TRACKING CLIMATE AGENDA

Former EPA Chiefs Charge GHG Risk Reversal Violates Agency Mission, Law

Three former EPA administrators serving under both Republican and Democratic administrations are urging the agency not to finalize its proposal to rescind its landmark greenhouse gas endangerment finding that underpins numerous GHG standards. The trio of former administrators -- Republicans William Reilly and Christine Todd Whitman, and Democrat Gina McCarthy -- argue the proposal conflicts with EPA’s “clear” legal obligations, as well as established science and EPA’s mission. “The harms caused by greenhouse gas pollution are severe, urgent, and growing,...

Environmentalists Press EPA To Disclose AI Use In Vehicle, GHG Rollbacks

Environmentalists are pressing for a “detailed disclosure” by EPA of any use of artificial intelligence (AI) in its rulemaking to undo its greenhouse gas endangerment finding and related vehicle standards, arguing that failure to do so violates procedural requirements and removes safeguards against error. Their call, as part of broader comments to the agency on its GHG repeal proposal, signals concern with a general EPA statement on the use of AI in rulemakings that the agency quietly posted to its...

Reps. Peters, Barr Offer Transmission Bill Following Permit Framework Deal

Reps. Scott Peters (D-CA) and Andy Barr (R-KY) have reintroduced legislation to expedite permitting for transmission and other energy projects, in a bill focused on replacing the controversial transmission corridors program with a new grant program while maintaining environmental reviews for such projects. The Peters-Barr bill , the Streamlining Powerlines Essential to Electric Demand (SPEED) and Reliability Act, would replace the Department of Energy’s (DOE) program for high-priority transmission corridors by allowing the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to issue...

DOE Scuttles $7.5 Billion In Clean Energy Funds As Budget Fights Mount

The Department of Energy (DOE) is terminating $7.5 billion for 321 awards supporting 223 projects, largely in Democratic states, for clean energy and related projects -- in an Oct. 2 announcement that critics say is aimed at punishing Democrats for the federal government shutdown. The projects cover a wide range of sectors, including power, biofuel, hydrogen, solar, cement, carbon capture and storage, mining and transportation, though a key Trump official indicated the terminations are aimed at states that voted for...

Groups Say EPA Ignores Trillions In Harm From Ending Vehicle GHG Limits

Environmental and other groups are floating new analyses claiming that EPA’s proposed repeal of Biden-era vehicle greenhouse gas standards for vehicles ignores trillions of dollars of harms the plan would cause, part of an effort to make the case that EPA is acting arbitrarily in moving to scuttle its vehicle GHG program. The analyses are included in broader comments to the agency that claim EPA’s draft cost-benefit analysis for its plan is flawed for reasons including that it ignores the...

CCS Sector Fears End Of EPA’s GHG Reporting Rule Could Harm Permitting

The carbon capture and storage (CCS) sector is pushing back against EPA’s proposal to scuttle greenhouse gas reporting requirements, warning that including CCS-related reporting in its plan would undercut current and planned investments in such efforts and potentially also delay permitting of underground injection wells by EPA or states. During an Oct. 1 public hearing, critics also warned that EPA’s proposed repeal of its GHG reporting rule for nearly all sectors could force industry into other disparate reporting regimes, with...

EPA Floats HFC End-Use Flexibilities, Aligning With Near-Term Industry Asks

EPA is proposing to provide relief to food retailers, semiconductor manufacturers and others that are required to replace climate-warming hydrofluorocarbons with safer alternatives, issuing a plan that delays compliance deadlines and raises regulatory thresholds but stops short of adopting some of the longer-term exemptions industry sought. EPA Sept. 30 issued a proposal that seeks to extend a host of compliance deadlines, allowing companies in subsectors including residential air conditioning, retail food refrigeration, cold storage warehouses, and semiconductor manufacturing to use...

Court Declines To Rehear Firm’s Nondelegation Challenge To HFC Law

The D.C. Circuit is denying a request from a manufacturer of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) to reconsider its claim that Congress illegally delegated authority to EPA in a 2020 law governing the climate-warming chemicals, scuttling chances that the court might reverse a prior panel ruling against the company. In a pair of orders issued Sept. 30, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected requests from RMS of Georgia, also known as Choice Refrigerants, to rehear a panel...

EEI Warns EPA About Adverse Effects Of Reversing GHG Risk Finding

Investor-owned utilities are cautioning EPA about the potential fallout from removing the greenhouse gas endangerment finding and linked vehicle emissions standards -- arguing federal GHG standards play an important role in displacing federal common law suits and providing the regulatory certainty required to build new gas plants. The power sector is not regulated directly by EPA’s proposed rule, which seeks to rescind the agency’s threshold risk finding and repeal vehicle GHG standards. EPA is separately promulgating a rule that would...

Truck Makers Urge ‘Major Questions’ Attack On Some Vehicle GHG Limits

Truck and engine makers are pressing EPA to rely on the major questions doctrine, rather than scuttling its underlying greenhouse gas endangerment finding, to undo “Phase 3” truck greenhouse gas standards, citing fears that a legal strategy of relying on the GHG finding gambit is too risky to provide needed regulatory relief. The suggestion in Sept. 22 formal comments highlights broader industry fears in both the truck and auto sectors that EPA’s push to rollback vehicle GHG limits in tandem...

