Climate change isn’t unique to California, so the state should not be able to adopt its own vehicle emissions standards, the Environmental Protection Agency said last week, formally denying the state’s request to regulate greenhouse gases from cars. This stymies efforts by more than a dozen states, including Maine, to address climate change in the absence of strong federal policy. It also shows how far the Bush administration will go to reinterpret the Clean Air Act.

The EPA says California isn’t eligible for a waiver because the state doesn’t have “compelling and extraordinary conditions,” because the rest of the nation also suffers the effects of global warming. Apparently, the EPA doesn’t consider wildfires, mudslides and extreme air pollution compelling.

This logic also goes against nearly 40 years of practice as the agency had yet to deny a waiver, even for less compelling problems such as pollution from diesel engines.

“Climate change is one of the most daunting challenges we face, and we must develop reasonable solutions to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions,” Sen. Susan Collins said. “If states like my home state of Maine establish reasonable standards to help address this serious problem, the federal government should not stand in the way.”

Sen. Collins and Sen. Olympia Snowe are among 15 co-sponsors of a Senate bill to allow California’s waiver request.

“Although I am confident that the court system will ultimately overturn this decision, I am troubled that this administration has unnecessarily delayed enactment of a strong curtailment of greenhouse gas emissions,” Sen. Snowe said.

Unnecessary delay has become a frequent tactic of the agency, which is charged with protecting the environment, not corporate interests.

Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court strongly rebuked the Bush administration for arguing that the EPA did not have the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions because it was not a pollutant. The court said that by not regulating carbon dioxide, the agency was harming the states and that the harms associated with climate change are “serious and well-recognized.” For example, rising seas already have submerged coastal land in Massachusetts.

The court also rejected the EPA’s assertion that its regulating greenhouse gas emissions would be insignificant because other countries such as China and India contribute to global climate change. “Agencies, like legislatures, do not generally resolve massive problems in one fell swoop,” Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the court majority.

The court directed the agency to begin work on carbon dioxide regulations, work that has been stalled while the administration decides how such regulations would mesh new gas mileage standards recently passed by Congress.

Last month, a federal court rejected the administration’s scheme to allow power plants to avoid reductions in mercury emissions. The EPA illegally took the power plants off a list of industries that are required to use the best available technology to reduce mercury emissions to the greatest extent possible, the court wrote.

Other courts have rejected other attempts by the administration to weaken or circumvent Clean Air Act requirements.

In addition to a lot of unnecessary legal expanses, these delays mean tons of avoidable and hazardous pollutants continue to be spewed into the air, endangering the health of the planet and the people who live on it.