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The Trump administration is set this week to overturn an Obama-era scientific finding that serves as the legal basis for federal regulation of greenhouse gases, the Environmental Protection Agency said Monday.
Repealing the so-called hazard finding, a scientific determination that greenhouse gas emissions endanger human health, would remove the legal basis for broader regulation of greenhouse gases and mark the Trump administration's broadest rollback of climate policy.
The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that the repeal is expected to be released later this week and quoted EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin as saying it would constitute "the largest act of deregulation in the history of the United States."
The Trump administration has been working on the repeal for more than a year. The proposed rule was sent to the White House Office of Management and Budget for review on Jan. 7.
The proposal, unveiled last summer, received over half a million public comments.
The repeal would remove regulatory requirements to measure, report, certify and comply with federal greenhouse gas emissions standards for cars, administration officials told the Wall Street Journal, but would not apply to stationary sources such as power plants.
An EPA spokesman said the finding of endangerment was used by the Obama and Biden administrations to "justify trillions of dollars in greenhouse gas regulations covering new vehicles and engines."
On January 30, a federal court ruled that the Department of Energy violated the law when it formed a climate science advisory group whose report was intended to support the EPA's overturning of the hazard finding, potentially making the final rule vulnerable to legal challenges.
While many industry groups supported repealing vehicle emissions standards, many others were reluctant to show public support for overturning the finding of endangerment because of the legal and regulatory uncertainty it would cause.
Last month, the American Petroleum Institute said it supported repealing the hazard finding for vehicles but said it should be left in place for stationary sources, which would require the EPA to regulate a potent greenhouse gas called methane from the oil and gas sector.
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