Legal Risks Seen Growing As EPA Eyes Quick Repeal Of GHG Risk Finding

EPA’s rapid schedule for finalizing its greenhouse gas endangerment finding rescission could exacerbate the effort’s legal vulnerability, observers say, potentially further imperiling the sweeping move to deregulate GHGs that sources have already characterized as a high-risk venture. “I think some errors due to the schedule are inevitable,” a former EPA official tells Climate Extra . “The issue is whether they will be fatal or not. We can’t know that till we see the final product.” Questions about the impact of...

EPA Urges Court To Preserve Oil And Gas Methane Compliance Delay

EPA is resisting environmentalists’ call for a court to immediately vacate the agency’s interim final rule delaying compliance requirements for oil and gas sector methane and other emissions, claiming it “lawfully invoked” a good-cause public comment exemption and that the groups have failed to justify their “extraordinary request.” EPA’s stance laid out in a Sept. 25 opposition motion filed in Environmental Defense Fund, et al. v. EPA in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit...

GOP AGs Offer Path To Scrap Mass. But Doubt Need Given GHG Risk Repeal

Over two dozen GOP attorneys general are offering a path for the Supreme Court to scrap its 2007 Massachusetts v. EPA ruling ratifying EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases, though they claim this is not necessary for EPA’s proposed GHG finding repeal because the plan is consistent with the “best read” of the Clean Air Act CAA). “[L]egal developments since Massachusetts have shown that GHGs like carbon dioxide are not ‘air pollutants’ under [Clean Air Act section] 302(g),”...

Wright Slams Scientists Pushing Back On Controversial DOE Climate Study

Energy Secretary Chris Wright is promising to gather government officials and critics of a high-profile report that questions the longstanding consensus about climate change and its harms to debate the issue, even as he also seeks to discredit criticism of the report, in remarks that further distance himself from the scientific community. Wright is promising to invite scientists who have been critical of the report to a convening to discuss their views -- important given ongoing confusion about the future...

Democratic States Warn EPA’s GHG Risk Plan Flouts High Court Precedent

A coalition of Democratic cities and states led by Massachusetts and California is blasting EPA’s proposed recission of its greenhouse gas endangerment finding, arguing EPA’s justification is foreclosed by the Supreme Court, disregards “overwhelming” science and is “misguided” in seeking input on ways to ensure continued preemption of state vehicle GHG rules. The 225-page arguments are spelled out in Sept. 22 comments filed in response to EPA’s proposal to withdraw its 2009 endangerment finding that forms the basis for the...

State Coalition Charges EPA Lacks Authority To Scrap Vehicle GHG Limits

A California-led coalition of Democratic states and cities is charging that EPA’s plan to scrap all vehicle greenhouse standards ignores states’ reliance interests, exceeds limited agency authority to “revise” the standards, and cannot rely on the agency’s plan to scuttle its GHG risk finding that would be “ineffective” in undoing the basis for the standards. In Sept. 22 comments , the coalition cites $1.2 trillion in avoided climate harms under the current federal GHG program over the next three decades,...

EPA GHG Reporting Rollback Could Drive Multiple State, Other Programs

EPA’s proposal to virtually eliminate its Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP) is sparking warnings that such a step would create new pressures for multiple differing GHG reporting requirements, including at the state level, alongside new difficulties in asserting environmental performance in domestic or foreign markets. Those fears supplement prior concerns that ending EPA’s program would complicate industry’s ability to claim tax credits for carbon capture and storage (CCS) and clean hydrogen production. EPA’s proposal is also sparking claims by the...

Automakers Seek ‘Backstop’ Vehicle GHG Standards As Regulatory Hedge

The main auto sector trade group is calling on the EPA to adopt revised vehicle greenhouse gas standards as an “alternative or backstop” to the agency’s proposal to scrap its greenhouse gas endangerment finding and related vehicle GHG limits, calling such a plan “critical if motor vehicle GHG standards are retained or reinstated in some way.” The pitch in Sept. 22 comments from the Alliance for Automotive Innovation builds on the sector’s recent push for interim relief from the standards...

Bill enables transmission providers to prioritize ‘dispatchable’ energy

The House has approved a bill to allow transmission providers to prioritize “dispatchable” energy -- which could advantage fossil energy sources -- but with only five Democrats voting in favor, the measure’s prospects in the Senate remain unclear. The “Guaranteeing Reliability through the Interconnection of Dispatchable Power” (GRID) Act, introduced by Rep. Troy Balderson (R-OH) in February, requires the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to craft a rule to allow transmission providers to apply to receive higher placement in the...

Industry Asks 9th Circuit To Halt California GHG Disclosure Laws Amid Appeal

Industry groups are seeking to convince the 9th Circuit to quickly block implementation of California’s corporate climate-disclosure laws while they appeal a lower court decision rejecting their preliminary injunction request -- with the plaintiffs bringing First Amendment arguments already eyeing Supreme Court appeal. “Plaintiffs now face imminent, irreparable harm, with compelled speech due on or before January 1, 2026, and unrecoverable compliance burdens being incurred already,” states a Sept. 15 motion for injunction pending appeal in Chamber of Commerce of...

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