ISSUE: Environmental Policy Alert

EPA Floats Plan To Scrap Biden-Era PM2.5 Air Standards By February

EPA says it intends to release its eagerly anticipated proposal to roll back tougher Biden-era federal air quality standards for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) this fall, with a final rule due in February, as the agency seeks to keep a lawsuit on the issue in abeyance, although environmentalists will likely oppose any further litigation delay. In an Aug. 13 motion to govern proceedings in Commonwealth of Kentucky, et al. v. EPA, et al. , EPA seeks a further 45-day abeyance...

Industry Wary Of EPA’s Proposal To Scrap All Power Plant GHG Authority

Utility and other industry groups are expressing unease or avoiding a direct position on EPA’s primary proposal to remove the agency’s threshold authority to regulate power plants’ greenhouse gases, with most groups focusing their advocacy on supporting the agency’s “alternate” plan that rolls back Biden-era rules but retains the regulatory authority. Industry is “concerned about maintaining EPA’s ultimate authority to do something about climate, rather than determining that there’s just no authority [for the agency] to do anything,” says one...

EPA Floats Power Plant ELG Deadline Extension As Officials Weigh Rollbacks

The Trump EPA is floating for interagency review a draft plan delaying compliance with zero-discharge requirements in a Biden-era rule governing effluent limitations for power plants, though officials are asking a federal appellate court to delay litigation over the regulation as they weigh more substantive revisions. According to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), EPA Aug. 11 submitted for interagency review its proposed rule extending zero-discharge compliance deadlines. The agency floated the proposal on the same day it filed...

EPA Plans Quick Finalization Of Federal CCR Permit Plan Amid Rule Review

EPA is planning to quickly finalize a rule creating a federal coal combustion residuals (CCR) permit program that would regulate sites in states that lack approved programs, even as officials are separately seeking to delay until December a pending suit over the Biden-era legacy CCR rule while officials review it. EPA filed an Aug. 11 motion asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to hold the case, City Utilities of Springfield, Missouri v. EPA, et...

Chemours Appeals Order Requiring Immediate PFAS Discharge Reductions

PFAS manufacturer Chemours is appealing a federal court’s order requiring the company to immediately reduce its discharges of a next-generation PFAS to comply with its wastewater discharge permit, after the judge reinforced the court’s authority to grant preliminary injunctive relief to citizens seeking to enforce the Clean Water Act (CWA). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit Aug. 12 docketed Chemours’ petition seeking review of Judge Joseph Goodwin’s Aug. 7 order in West Virginia Rivers Coalition (WVRC) v....

Environmentalists Outline Legal Case Against EPA’s Utility GHG Rule Repeal

Major environmental groups are detailing their legal case against EPA’s proposal to repeal greenhouse gas standards for power plants, arguing the plan is “fundamentally” at odds with the Clean Air Act’s purpose and that numerous provisions are unlawfully arbitrary including a failure to weigh key emissions implications of the proposal. EPA’s view is “squarely at odds with the statutory text and structure,” says Aug. 7 comments from a half dozen major environmental groups. There, the environmentalists are referring to EPA’s...

Environmentalists Sue EPA Over Coke Ovens Air Rule Compliance Delay

Environmental groups are suing over EPA’s interim final rule (IFR) delaying deadlines for coke plants to comply with tougher Biden-era air toxics regulations, with the litigation echoing a recent suit charging that a similar rule violated procedural requirements in delaying deadlines for the integrated steelmaking sector. In their Aug. 6 suit filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Group Against Smog and Pollution (GASP), et al. v. EPA , environmental groups challenge EPA’s July...

Amidst LCRI Defense, EPA Plans To Provide ‘Flexibilities’ For Water Utilities

EPA is planning to defend the Biden-era rule requiring near-total replacement of lead service lines by 2037 against a utility group suing to block the regulation, but will work to provide “practical implementation flexibilities and regulatory clarity” to assist water systems with compliance. The Justice Department (DOJ) “is now moving forward with the process of defending the rule,” EPA told Inside EPA on Aug. 7, after the agency signaled it was ready to move forward with the litigation, which...

Court Rejects Environmentalists’ Suit Seeking Farms’ Emissions Reporting

A federal district court is rejecting environmentalists’ lawsuit seeking to force EPA to issue air emissions reporting mandates for animal feeding operations (AFOs), backing the agency’s view that a 2018 law barring such reporting under the Superfund law also bars reporting under community right-to-know legislation for emergency pollution releases. The Aug. 7 ruling by Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump-appointed judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, deals a blow to environmental and community groups that for...

EPA Plan To Drop Stricter NSR ‘Accounting’ Faces Environmentalists’ Suit

Environmental groups are pledging to sue over EPA’s decision to scrap a Biden-era proposal to tighten the agency’s project emissions accounting (PEA) rule that eased air permitting requirements, asking a federal court to pause an existing suit over the issue while they prepare fresh litigation. In an unopposed Aug. 1 motion to govern proceedings in Environmental Defense Fund, et al. v. EPA, et al. , environmentalists ask the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit for a...

