Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler is offering a relatively uncertain defense of the carbon dioxide standards in the agency's just-proposed rollback of Obama-era requirements for new coal plants, telling reporters that the proposed limits might be tightened in response to comments on the plan.
The nominee was confirmed on a party-line vote with even Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), a strong coal supporter, voting against the nominee due to concerns that he does not take climate science seriously.
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.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's (FERC) narrow reviews of greenhouse gas and climate issues in its approvals of natural gas pipelines and other energy projects are facing their first tests in a pair of lawsuits in a key appellate court, after that court earlier required broad GHG considerations for a separate pipeline.
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.
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.
The new agreement deepens EPA's collaboration with the State Review of Oil and Natural Gas Environmental Regulations, a group that includes EPA, states, industry and environmentalists.
Environmental and taxpayer groups say the Trump administration's rollback of methane rules for oil and gas sites on federal lands leaves a “patchwork” of state programs that will boost pollution and waste of public resources.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit is explaining its October decision to vacate the Army Corps of Engineers' use of a Clean Water Act (CWA) dredge-and-fill permit to construct a portion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), a major natural gas pipeline, in West Virginia, saying in a hard-hitting ruling that the Corps lacked authority to unilaterally change the permit's conditions.
