On January 28, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it was dismissing all of the members of its Science Advisory Board (SAB) and Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC). SAB and CASAC have been in existence since the 1970s, and are to be comprised of independent expert external scientific peer reviewers and advisors with breadth, depth, and diversity of expertise, experience, and perspectives. Both the SAB and CASAC advise the EPA administration on scientific and technological issues pertinent to the development of regulations and other decisions. Neither is a policy or decision-making body and their advice is not determinative.
NC State Professor Chris Frey, was interviewed by CNN regarding the recent dismissal of the SAB and the CASAC. Frey served on the EPA SAB from 2012 to 2018, the EPA CASAC from 2008 to 2012, and chaired CASAC from 2012-2015. Frey was a member of an CASAC auxiliary Particulate Matter Review Panel that was dismissed by EPA Administration Wheeler in October 2018, just days before the EPA released a major scientific assessment that it was poised to review. Frey and other panelists subsequently convened independently and continued to deliver advice to the Agency that dismissed them.
The Clean Air Act, and the Environmental Research, Development and Demonstration Authorization Act, are the Federal laws under which the CASAC and SAB, respectively, are chartered. These and other Federal laws generally require that the EPA use the best available science to inform regulatory and other decisions. The credibility of EPA decisions depends on the credibility of the science that informs the decisions. The credibility of the science depends on adherence to time-tested processes, procedures, and norms for peer review and science advising. Interference with accepted scientific practices, such as bulk dismissal of duly appointed scientific advisory committees, is an infringement of scientific integrity and undermines public trust in decisions made by the government.