In revoking its scientific finding that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will seek to dismantle the legal underpinning of its authority to act on climate change under the Clean Air Act. To that end, observers expect the EPA’s strategy to rely on recent Supreme Court decisions that restrict its authority to act on climate under current law.
“We expect EPA to revoke the endangerment finding for legal reasons, not scientific ones,” Bracewell’s Jeff Holmstead, who served as head of EPA’s air office during President George W. Bush’s administration, told Inside Climate News. “This is the only way that they can ‘drive a stake through the heart of climate religion,’ as Administrator Zeldin has said.”
