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In an astonishing move, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed on Tuesday to remove the 2009 landmark.
The proposal would also revoke the standards set by agents for greenhouse gas emissions from all vehicles.
The so-called danger discovery is a formal determination to ensure that planet-warming greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane pose a threat to human health and the environment. This stems from decades of expert research and analysis, forming legal and scientific basis for regulating these emissions under the Clean Air Act.
A reversal can lead to many of the criteria that depend on it. The automotive industry and other pollution sectors release freely to release greenhouse gases without restrictions. But experts and state regulators say California could represent a great opportunity to set a national model as it could open the door to stronger regulations at the national level.
“Here in California, we recognize science, we recognize the need for urgency and plan to continue our important work protecting the public,” Leanne Randolph, chairman of the California Air Resources Committee, told The Times.
The plan presents the latest action in a series of actions by the Trump administration, as well as the recent ability to set California’s strict tailpipe emissions standards to reverse long-standing climate policy, including the proposed abolition of the EPA’s proposed power plant emissions standards in June.
The 2007 Supreme Court case, Massachusetts v. EPA, confirmed that greenhouse gases were identified as air pollutants under the Clean Air Act, and that the EPA has the authority to regulate them. The discovery provided a legal basis for regulating carbon footprints from vehicles, power plants and other pollution sectors, allowing us to take a risk two years later.
A chorus of supporters and experts on Tuesday denounced the administration’s plan to reverse the findings as dangerous and shortsighted. Independent researchers around the world have long concluded that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases released by the burning of fossil fuels are dangerously warming the planet, contributing to wildfires, extreme heat, floods and other natural disasters.
At this point, the impact on California is unknown. Some experts said the EPA’s proposal could make it difficult for California to meet its climate targets. In particular, the impact of greenhouse gas emissions is not respectful of states or borders.
“What these actions mean is that there is more emissions, which causes more extreme weather, and ultimately harms much writing to California residents and US residents,” said Kathy Harris, director of the Clean Vehicle Program for the nonprofit Council of Natural Resources Defense.
Harris said the EPA is creating the weakest possible standard, but the EPA is trying to undermine the authority of California and other states to set stronger rules, saying it “takes away the levers that states may need to protect their citizens and residents.”
“The Environmental Protection Agency has one job, it’s about protecting the environment and they’re giving up on that responsibility,” she said.
But other experts said California is being built on its own to survive the storm. The state is well known for suffering from smog and air pollution, and was a leader in adopting aggressive environmental regulations that far exceed national standards.
In fact, much of the state’s ambitious work has been preceded by many of the ambitious tasks on clean air and climate, and many of the efforts to endure the development of clean air laws. For example, California implemented the country’s first tailpipe emissions standard in the 1960s, and became the first state to pass a law in 2002 requiring reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles.
Randolph, the Air Resources Commission, leads the country with a 2002 renewable energy portfolio standard that requires California to raise the state’s utilities to raise the 2006 Congressional Bill 32 with utilities in the state to increase the share of electricity from renewable energy sources, with 1990 emission reductions reaching four years ago over 2020.
Senate Bill 100, enacted in 2018, further unlocked the clean energy space by 2045 by requiring that all retail electricity sales in the state provide carbon-free resources, she said.
These items fall under the powers of the state and will not be affected by the abolition of danger detection, Randolph said.
Legal experts had expected that if Donald Trump was re-elected, he would roll back federal greenhouse gas regulations significantly.
“With this proposal, the Trump EPA proposes to end 16 years of uncertainty for automakers and American consumers,” read a statement from EPA administrator Lee Zeldin. “In our previous work, many stakeholders have told me that Obama and the Biden EPA twist the law, ignore precedents, ignore distorted science, achieve their preferred objectives, and paste hundreds of billions of dollars of hidden taxes on American families every year.”
Zeldin said danger detections are being used to justify more than $1 trillion restrictions that have thwarted consumer choices.
Anne Carlson, director of the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and UCLA’s environment, said the EPA’s move might be seen as another attempt to defend the fossil fuel industry, but the decision could backfire.
Carlson said the Trump administration could unintentionally abandon its regulatory powers to California and other progressive nations by regulating greenhouse gases to federal authorities to regulate them.
“If the EPA says it assumes that greenhouse gases are not regulated under the Clean Air Act, that means that they can be regulated under traditional state authorities,” Carlson said. “So this could have a California silver lining. It would definitely be a lawsuit, but in fact it could give a strong legal argument that greenhouse gases can be adjusted from the vehicle.”
Others also said that EPA movements could also have a galvanizing effect.
“They propose to move away from all the protections for public health from these truly harmful effects of climate change,” said Peter Zarzal, associate vice president of the nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund. “But the state has always played an important role in regulating this pollution, and I think that role is even more pronounced in the environment we live in.”
That said, California is not spared the decisions made by the federal government.
Fifty years ago, California sought and asked for an EPA waiver to be received so that the federal government could set up tailpipe emissions stricter than what was mandated. By 2035, the exemption formed the basis for the state’s nationwide ban on gas-powered vehicles sales in California. General Rob Bonta argued that the move was illegal.
Meanwhile, Trump administration officials and representatives from the automotive industry celebrated the latest announcement of the EPA on Tuesday.
“The trucking industry supports cleaner and more efficient technology, but it requires policies that are rooted in real-world situations. We thank the Trump administration for continuing to deliver for the American people while continuing to reduce the impact on the environment,” President and CEO Chris Spear.
“Today’s announcement is a monumental step towards returning to common sense policies that expand access to affordable, reliable, safe energy and improve the quality of life for all Americans,” said Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
EPA proposals review the process after a public comment period and before finalising. Several environmental groups said they were ready to challenge the rules in court.
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