Suit Over Steel Sector Air Rule Tests EPA Policy Of Delaying Compliance

Environmentalists are challenging EPA’s recent practice of delaying compliance deadlines for Biden-era air rules via interim final rules that avoid the traditional notice-and-comment process, attacking the agency’s use of a “good cause” exemption to delay deadlines for steel plants in a lawsuit that may also affect similar delays for other air rules. In Clean Air Council, et al. v. EPA , a suit filed July 28 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, environmental groups...

Setting National Model, New Jersey Inks $2 Billion PFAS Cleanup Deal

New Jersey has reached a landmark proposed settlement valued at over $2 billion with DuPont and related entities over longstanding PFAS contamination, setting what officials say is the largest environmental settlement achieved by a single state and one that will continue the Garden State’s “nation-leading” PFAS abatement efforts. “The companies have agreed to fully clean up contamination at four New Jersey sites and to pay $875 million in natural resource and other damages to the State for the harm that...

EPA Seeks To Resume LCRI Suit, Signaling Decision On Replacement Rule

EPA is seeking to resume litigation challenging the Biden-era Lead and Copper Rule Improvements (LCRI), which requires near-total replacement of lead service lines by 2037, signaling the agency has decided whether it will defend the rule or ask the court to send it back to EPA for reconsideration. In an Aug. 4 motion , EPA asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to end a months-long pause on the case, which had been granted to allow Trump...

D.C. Circuit Denies Claim That HFC Law Violates Nondelegation Doctrine

A unanimous three-judge D.C. Circuit panel is rejecting a constitutional challenge to the 2020 law requiring EPA to phase down climate-warming hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), concluding that the statute does not delegate legislative authority to the agency as a free-market legal group has argued. The court also disagrees with the New Civil Liberties Alliance lawyers representing HFC manufacturer Choice Refrigerants that a recent Supreme Court decision helps their case -- instead emphasizing that the high court has said Congress need not provide...

EPA Seeks To Extend Energy Star ICR, Opening Door To Retaining Program

EPA is seeking to extend an expiring Information Collection Request (ICR) to inform its Energy Star voluntary efficiency labeling program, a routine step that appears to leave the door open to retaining the program that a broad range of supporters feared the Trump administration was planning to eliminate. The agency is set to publish the proposed ICR in the Federal Register Aug. 1. Although the extension request is not a definitive indication of EPA’s plans, if the ICR is...

Trump Nominates ACI Executive To Serve As EPA Chemicals Chief

President Donald Trump has nominated Douglas Troutman, the acting CEO and general counsel of the cleaning industry’s trade group, to serve as EPA’s next chemicals chief, picking a nominee with a commitment to consensus at a time when the TSCA program faces significant uncertainty and major clashes between industry and environmentalists. The White House July 30 transmitted Troutman’s nomination to be EPA’s “Assistant Administrator for Toxic Substances,” though the office he will lead if confirmed is the Office of Chemical...

EPA Claims GHG Endangerment Repeal Retains Air Law Preemption Shield

EPA is claiming that repealing the agency’s 2009 greenhouse gas endangerment finding and related vehicle GHG limits would nevertheless preserve federal preemption of state vehicle GHG standards under the Clean Air Act (CAA) as well as federal common law claims related to GHGs. The agency’s arguments -- which could affect oil majors’ chief legal defense against a raft of over two dozen climate tort cases proceeding in state courts -- underscore a potential high stakes consequence for industry from EPA’s...

Experts Doubt Speedy Benefits From Trump Order Easing Permitting For AI

Lawyers and permitting experts are doubtful that Trump administration efforts to ease environmental permitting for data centers and other artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure will yield quick results, as regulators work to craft rules to implement the policies while project developers will likely resist testing them early due to legal risks. “If federal agencies successfully implement these streamlining efforts, businesses developing data centers or associated energy sources may be subject to reduced regulatory requirements and may be able to take advantage...

Key Democrat Sets Conditions On GOP Call For Bipartisan Permitting Talks

A top Senate Democrat is laying out conditions for any bipartisan agreement on permitting reforms, though it is not clear if Republicans and the Trump administration will agree to Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s (D-RI) call to rein in the president’s “lawless” activities or apply any reforms to clean energy projects, not just fossil fuels. “It makes no sense for Democrats to agree to permitting reform until the Trump administration stops its lawless disregard for congressional authority and judicial orders,” Whitehouse, the...

Industry Groups Offer Cautious Pushback To EPA’s GHG Finding Repeal

Major power and oil industry groups are offering cautious pushback to EPA’s proposal to rescind its 2009 greenhouse gas endangerment finding that underlies its climate rules, indicating that industry is not comfortable with the notion of fully scrapping such rules in large part because it could undercut federal preemption of state rules. While some groups in early reaction to EPA’s July 29 plan are supporting the Trump administration’s proposal to repeal Biden-era vehicle GHG standards, they offered a more careful...

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