Trump’s EO on Energy Independence

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Coal miners watch as Trump signs EO on Energy Independence.

What’s in it?  The text is hard to find.

First and most prominently, the executive order directs the Environmental Protection Agency to review the Clean Power Plan, one of Obama’s key regulatory actions to drive down greenhouse gas emissions in the electric power sector. Because an executive order cannot directly overturn a regulation, the EPA will have to come to a finding about whether the CPP should be revised or repealed.

The Supreme Court ruled in a 7-to-2 decision in June 2014 that the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency is free to regulate carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as long as the source of emissions in question is a traditional polluter, like a factory or a power plant, rather than a school or a shopping mall. The decision was largely written by conservative Justice Antonin Scalia. However, the Court also chastised the EPA for acting without a clear directive from Congress.

Some claim that the Supreme Court requires EPA to regulate greenhouse gases, but that is not correct. The Court ruled that CO2 can be considered a “pollutant” under the Clear Air Act, but EPA decides what, if anything to do about it. Expect lots of legal activity around this, including EPA seeking congressional legislation before regulating.

While determining the fate of the CPP could end up being a complex multi-year undertaking, the order also includes the following actions that can be carried out quickly:

• Reversing Obama’s moratorium on new coal mining leases on federal lands;
• Removing the consideration of greenhouse gases from permit reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act;
• Formally abandoning Obama’s roadmap on how to achieve U.S. emissions reductions
• Eliminating a tool for cost-benefit analysis in regulatory review called the “Social Cost of Carbon”

Finally, although Trump’s directive does not directly address American engagement in the Paris Agreement or other international climate agreements, it does have some implications for broader U.S. engagement in international climate policy. Rolling back the CPP would remove an important component of the American climate strategy and make it more difficult to achieve Obama’s U.S. climate targets. Other players, including big emitters like China, the European Union, and India, are aware of Trump’s stance on climate and will not be surprised by this action: most countries have committed to continuing to pursue their own goals in development as well as climate actions.

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March 28, 2017 at 09:11AM

Donald Trump Declares ‘New Age Of American Energy’ As He Destroys Obama’s Climate Legacy

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
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US President Donald Trump set out to obliterate his predecessor Barack Obama’s legacy on climate change as part of a bid to unleash America’s energy potential.

Mr Trump last night signed a sweeping executive order slashing measures from the Obama era, a move that was welcomed by the oil and coal industries as a bold step to end regulations that were “choking” the economy.

Environmentalists condemned the move, accusing Mr Trump of wanting to “travel back to when smokestacks damaged our health” and said they would take his administration to court.

The president specifically targeted the Clean Power Plan, Mr Obama’s signature effort to tackle global warming.

Mr Obama’s plan required states in the US to cut carbon emissions from power plants collectively by 32 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030.

That measure was introduced in 2014 but has been stalled in the courts following challenges in Republican states.

It was key for the US to meet obligations under the 2015 Paris climate accord, which has been signed by nearly 200 countries.

In the election campaign Mr Trump promised to pull the US out of the Paris agreement but since taking office he has not mentioned it, and neither did the executive order. The issue was believed to be still under discussion at the White House.

Last night ExxonMobil, the giant oil company, urged the Trump administration to stay in the Paris agreement, calling it an “effective framework for addressing the risks of climate change”.

Signing the order Mr Trump said: “My administration is putting an end to the war on coal. With today’s executive action I am taking historic steps to lift the restrictions on American energy, to reverse government intrusion, and to cancel job-killing regulations.”

Mr Trump, standing next to a group of miners at the Environmental Protection Agency, said it marked a “new era in American energy”.

He added: “This is about bringing back our jobs, bringing back our dreams, and making America wealthy again. We love our coal miners.

“We are going to start a new American energy revolution, one that celebrates American production on American soil.”

Scott Pruitt, Mr Trump’s Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said the president was “setting a new course”.

He added: “It’s going to create jobs in the oil and gas sector. For too long, over the last several years, you’ve had certain industries, certain sectors of our economy that were within the cross hairs of the EPA. That is not going to happen anymore.”

Mr Pruitt caused controversy recently by saying he was not convinced that carbon emissions from human activity are the primary driver of global warming.

In all, Mr Trump’s “Energy Independence” order blocked half a dozen anti-global warming executive orders signed by Mr Obama.

It included ending an Obama-era moratorium on leasing government controlled land for coal mining, and eased limits on methane emissions from oil and gas production.

The president also made clear that the issue of carbon emissions would be less of a consideration in future when making decisions about infrastructure projects.

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March 28, 2017 at 08:54AM

Donald Trump Overturns Obama’s Climate Change Rules

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President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday taking steps to unravel the most contentious climate-change policies of his predecessor.

“My administration is putting an end to the war on coal,” Mr. Trump said in remarks ahead of the official signing at the Environmental Protection Agency, repeating a campaign slogan in which he promised to bring back mining jobs.

He said he was ending a “crushing attack” on the industry and paring back regulations that impeded job creation but that he still believed his administration could ensure clean water and clean energy.

“We’re getting rid of the bad ones,” he said, adding that his administration had taken other steps to boost energy production, including expediting approvals of two controversial oil pipelines, Dakota Access and Keystone XL.

The order formally reviews President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which would have required utilities to reduce power plant carbon-dioxide emissions to 32% below 2005 levels by 2030. It also initiates review of a parallel regulation that would call for emission cuts to power plants not yet built.

The order will pull back August 2016 guidance from the Council on Environmental Quality on climate change and official estimates of the social cost of carbon, methane and nitrous oxide and rescind a temporary ban on new coal leases on federal lands, which Mr. Obama’s Interior Department issued in early 2016.

Mr. Trump was flanked by coal miners, Vice President Mike Pence, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt.

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March 28, 2017 at 08:54AM

Trump Signs Executive Order Unwinding Obama’s Climate Policies

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WASHINGTON — President Trump signed on Tuesday a much-anticipated executive order intended to roll back most of President Barack Obama’s climate-change legacy, celebrating the move as a way to promote energy independence and to restore thousands of lost coal industry jobs.

Flanked by coal miners at a ceremony at the Environmental Protection Agency, Mr. Trump signed a short document titled the “Energy Independence” executive order, directing the agency to start the legal process of withdrawing and rewriting the Clean Power Plan, the centerpiece of Mr. Obama’s policies to fight global warming.

The order also takes aim at a suite of narrower but significant Obama-era climate and environmental policies, including lifting a short-term ban on new coal mining on public lands.

The executive order does not address the United States’ participation in the 2015 Paris Agreement, the landmark accord that committed nearly every country to take steps to reduce climate-altering pollution. But experts note that if the Trump program is enacted, it will all but ensure that the United States cannot meet its clean air commitments under the accord.

Mr. Trump advertised the moves as a way to decrease the nation’s dependence on imported fuels and revive the flagging coal industry.

But energy economists say the order falls short of both of those goals — in part because the United States already largely relies on domestic sources for the coal and natural gas that fires most of the nation’s power plants.

“We don’t import coal,” said Robert N. Stavins, an energy economist at Harvard University. “So in terms of the Clean Power Plan, this has nothing to do with so-called energy independence whatsoever.”

Scott Pruitt, the E.P.A. administrator, said in an interview on ABC News on Sunday that the order will help the United States “be both pro-jobs and pro-environment.”

But coal miners should not assume their jobs will return if Trump’s regulations take effect.

The new order would mean that older coal plants that had been marked for closing would probably stay open for a few years longer, extending the demand for coal, said Robert W. Godby, an energy economist at the University of Wyoming.

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March 28, 2017 at 08:24AM