Trump’s EPA now says greenhouse gases don’t endanger people

NPR cited CEI’s expert on the EPA

“Since the 2009 endangerment finding, the EPA has been trying to regulate greenhouse gases and as a result trying to control large portions of the economy,” Daren Bakst, director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which advocates for regulatory reform on various policy issues, wrote in an email to NPR. He specifically points to rules limiting climate pollution from power plants and from cars and trucks.

Bakst calls the potential harms in the 2009 endangerment finding “speculative at best” and echoes an argument many conservatives make, saying, “Even if the United States eliminated all of its greenhouse gas emissions, it would have little to no measurable effect on global temperatures.”

The U.S. is the largest historical emitter of man-made climate pollution and, under the Paris climate agreement, has agreed to contribute to the global effort to reduce emissions and limit warming. Trump has signed a directive to have the U.S. withdraw from that agreement.

If the EPA finds the 2009 endangerment finding is no longer applicable, Bakst says that “would preclude future greenhouse gas regulations.” And he says “it should be easy to repeal existing rules that are predicated on the 2009 finding.”

Read more at NPR