From Akin Gump
In an interview on CNBC’s Squawk Box program on March 9, 2017, recently confirmed Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt stated that he “would not agree that [CO2] is a primary contributor to the global warming that we see.”
The statement runs contrary to more than a decade of regulatory determinations—for example EPA’s 2009 “endangerment finding” concluded that emissions of CO2 contribute to climate change.
If adopted by the administration as policy, this change would have significant implications for EPA’s regulation of a wide range of sources, from energy production and manufacturing to vehicles and consumer products.
If the newly released 2018 budget blueprint is any indication, the administration will not shy away from such a shift.
In addition to reducing EPA’s budget by 31 percent and EPA staff by 3,300, the blueprint would discontinue funding for the Clean Power Plan, international climate change programs, climate change research and partnership programs, and related efforts.
President Trump is also expected to sign an EO shortly to decrease or eliminate the EPA’s consideration of costs associated with CO2-induced climate change when conducting cost-benefit analysis for federal regulations (the so-called “Social Cost of Carbon” policy).
Building on the cuts in the 2018 budget blueprint, the EO could also include a long-anticipated directive to review and/or revoke all, or portions of, the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan and related climate regulations addressing power plant emissions and new coal leases.
How and if he retains any aspect of the prior Social Cost of Carbon guidance will be an indication of how far President Trump intends to go in following Pruitt’s lead on climate policy generally.
