LANSING — The Environmental Protection Agency is in the process of rolling back a landmark policy that provides much of the basis for the federal government’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
The decision would undo many of the climate policies of previous administrations, and potentially stymie the agency’s ability to do so in the future.
“It basically just blows a hole in their ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions,” said Carlee Knott, energy and climate policy manager for the Michigan Environmental Council.
The EPA, which is tasked with ensuring clean air across the country, now says they’re prioritizing deregulation and working to limit the government’s authority to set emission standards for cars and power plants.
The Trump administration is pushing to overturn the ‘endangerment finding’, which was published in 2009 and said that emissions from vehicles threaten public health.
That determination gave the EPA much of its modern authority to regulate the release of greenhouse gasses.
“By reversing this, they’re going to tie their hands and essentially not be able to regulate power plants and vehicle emissions,” Knott said.
Knott says that rolling back the rule would significantly worsen air quality — and public health.
“That’s going to lead to more hospitalizations, more respiratory problems, and also just more premature deaths from complications with those issues,” she said.
According to the Energy Information Administration, nearly a third of the US’s carbon emissions come from cars, through gas and diesel consumption.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in March that reversing the policy would take a “dagger straight into the heart” of climate change policies.
“The current administration is taking an ax to that and doing the best that they can to rescind and really step back from the EPA’s purpose and mission,” said Zoe Zeerip, Great Lakes Business Network coordinator with the Groundwork Center.
The endangerment finding was cited in Biden-era regulations that required automakers to reduce emissions in a push to increase the adoption of electric vehicles.
The EPA estimated that the rules would have avoided more than 7 billion tons of carbon emissions over the next 30 years, equivalent to about four years of total transportation emissions in the US.
Advocates say that regulations on emissions help mitigate the impacts of climate change, some of which we’re already seeing through longer heat waves and more frequent wildfires.
“It’s impacting our daily lives, and it’s up to the EPA to protect us against those damages that are occurring — because not only do they impact public health, but they impact our economy and they impact the businesses, and tourism and farms. The list goes on and on,” Zeerip said.
The EPA will accept public comments on the proposal through Sept. 15.
