EPA changes effect of California’s climate efforts

Since the Trump Administration began, there have been significant changes to many governmental and nongovernmental agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency. Trump has recently announced that over two dozen environmental regulations will be rolling back in order to reduce regulatory costs and “hidden taxes” on Americans. Lee Zeldin, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency appointed by President Trump, has called these rollbacks “the greatest day of deregulation our nation has ever seen.”

These rollbacks are going to have effects across the entire country, but one state that is particularly subject to change is California. California has been a leading state in the past years in making alterations to regulations in order to combat the damage of climate change. These rollbacks are going to cause significant changes to California’s environmental regulations, vehicle emission standards, and air and water quality.

Some environmental regulations the Trump Administration has targeted are the Endangerment Finding, Clean Power Plan, and Mandatory Greenhouse Gas Reporting. The Endangerment Finding, created in 2009 by the EPA, stated that conclusions that CO2 emissions are dangerous for human health. However, now the EPA, under new leadership, is considering going back on these claims and saying that CO2 is not harmful to human health. The Clean Power Plan was created to reduce coal and gas power plant emissions but was cut down by the Supreme Court in 2022. The EPA was trying to develop new plans that would reintroduce this idea, but plans have since been halted. Finally, the EPA previously required over 8,000 polluters within the US to report their yearly emissions, with 400 of those companies being in California. Still, this requirement could soon be gone, leaving companies to be as irresponsible as these please regarding harmful emissions.

The rollbacks will also significantly impact electric vehicle mandates, which California is a leader in nationwide. California has spent a lot of time building infrastructure to support EVs so that the mandates of EVs within the state would be feasible for residents. Now, the EPA wants to terminate federal emission standards for light, medium, and heavy-duty vehicles, thus meaning that the push for more EVs will be lessened. Federal incentives for EV adoption and EV infrastructure will likely soon be rolled back as well.

While the impacts on air and water quality standards are not as concrete with these new rollbacks, there is grave danger that basic protections that Americans have enjoyed from acts like the Clean Water Act could be altered. Currently, the EPA plans to reconsider air toxic standards for coal plants, meaning that regulations preventing harmful pollutants will be lessened across the country. The Clean Water Act is in direct harm with federal protection for wetlands and drinking water possibly being altered. Environmentalists call these rollbacks a major setback in the United States' progress in combating climate change. They are saying that these effects could have major impacts on human health, specifically in California, leading to conditions that make wildfires even more severe than they already are.

In California, lawmakers are proposing new legislation to protect federal-level environmental protections. While the EPA has proposed these rollbacks, it is not without a fight from state and local governments that they will be enacted. The United States contributes to 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions, meaning that support from the federal government on controlling and cutting emissions is crucial for the fight against climate change. During this time, the federal government is not showing support, but the power of state governments, like in California, shows that climate change can be fought at more local levels.

---