Biden pushes U.S. to get off the coal train

Your guide to the political forces shaping the energy transformation
Apr 25, 2024 View in browser
 
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By Jack Quinn

Joe Biden speaks on Earth Day at Prince William Forest Park in Triangle, Virginia.

President Joe Biden speaks on Earth Day at Prince William Forest Park on April 22, 2024, in Triangle, Virginia. | Andrew Harnik/Getty Images


The Biden administration’s climate crusade reached a crescendo Thursday, with the Environmental Protection Agency finishing four rules that could all but eliminate coal plants by the 2030s.

The new rules crack down on pollution from fossil fuel power plants, with new standards for coal ash, wastewater, mercury emissions and carbon dioxide. The carbon standard could transform the power sector, requiring utilities to either make major investments in coal plants to limit planet-warming pollution, or abandon coal altogether in favor of cleaner energy sources.

Under the framework, all existing coal plants will need to install carbon capture and storage by 2032 if they plan to remain operating past 2039. Future natural gas plants that run frequently will have to do the same.

EPA Administrator Michael Regan told reporters that the rules give utilities, regulators and states clarity on the clean energy transition — and ample time to plan retirements and avoid electricity disruptions, Jean Chemnick writes.

“We are ensuring that the power sector has the information needed to prepare for the future with confidence, enabling strong investment and planning decisions,” Regan said on Wednesday.

Here comes the counterattack

But Republican lawmakers and critics in the power industry are already announcing legal and political attacks, Jean writes with Robin Bravender.

The “barrage of new EPA rules ignores our nation’s ongoing electric reliability challenges and is the wrong approach at a critical time for our nation’s energy future,” said Jim Matheson, CEO of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association.

West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said she’ll use the Congressional Review Act to try to kill the rules, writes Emma Dumain. That 1996 law allows Congress to rescind a rule with a simple majority — but it would require a two-thirds majority of both chambers to override a veto from Biden.

As with the Obama administration’s attempt to tackle the power sector’s climate pollution nearly a decade ago, the fate of EPA’s new rules may ultimately rest with the Supreme Court.

EPA created its power plant pollution rule using its authority under the Clean Air Act. But in recent years, conservative groups have persuaded the Supreme Court to whittle away federal agencies’ powers — including through a newly adopted “major questions” doctrine.

The doctrine — which the high court used to strike down the Obama rule two years ago — says federal agencies must have express permission from Congress to handle especially politically and economically significant issues. How significant is still a mystery.

What the rules leave out

The rules issued Thursday omit one big pollution source: existing natural gas plants. Gas is on the verge of overtaking coal as the power sector's largest source of carbon pollution this year.

EPA plans to pursue a second rulemaking targeting those plants in 2025. But if former President Donald Trump wins the White House in November, he would most likely reverse course.

Still, environmental groups emphasized on Thursday that EPA’s new standards would make a big dent.

“Burning coal and oil produces a long list of dangerous air pollutants, including carcinogenic metals as well as other emissions that react to form particulate matter,” said American Lung Association CEO Harold Wimmer in a news release. “The new standards will reduce these dangerous emissions.”

 

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Towers for electric transmission lines.

Towers for electric transmission lines. | Tim Boyle/Getty Images


DOE launches transmission initiatives
The Department of Energy has created a one-stop shop for the federal permitting of major transmission projects, Jason Plautz and Peter Behr write.

The effort aims to ensure the approval process for large power lines doesn't exceed two years. It comes amid worries that a growing number of renewable energy projects — including solar in the West and offshore wind in the Northeast — may come online faster than the necessary transmission is built.

DOE also announced up to $331 million in funding from the bipartisan infrastructure law funding for a 2 gigawatt transmission line project that will carry clean energy between Idaho and Nevada.

Trump 2.0 Interior redux
Many Trump-era Interior Department officials would likely return to their old jobs if former President Donald Trump wins another term, Michael Doyle reports.

“I think there are going to be a lot of familiar faces that will want to go back,” said Cole Rojewski, Interior’s congressional liaison between 2019 and 2021.

Among those familiar faces: former Bureau of Land Management acting Director William Perry Pendley, who recently wrote Interior policy recommendations for the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 strategy. “You bet,” Pendley said when asked if he would be interested in a return to a Trump-led Interior.

Spanish climate minister to top EU election ticket
Spanish Minister of Ecological Transition Teresa Ribera will serve as the ruling Socialist Party’s leading candidate in the June EU elections, in a sign of the Spanish government’s prioritization of climate issues under Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s fragile coalition, Leonie Cater writes.

Sánchez narrowly secured another term in office last year after striking a deal with Catalonian separatist parties, but has faced difficulties in navigating a narrow majority in parliament with intense policy disagreements among members within the ruling coalition.

With the EU elections providing another test of Sánchez’s support — and right-wing opposition party Vox projected to make significant gains — the Socialist party has opted to place the country’s chief climate representative at the center of its pitch to voters.

In Other News

Settling in: Oil prices have stabilized over recent days as dampened U.S. demand overshadows the waning risk of escalating tensions in the Middle East.

Off the ground: Bolivia’s state-owned YLB will produce its first major quantities of battery-grade lithium in 2024, as the country with the world’s largest lithium resource potential tries to catch up to its neighbors.

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Scotland First Minister Humza Yousaf addresses a rally in support for an independent Scotland on April 20, 2024 in Glasgow, Scotland.

Scotland First Minister Humza Yousaf addresses a rally in support for an independent Scotland on April 20, 2024 in Glasgow, Scotland. | Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images


Scotland’s governing coalition fell apart after Green lawmakers blasted the Scottish National Party over the country's failure to meet a looming carbon reduction target.

The developer of a 1.5-gigawatt offshore wind project in New Jersey will restructure its bid to state regulators, and will likely ask taxpayers to cover part of the project’s ballooning costs.

A group of U.S. solar manufacturers has placed a contentious trade dispute on Biden's desk by filing an anti-dumping complaint against Southeast Asian companies accused of stockpiling cells and panels from China.

That's it for today, folks! Thanks for reading.

 

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