(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump’s environmental chief moved to revise Biden-era climate mandates curbing greenhouse gas pollution from the nation’s power plants.
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The move represents one of the most consequential yet by the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Lee Zeldin, as the White House moves to ease regulations on domestic energy development and electricity production. The development was fully expected; the president vowed to “terminate” the measure while on the campaign trail. Yet the relative speed of Zeldin’s announcement, less than two months into Trump’s second term, underscores the priority the new administration is placing on the issue.
Zeldin isn’t immediately replacing the Biden-era mandates. Instead, his announcement marks the beginning of a formal rule-making process that could result in replacing the requirements with only modest pollution curbs, mirroring an approach the EPA took during Trump’s first term.
Trump promised on the campaign trail to “open dozens and dozens” of power plants to help meet an expected surge in energy demand from data centers and manufacturing. And Trump has cast US energy abundance as an unparalleled advantage in the global quest to dominate artificial intelligence. Since taking office, Trump and top officials also have repeatedly emphasized the importance of more US electricity generation to win the global race to dominate artificial intelligence.
The Biden-era regulation limiting planet-warming pollution from power plants has been a top target for criticism from fossil fuel advocates and electric utilities that have battled the measure in court. Opponents argue it will unnecessarily force closures of coal-fueled plants while discouraging construction of new natural gas-based facilities.
The shift could also ease checks on greenhouse gas emissions even as scientists say the world needs to rapidly curtail the pollution to restrain global warming and avoid escalating, catastrophic consequences of climate change. The power sector has been viewed a critical opportunity for paring planet-warming pollution, with government subsidies and declining costs helping drive potential emission-free replacements in the form of solar and wind energy.