Environment, health groups sue over Trump move to wipe out climate rules for power plants

Environmental and public health-focused organizations are suing the Trump administration over its move to wipe out most climate regulations on coal and gas power plants.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), American Lung Association, American Public Health Association, Clean Air Council, Clean Wisconsin and the Environmental Defense Fund filed the suit on Thursday.

The move comes just days after the administration finalized its move to gut the nation’s climate rules for coal and gas plants, eliminating the vast majority of rules that the Biden administration said would prevent 1.38 billion metric tons of carbon emissions through 2047, the equivalent of taking 328 million gas-powered cars off the road for a year.

That’s because existing coal and new gas plants will no longer have to prevent 90 percent of their carbon dioxide emissions from entering the atmosphere.

As the electric sector makes up a quarter of the U.S.’s total planet-heating emissions, that move could be one of the Trump administration’s most consequential climate rollbacks.

The administration estimated that it could save $310 billion.

The groups that sued Thursday said the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has a legal responsibility to limit planet-warming emissions, and that not doing so would have significant health consequences.

“Repealing these standards without a replacement is an abdication of EPA’s legal responsibility to protect public health and the environment,” said Meredith Hankins, federal climate legal director at NRDC, in a written statement. “The Clean Air Act and Supreme Court precedent demand that the EPA address climate pollution from the largest industrial source in the nation. The EPA’s legal reasoning is fatally flawed, so we are going to court.”

“Emissions from power plants drive climate change, and climate change is a health emergency,” said Harold Wimmer, president and CEO of the American Lung Association. “Measures that clean up power plant emissions also clean up other lung-harming pollutants at the same time. EPA has the authority and the responsibility to protect people’s health from air pollution.”

The EPA declined The Hill’s request for comment on the lawsuit. When it put forward the rule, the agency said that its move was a money saver.

“For over 15 years, the Obama and Biden administrations implemented a war on coal to destroy reliable and affordable energy. The Trump Administration has come in to protect American energy and to make sure you can afford to keep the lights on,” said EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin.