With regulatory standards on power-sector carbon seesawing back and forth since former President Barack Obama finalized the Clean Power Plan a decade ago, Bracewell’s Jeff Holmstead told E&E News that it might be beneficial to the new Trump administration if it bypassed replacing the carbon rule at this time.
“They may well try to come up with a replacement rule, but that will take longer,” noted Holmstead. “If all they want to do is revoke the rule, that’s a much simpler task, because they don’t have to develop a new regulatory program or a new approach.”
Holmstead added that EPA could issue a final rulemaking in a year to dismantle the Biden-era rule, where Trump’s DOJ could defend the action from start to finish, making it more likely that it would withstand legal review.
