New Tool Reveals Country's Most Polluted Places: How Close Do You Live?

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http://www.alternet.org/environment/153786/new_tool_reveals_country%27s_most_polluted_places%3A_how_close_do_you_live/

Looking for some awkward synergy? The Environmental Protection Agency recently released a comprehensive database of America's greatest greenhouse gas creators. It interactively indexes the 6,700 power plants and other facilities responsible for 80 percent of U.S. emissions, in an accessible online resource that gives interested citizens the ability not only to monitor their local and national pollution, but also to reproduce data-specific graphs and charts to fire off to colleagues and friends on social networks.

The tool debuted the day after President Obama made his first-ever visit to the EPA, a much less impressive debut. Fueled by billions of tons of the greenhouse gases the EPA's GHG Reporting Program data publication tool dutifully tracks, global warming has recently unleashed an unseasonal hellscape on the U.S., with temperatures scorching some regions 40 degrees above normal. But at least Obama came with his environmental game-face on.

"We don't have to choose between dirty air and dirty water or a growing economy," President Obama stumped to a crowd of 800 employees gathered at the EPA's Washington headquarters. "We can make sure that we are doing right by our environment and in fact putting people back to work all across America. When I hear folks grumbling about environmental policy, you almost want to do a Back to the Future reminder of what happened when we didn't have a strong EPA. You have a president who is grateful for your work and will stand with you every inch of the way."