EPA Set to Scrap Power Plant Emission Limits in Major Deregulation Move

The Environmental Protection Agency is poised to repeal regulations limiting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants that burn coal and natural gas, a step Administrator Lee Zeldin has said would spare industry billions of dollars and help "unleash" American energy.

The change, first proposed last year, could be announced as early as Monday, according to people familiar with the plan. It marks a sharp reversal from the climate and industrial-pollution policies pursued under Democratic presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, which often focused on low-income and majority Black or Hispanic communities.

The repeal is expected to face immediate legal challenges. Those familiar with the proposal said it could also constrain future administrations from regulating greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. The EPA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The rollback is part of President Donald Trump's repeated pledge to ease energy production and simplify electricity supply for homes and businesses. It is among nearly three dozen environmental regulations Zeldin targeted in early 2025, when he described the effort as the "most consequential day of deregulation in American history." In proposing the new rules last year, Zeldin said they were intended to end what he called the Biden and Obama administrations' "war on so much of our U.S. domestic energy supply."

Environmental and public health groups condemned the move and vowed to fight it in court. Vickie Patton, general counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund, said dismantling national protections against climate pollution from power plants would carry enormous costs for families' health, safety and well-being. She noted that Americans are already dealing with record heat, more dangerous floods and storms, and rising insurance costs, and said clean, affordable and reliable technologies are widely available.

Coal-, gas- and oil-fired power plants account for roughly one-quarter of U.S. climate pollution, second only to transportation, and represent one of the largest sources of climate-changing pollution worldwide. The rules targeted by the EPA could prevent an estimated 30,000 deaths and save $275 billion annually while in effect, according to an examination that drew on the agency's own prior assessments and other research. Even a partial rollback would mean more smog, mercury and lead, and especially more fine airborne particles that can lodge in lungs and cause health problems, along with higher greenhouse gas emissions.

Biden had made fighting climate change a hallmark of his presidency. Under a strict EPA rule issued in 2024, coal-fired plants would have been required to capture smokestack emissions or shut down. In its proposal last year, the Trump EPA argued that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases from fossil fuel-fired plants do not contribute significantly to dangerous pollution or climate change and therefore do not meet a threshold under the Clean Air Act for regulation. It also said such emissions are a small and decreasing share of global emissions. Zeldin said the Biden-era rules were designed to "suffocate our economy in order to protect the environment," with the intent to regulate the coal industry "out of existence."