The Biden administration has been racing this spring to finalize a series of major environmental regulations, including rules to combat climate change, a first-ever ban on asbestos and new limits on toxic chemicals in tap water.
Many of the rules had been in the works since President Biden’s first day in office, when he ordered federal agencies to reinstate or strengthen more than 100 environmental regulations that President Donald J. Trump had weakened or eliminated. The president has pledged to cut the emissions that are driving climate change by about half by 2030. That’s something scientists say all industrialized nations must achieve to keep global warming at relatively safe levels.
Lawyers for the Biden administration have tried to use every tool available to protect the rules from being gutted by a future administration or a new Congress.
Under the Congressional Review Act of 1996, Congress can eliminate new federal regulations by a simple majority vote within 60 legislative days following their publication in the Federal Register. Senate Republicans used that procedure in early 2017 to eliminate 14 regulations that had been drafted by the Obama administration in 16 days.
To avoid that fate, the White House asked federal agencies to set important rules by this spring. That doesn’t mean a new occupant of the White House couldn’t undo them through the regular rule-making process, or that the Supreme Court couldn’t eventually strike them down. But it cuts off a possible line of attack.
Here are 10 important environmental rules the Biden administration rushed through to meet its self-imposed spring deadline.
electrifying cars
The federal government’s most important climate regulation, this Environmental Protection Agency rule is designed to reduce tailpipe pollution. Transportation is the segment of the U.S. economy that generates the most greenhouse gases. The rule does not ban sales of gasoline-powered cars or require the sale of all-electric vehicles, but it increasingly limits the amount of pollution allowed from car tailpipes over time, so that by 2032, More than half of new cars sold in the U.S. are most likely zero-emission vehicles, up from just 7.6 percent last year.
That would prevent more than seven billion tons of carbon dioxide emissions over the next 30 years, according to the EPA. That is equivalent to eliminating all the greenhouse gases generated by the United States in one year.
Drastically reduce pollution from power plants
This EPA regulation reduces pollution from power plants, the second largest source of planet-warming emissions in the country. Requires existing coal plants in the United States to reduce 90 percent of their greenhouse gas pollution by 2039. It also requires future high-capacity power plants that burn natural gas to reduce their emissions by 90 percent by 2032.
The rule is widely seen as a death sentence for American coal plants. It will also make it difficult for many natural gas plants to operate without using carbon capture and sequestration, a process that traps smokestack emissions before they reach the atmosphere and then stores them. That technology is extremely expensive and is not fully implemented in any US coal plants.
The EPA estimates that the rule controlling greenhouse gases from power plants would eliminate 1.38 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide by 2047, equivalent to avoiding the annual emissions of 328 million gasoline-powered cars. .
Plug methane leaks
This EPA rule requires oil and gas producers to detect and repair leaks of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that floats into the atmosphere from pipelines, drilling sites, and storage facilities.
Methane remains in the atmosphere for about a decade after it is released, but in the short term it is about 80 times more powerful at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, which remains in the air for centuries.
The regulation would prevent 58 million tons of methane emissions by 2038, roughly equivalent to all the carbon dioxide emitted by U.S. coal power plants in a single year.
Asbestos ban
The EPA banned chrysotile asbestos, the only type of asbestos still used in the United States that has been linked to mesothelioma and other cancers.
Known as white asbestos, the mineral is used in roofing materials, textiles and cement, as well as in gaskets, clutches, brake pads and other automotive parts. It is also a component of diaphragms used to produce chlorine.
The rule prohibits imports but allows companies up to 12 years to phase out asbestos use in manufacturing, depending on the facility.
End chemicals ‘forever’ in tap water
The EPA is for the first time requiring municipal water systems to remove six synthetic chemicals linked to cancers, metabolic disorders and other health problems that are present in the tap water of hundreds of millions of Americans.
Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, collectively known as PFAS, are found in everything from dental floss to firefighting foams to children’s toys. They are called permanent chemicals because they break down very slowly and can build up in the body and the environment.
Under the new rule, water utilities must monitor supplies of PFAS chemicals and must notify the public and reduce contamination if levels exceed a standard of 4 parts per billion for perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances.
Protect endangered species
The administration restored several protections under the Endangered Species Act for endangered animals and plants that had been relaxed under the Trump administration.
The rules, issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries service, give federal officials more leeway to protect species in a changing climate, restore protections for animals classified as “threatened” with extinction, which is one step away from being “endangered” and clarifies that decisions about listing a species should be made without considering economic factors.
Protecting the Alaskan Wilderness
The Department of the Interior denied a permit for Ambler Road, a proposed 211-mile industrial highway through Alaska’s fragile wilderness to a large copper deposit. It was a huge victory for opponents who argued it would threaten wildlife and Alaska Native tribes that depend on hunting and fishing.
The road was essential to reach what is estimated to be a $7.5 billion copper deposit lying beneath ecologically sensitive land. There are currently no mines in the area and no permit applications have been submitted to the government; The path was a first step.
The Department of the Interior found that a highway would disrupt wildlife habitat, contaminate salmon spawning grounds and threaten the hunting and fishing traditions of more than 30 Alaska Native communities.
Safety in chemical plants
EPA rules for the first time require nearly 12,000 chemical plants and other industrial sites nationwide that handle hazardous materials to explicitly plan for and invest in safety measures against disasters, such as storms or floods, that could lead to an accidental release. For the first time, chemical plants that have suffered accidents will have to undergo an independent audit. And the rules require chemical plants to share more information with neighbors and emergency services.
Raising the price to drill on public lands
The Interior Department made it more expensive for fossil fuel companies to extract oil, gas and coal from public lands, raising royalty rates for the first time in 100 years in an attempt to end the bargain rates enjoyed by one of the most profitable in the country. .
The government also more than tenfold increased the amount of bonds companies must obtain before starting drilling.
The rate increase was ordered by Congress under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which directed the Department of the Interior to increase the royalty rate from 12.5 percent, set in 1920, to 16.67 percent. hundred. Congress also stipulated that the minimum bid in auctions for drilling leases should be raised from $2 per acre to $10 per acre.
But the sharp increase in bonus payments, the first increase since 1960, was decided by the Biden administration, not Congress. It came in response to arguments from environmental groups, watchdog groups and the U.S. Government Accountability Office that the bonds do not cover the cost of cleaning up abandoned and uncapped wells, leaving taxpayers with that burden.
Permits for roads, power lines and pipelines
The White House released rules designed to speed federal construction permits for clean energy projects, while requiring federal agencies to more weigh harmful effects on the climate and low-income communities before approving projects like roads and wells. tankers.