Trump EPA to 'reconsider' CO2 emissions cap on power plants

The US Environmental Protection Agency will "reconsider" a rule limiting CO2 emissions from power plants, the federal agency said on March 12, advancing President Donald Trump's vow to undo the landmark climate regulation.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the agency would review the 2024 carbon standard along with more than two dozen other Biden administration actions, including its regulations on power plants' mercury emissions and wastewater, and its tailpipe emissions rules for vehicles.

Zeldin also vowed to go after the EPA's landmark 2009 "endangerment finding," which gave the agency the statutory authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

"Today is the greatest day of deregulation our nation has seen," Zeldin said in a March 12 statement. "We are driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion to drive down cost of living for American families, unleash American energy, bring auto jobs back to the US and more."

The Biden EPA's carbon standard for power plants, finalized in April 2024, imposed first-ever limits on the CO2 emissions of existing coal-fired and new gas-fired power plants. The rule, which drew praise from climate groups, effectively requires coal plants to install carbon capture technology or retire. However, US electric utilities widely condemned the move, arguing that carbon capture retrofits are too expensive and the resulting plant retirements would threaten grid reliability.

'EPA regulations should be flexible'

Zeldin's announcement is not the first attempt to rein in that rule, dubbed the "Clean Power Plan 2.0" after an Obama-era rule that was struck down. In December 2024, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit heard oral arguments from a coalition of states and industry groups challenging the EPA's carbon limits. And in February, Republican US House members introduced a bill aiming to nullify the rule.

The Trump administration's plan to review the EPA's endangerment finding could also impact the carbon standard for power plants. The landmark policy, repeatedly upheld by the US Supreme Court, concluded that greenhouse gases are a threat to public health and, therefore, subject to the Clean Air Act. The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act also explicitly codified the Supreme Court's finding that CO2 is a pollutant.

A spokesperson for the Edison Electric Institute (EEI), which represents investor-owned utilities, said the trade group supports the EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

However, "EPA regulations should be flexible and account for impacts to customer bills and grid reliability," Alex Bond, EEI's executive director of clean energy and environment, said in a March 12 email.

"Electric companies must have a consistent federal framework in place," Bond added. "Otherwise, they would face a patchwork of state regulations and lawsuits from plaintiffs that could raise costs to customers and impact grid reliability."

In April 2024, the Biden administration also tightened its mercury and air toxics standards, or MATS, for lignite coal-fired power plants. The US Supreme Court has declined to block the rule.

Zeldin said the MATS rule has caused "significant regulatory uncertainty" for operators of coal-fired power plants. He noted that 23 states have joined a lawsuit against it. He proposed a two-year compliance exemption while going through a rulemaking process.

Trump's deregulatory agenda

On his first day in office, Trump declared a national energy emergency, though power sector representatives lack consensus on whether the increasing electricity demand has reached crisis levels. Trump also ordered agencies on Jan. 20 to review any regulations that "impose an undue burden" on energy development.

"President Trump promised to kill the Clean Power Plan in his first term, and we continue to build on that progress now," Zeldin said on March 12.

Industry observers see the move as consistent with the administration's stated plans.

"It is not particularly surprising that the Trump administration would move to reconsider the Biden-era regulations designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from certain fossil fuel power plants," Romany Webb, a research scholar at Columbia Law School and deputy director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, said in an email.

Similar power plant regulations were a focus for walk-backs during the first Trump administration, Webb noted. But the power plant emissions rules the Biden administration put into place "look very different from those that were targeted during the first Trump administration and it will likely be much more difficult for EPA to justify changes to them," Webb said.

"The Biden-era regulations adopt an approach that's consistent with what EPA had done for decades — establish emissions limits based on technically feasible controls that could be installed at power plants themselves," Webb said. "Claiming it does something different won't make it any easier for EPA to revise the rule."

In a statement, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) said the proposed regulatory changes would allow power plants to pollute without consequence. The environmental advocacy group accused the EPA of abandoning its mission and breaking historical precedent.

Jackie Wong, the senior vice president for climate and strategy at the NRDC, said the group's legal team and scientists will push back against the proposed changes. The Sierra Club, too, lambasted the EPA's moves.

"The American people should be furious," Ben Jealous, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in a statement. "The EPA exists to protect us from serious pollution that endangers our lives and wellbeing, but Trump and Lee Zeldin are attempting to turn it into corporate polluters' best friend."