A coalition of health and environmental groups sued the Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday, challenging the rescinding of a scientific finding that has been the central basis for U.S. action to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change.
A rule finalized by the EPA last week revoked a 2009 government declaration known as the endangerment finding that determined that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare. The Obama-era finding is the legal underpinning of nearly all climate regulations under the Clean Air Act for motor vehicles, power plants and other pollution sources that are heating the planet.
The repeal eliminates all greenhouse gas emissions standards for cars and trucks and could unleash a broader undoing of climate regulations on stationary sources such as power plants and oil and gas facilities, experts say.
The legal challenge, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, asserts that the EPA’s rescission of the endangerment finding is unlawful. The 2009 finding supported common sense safeguards to cut climate pollution, including from cars and trucks, the lawsuit says. Clean vehicle standards imposed by the Biden administration were set to “deliver the single biggest cut to U.S. carbon pollution in history, save lives and save Americans hard-earned money on gas,’’ the coalition said in filing the case.
After nearly two decades of scientific evidence supporting the 2009 finding, “the agency cannot credibly claim that the body of work is now incorrect,’’ says Brian Lynk, a senior attorney at the Environmental Law & Policy Center.
The case was brought by groups including the American Public Health Association, American Lung Association, Alliance of Nurses for a Healthy Environment and Physicians for Social Responsibility, along with environmental groups such as the Center for Biological Diversity, Conservation Law Foundation, Environmental Defense Fund, Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club.
The suit named EPA and its administrator Lee Zeldin as defendants.
President Donald Trump said in announcing the repeal that it was “the single largest deregulatory action in American history, by far,” while Zeldin called the endangerment finding “the Holy Grail of federal regulatory overreach.”
Read the full story from the Associated Press.
