Climate Policy Watch

The Trump administration's imminent proposal to roll back the Obama administration's greenhouse gas rule for new coal-fired power plants will dramatically raise the allowable emissions rate of carbon dioxide by almost 60 percent for some units, a move that will end the current rule's implied mandate for partial carbon capture, according to an EPA statement obtained by Inside EPA.

A major utility with operations in eight Western and Midwestern states is vowing to sharply cut greenhouse gases over the next decade and eliminate all carbon emissions by 2050, expanding on moves by other utilities in the region to quickly drop coal despite the Trump EPA's ongoing efforts to rescind Obama-era climate rules and encourage new coal plants.

Environmentalists are joining Capitol Hill Democrats in an effort to obtain more information on EPA cost assumptions related to the Trump administration's planned rollback of vehicle fuel economy and greenhouse gas standards, arguing the agency has improperly ignored its own data in favor of more pessimistic estimates from the Transportation Department.

Following a series of court losses, the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) is mulling narrow new guidance to federal agencies for how to consistently consider greenhouse gas emissions in National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) reviews, after it withdrew a detailed guide the Obama CEQ issued on the topic after years of work.