A breakdown of major EPA deregulatory moves around water, air, climate

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin on Wednesday announced nearly three dozen deregulatory moves that he said would spur the U.S. economy by rolling back rules that have unfairly burdened industry. Many of the moves would affect landmark regulations aimed at protecting clean air and water.

Industry generally applauded the proposed changes, while environmentalists worried about what would amount to historic rollbacks if they are approved. Here's a look at some of the 31 regulatory changes Zeldin announced:

Reconsider power plant emissions standards

The Biden administration set limits on planet-warming emissions from existing gas and coal-fired power plants – a major step in the administration’s effort to reduce greenhouse gases from the heavily polluting energy sector. Trump has long opposed such tough, climate-friendly limits and has instead promoted oil and gas development. Zeldin said the agency would reconsider the Biden administration standards to avoid constraining energy production.

Reconsider toxic emission limits on power plants

Coal plants emit toxic metals like mercury and the Biden administration issued a rule to severely limit those pollutants. Officials at the time said technology had progressed enough for these plants to do better. The EPA on Wednesday said nearly two dozen states had sued, arguing the rule was costly and a major burden, especially to coal plants. They also considering offering industry a two-year compliance extension while officials reconsider the rule.

Reconsider wastewater rules for coal and other power plants

Hazardous metals like mercury and arsenic end up in the wastewater of steam-powered electric generating power plants like coal. These can have serious health effects including increasing cancer rates and lowering childhood IQ scores. The Biden administration tightened regulations of this wastewater. The EPA said it will revisit those “stringent” rules that are costly to industry and therefore may raise residential energy bills.

New uses for oil and gas wastewater

Currently, treated wastewater generated from oil and gas drilling can be used in limited ways in certain western lands, such as for agriculture. Environmentalists say there can be a broad range of contaminants in the wastewater, some of which might not be known. The EPA said it will reconsider those rules and look at how the treated water could be used for other purposes like cooling data centers, fighting fires and other ecological needs. They say the current rules are costly, old and don’t reflect the capabilities of modern treatment technologies.

??Reconsider petrochemical emergency planning

The Biden administration tightened safeguards against accidents for industrial and chemical plants that millions of people live near. The agency’s risk management program added planning and reporting requirements for facilities and forced some to implement new safeguards. Accidents at these plants can be severe – a 2019 explosion at a Texas facility, for example, forced tens of thousands to evacuate, for example. Industry associations have criticized parts of the rule, such as requirements to publicly report sensitive information.

Zeldin said Biden administration officials “ignored recommendations from national security experts on how their rule makes chemical and other sensitive facilities in America more vulnerable to attack.” The EPA is reconsidering the rule.

Reconsidering greenhouse gas reporting requirements

The EPA said it was reconsidering its mandatory greenhouse gas reporting program, which requires thousands of major industrial polluters to tell the agency about its emissions. Zeldin said the “bureaucratic government program” costs hundreds of millions of dollars and doesn’t help air quality. Until now, the EPA said the data helped businesses compare their emissions to competitors and find opportunities to reduce them and lower costs.

Reconsider light-duty, medium-duty, and heavy-duty vehicle regulations

Zeldin vowed to review his agency’s emissions standards for cars and trucks, calling the tightened emissions rules the “foundation for the Biden-Harris electric vehicle mandate.” Nothing the Biden administration implemented required automakers to make and sell EVs or for consumers to buy them. Loosening standards would allow vehicles to emit more planet-warming greenhouse gases, but many automakers have already been investing in making their vehicles more efficient.

Reconsider 2009 Endangerment Finding and regulations that rely on it

The scientific finding, under the 2009 Clean Air Act, determined that planet-warming greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare. It has been at the core of the nation’s action against climate change. Trump had already directed the EPA to consider the finding’s “legality” in an executive order. Experts say the impacts of climate change on human health and the environment are already clear, and that upending the finding would be devastating.

Reconsideration of technology transition rule

This program enforced strict rules to reduce the use of hydrofluorocarbons, highly potent and planet-warming greenhouse gases used in refrigerators, air conditioners, heat pumps and more. HFCs, as they are known, are thousands of times more powerful than carbon dioxide and leak through equipment that uses compressed refrigerants. Dozens of countries around the globe have pledged to slash their use and production of the chemicals.

Ending ‘Good Neighbor Plan’

This rule was intended to limit air pollution by restricting power plant smokestack emissions, and those from other industrial sites, across 11 states. Eliminating it would especially impact downwind neighborhoods that are burdened by pollution from ground-level ozone, or smog, that is out of their control. However, the Supreme Court had already put a hold on the rule last summer, ruling that states challenging it were likely to prevail.

Reconstitute Science Advisory Board and Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee

These seats have long been politicized given how influential they can be in setting national environmental policy. The board reviews “the quality and relevance of the scientific and technical information being used by the EPA or proposed as the basis for Agency regulations” and agency research programs. Congress directed the agency to establish the board to provide the Administrator science advice in 1978. The committee can give “independent advice” to the agency’s Administrator specific to the nation’s Ambient Air Quality Standards.

Reconsider Particulate Matter National Ambient Air Quality Standards

Power plants and industrial facilities release particulate matter, or soot, that can easily pass through a person’s lungs and into their bloodstream. Last year, the Biden administration tightened standards regulating soot in response to scientific research indicating existing regulations were insufficient. At the time, the EPA estimated its stronger regulations would save thousands of lives and prevent hundreds of thousands of cases of asthma and lost workdays annually. The Trump administration’s EPA says these regulations are “a major obstacle” for companies and that the U.S. has low levels of soot.

Reconsider national emission standards for air pollutants for American energy and manufacturing

These EPA standards apply to pollutants known or suspected to cause cancer, birth defects or other serious health problems. Industrial facilities are required to follow strict standards to monitor and limit the amount of these chemicals they release into the air. Last year, the EPA tightened standards surrounding ethylene oxide emissions, a human carcinogen commonly used as a sterilizer for medical equipment. The Trump administration said it is considering a “2-year compliance exemption” for facilities affected by these standards, among others.

Restructure the Regional Haze Program

For decades, this EPA program has required states to reduce pollution that threatens scenic views in more than 150 national parks and wilderness areas, including in the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone. Zeldin said that the U.S. has made strides in improving visibility in national parks and that the program is being used as justification for shutting down industrial facilities and threatening affordable energy.

Overhauling ‘Social Cost of Carbon’

The social cost of carbon is an EPA tool to weigh the economic costs and benefits of regulating polluting industries by putting a price tag on climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions – set at $190 per ton under the Biden administration’s EPA. That calculation is used in cost-benefit analyses, and was intended to account for greenhouse gas emissions’ impacts including natural disasters, crop damage, health problems and sea-level rise. Under the first Trump administration, carbon was pegged at around $5 per ton. An executive order Trump signed on his first day in office directs the EPA to consider eliminating this calculation entirely to advance his “Unleashing American Energy” policy.

Prioritizing coal ash program to expedite state permit reviews and update regulations

After coal is burned, ash filled with heavy pollutants including arsenic, lead and mercury is left behind and typically stored in giant pits under federal regulation. The EPA says it is now seeking to rapidly put regulation “more fully into state hands,” which environmental groups fear could lead to weaker standards. Last year, the Biden administration closed a gap that had allowed companies to avoid responsibility for cleaning up inactive coal ash pits – a policy that environmental groups say could now be repealed.

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