970. Since then, the EPA has passed more air quality improvement acts, and amendments to previous acts passed, to increase restrictions on air pollutants, with their main policy concern being the Clean Air Act. Improved air quality acts imposed by the EPA have been successful in cleaning the United States’ air quality by reducing ground-level ozone pollution and reducing emissions, allowing for a decrease in pollution related deaths/illnesses and a better standard of living. The EPA, through regulations and the Clean Air Act, has delivered it’s promise to improve air quality in the United States.

Over the past decade a concern for protecting and preserving the environment has developed amongst United States citizens. Citizens have been promoting clean air, clean water, and clean land. Clean air means protecting the public from airborne contaminants known to be hazardous to human health. The Clean Air Act of 1970 is a law designed to control air pollution on a national level. It requires the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop and enforce regulations in order to protect the people (Environmental Protection Agency 2013). Clean water is water which is safe enough to be consumed by humans or used with low risk of harm. The Clean Water Act of 1972 was developed to restore and maintain the chemical, physical,

In the 1970’s there was growing confusion regarding environmental policy due to certain states creating environmental protection laws which were largely ineffective. To ease confusion, fix national guidelines, and monitor and enforce them President Richard Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The EPA functions under three federal departments: the Interior, Agriculture, and Health, Education and Welfare departments. The original role of the EPA was to administrate the Clean Air Act which was enacted to reduce the air pollution caused by vehicles and industry. The EPA has since grown to enforce at least 12 major statutes such as: ocean dumping laws, safe drinking water, insecticides, and asbestos hazards in

Before water is allowed to run into home pipelines, it has to go through several steps, and they are: physical, chemical, biological, and radiological because any tap water from source systems can be contaminated. The Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974 describes contaminants as “Some drinking water contaminants may be harmful if consumed at certain levels in drinking water while others may be harmless” (Health reference series) . The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) is defined as the federal law that protects public drinking water supplies throughout the nation. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is what sets the regulations for what goes into the water for better quality. In other words, people need to know where their water comes from and whether or not it is safe to drink. The EPA tests the water to check if the sodium hypochlorite, calcium, magnesium, and pH level is equivalent to the federal rule of drinking water. For instance, if those methods of treating the water is not handled properly, the water could be corrosive and could damage the water pipes with lead or copper, which would end up in the drinking water and would not be safe for human consumption. The Flint water department did not properly treat its water when the switch from Lake Huron to the Flint River

The Clean Water Act (CWA) was created in response the rapid loss of clean water. The government wanted to restore and preserve the water, as much of it was no longer useable for consumption or recreational use. A lot of this was due to agricultural runoff which lead to a surplus of phosphorus and nitrogen in many waters. (Tim Martins)

The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (OSHA) was developed and approved because of the escalating costs of accidents and illnesses in the workplace. According to Gomez-Mejia, Balkin, and Cardy (2010), OSHA is a national law that requires organizations to offer a safe and healthy workplace, to conform with particular occupational and health standards, and to document job-related injuries and diseases.

7. The Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974 established the basic framework for protecting the drinking water of the United States. Most ground water used for drinking water occurs near the earth’s surface and is easily contaminated .The major concern is the potential contamination of underground sources of the drinking water by any of the hundreds or thousands of subsurface wastewater disposal .Waste disposal wells dispose of approximately more than 11% of the nation’s toxic fluid waste. The injection wells can be good or bad and cause a major problem. Some of the wells are used many different ways like for a aquifer recharge and the production of oil, gas, or minerals. Also for improper usage as disposal of toxic and hazardous waste. The EPA

Enacted in 1972, the Clean Water Act was formulated with the goals of putting the end to the discharging of high quantities of contaminated materials into water resources, and further prevent pollution of water , and making sure that surface waters met the standards needed to support human and agricultural usage. Essentially, the Clean Water Act stipulates the fundamental structure used in the regulation of discharges of toxic pollutants into water resources of the US and ensuring conformance of quality standards for groundwater (Environmental Protection Agency). The Clean Water Act was draws based on the Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948, which was later developed and revised in 1972 to the Clean Water Act. Under the Clean Water Act, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is authorized to implement programs to control pollution example being the establishment of standards for wastewater discharge for various industries. In addition, the CWA establishes the water quality standards applicable to all groundwater contaminants. The Clean Water Act makes it illegal to unload any contaminant material from a point source into navigable water bodies without acquiring permit from EPA. The National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit program, under the EPA, helps in controlling discharges (Environmental Protection