By Wire Reports and CEN Staff

WASHINGTON D.C. - Declaring that greenhouse gases are a significant threat to human health, the Environmental Protection Agency has proposed listing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases as pollutants under the Clean Air Act, a policy the Bush administration rejected.

The White House acknowledged that the EPA had transmitted its proposed finding on global warming to the Office of Management and Budget, but provided no details.

It also cautioned that the Obama administration, which sees responding to climate change a top priority, nevertheless is ready to move cautiously when it comes to actually regulating greenhouse gases, preferring to have Congress act on the matter.

The proposal, technically a “finding,” concluded that six greenhouse gases should be considered pollutants under the 1970 act. But it does not spell out how or what to regulate. If the White House approves the finding, the EPA as well as lawmakers will start that discussion.

Potential health impacts from warming, the finding said, include longer and more severe heat waves; increased smog in some areas; dangerous flooding caused by stronger storms; and diseases, including malaria and dengue fever, related to flooding and warmer weather.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson suggested last month that she would declare global warming a health threat, and recent agency decisions have hinted that the agency was leaning toward making greater use of the Clean Air Act, which is already used to curb emissions that cause acid rain, smog and soot.

In his first week in office, President Barack Obama directed the EPA to review a decision by the Bush administration denying California and other states the right to control auto emissions, which, along with pollution from coal-fired power plants, are a major source of greenhouse gases.