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E&E News
20 hours ago
- Business
- E&E News
‘Fight of our lives': Lobbying intense on climate law credits
The morning after the Senate Finance Committee released a new megabill text that would roll back tax credits for renewable energy development, the solar industry's top lobby group hosted a rally in the shadow of the Capitol. 'Time to storm the Hill!' Abigail Ross Hopper, CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association, said Tuesday. Lobbyists and industry leaders have been in a mad dash to rescue some of the energy tax incentives in the Democrats' 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. Advertisement The House's 'One Big Beautiful Bill Act,' passed last month, would roll back many of the credits dramatically. And a Senate draft is not much better for sources like wind and solar. SEIA's rally included workers and leaders for dozens of companies before marching to meet with lawmakers and aides. It was the group's eighth lobbying day this year. 'We are in a fight for our lives,' Hopper told the crowd, saying that 330,000 jobs are at stake. Trade groups and other advocates have been releasing studies warning about the legislation's potential harms to projects and employment, particularly in red states. The legislation's real effects remain a moving target because Republican leaders have promised to keep tweaking their tax, energy and border spending package. 'We are not at the end. We had that language come out of the Senate Finance [Committee] last night, but we are not finished,' she said. 'I would not ask you to travel here, take time away from your families, take time away from your businesses, if I thought that this was done. This is not done. You have the opportunity today … to tell these legislators what this means to you.' Hopper told reporters that the Finance Committee draft represented 'some steps toward progress, but it is far from acceptable.' 'A real frenzy' Companies and groups thought Republicans and President Donald Trump would ease from targeting climate law credits because of their economic impact. The House bill was a wake-up call, said Mike Carr, a lobbyist at Boundary Stone Partners who represents companies in solar, batteries and related fields. 'I think there was a general assumption that … they weren't going to pull the rug out from it,' Carr said. 'And the House bill really did pull the rug out from a lot of this.' Since the House passed its bill, it's been all hands on deck, Carr said. 'There's been a real frenzy since then, trying to help people understand how much is on the line, how many jobs could potentially be lost in various sectors.' Other major organizations fighting for the energy incentives include the American Clean Power Association and the American Council on Renewable Energy. 'While the Senate Finance Committee proposal eliminates poison pills from the House legislation, abrupt changes to the clean energy tax credits unnecessarily penalize companies that are making good faith investments under current law,' ACP CEO Jason Grumet said in a statement. The Edison Electric Institute thanked the Finance Committee for its work but made it clear that it sees room for improvements. 'Financial certainty and access to cost-effective financing are critical tools for electric companies as they continue to make needed investments to meet rising customer demand and to expand generation capacity,' said Pat Vincent-Collawn, the group's interim CEO. The group had taken a dimmer view of the House version, particularly around sourcing requirements, the short timeline for ending credits and tax credit transferability. Big business groups like the American Petroleum Institute and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have been mostly supportive of the congressional Republicans' efforts, but have also been pushing for longer timeframes for some tax credits, including for hydrogen and carbon capture. Before the Senate bill was released, the Chamber wrote in a post that the group would 'continue to urge policymakers to preserve pro-growth tax policies that enhance U.S. energy competitiveness and security, including credits for clean hydrogen production and carbon oxide sequestration, as well as technology-neutral credits to help meet the country's rapidly growing demand for electricity generation.' Republican group Republicans launched a new group called Built for America this month to advocate for the energy incentives from a conservative viewpoint. The $2 million campaign, led by former West Virginia Lt. Gov. Mitch Carmichael and former Trump campaign adviser Bryan Lanza, is putting advertisements in conservative platforms like Fox News and Truth Social, which is owned by the president. 'Trump country is booming. We're building, hiring and winning in America, because energy tax credits put America first,' one of the ads says. Another group called Advanced Energy United launched a six-figure campaign of its own targeting a handful of Senate Republicans with digital ads. That group is backed by major technology firms like Microsoft, automakers like Ford and other firms like NRG. 'Repealing these tax credits would devastate local economies, raise energy costs, and hand the keys of energy leadership to China — and the Senate now has a choice to make,' Harry Godfrey, the group's managing director for federal priorities, said in a statement. New lobbyists hired A number of companies and associations have retained new lobbyists in recent months to fight for the credits they support, according to disclosures filed with Congress. They include battery maker Energizer Holdings, chemical manufacturer Johnson Matthey, the Hydrogen Jobs Now Coalition, battery recycler Ecobat and the Clean Energy Buyers Association. The far-right House Freedom Caucus pointed to news that Energizer had retained a slate of Democratic lobbyists from Washington Council Ernst & Young. 'This should tell Republicans everything you need to know: The Swamp isn't even hiring Republicans to lobby on preserving the #GreenNewScam IRA tax subsidies,' the caucus wrote on X. Those pushing to terminate the tax credits have their advocates too. Pro-fossil fuel activist Alex Epstein has been involved, and Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) called him an 'enormous help' in rolling back the credits in the House bill. Epstein was disappointed in the Senate Finance Committee draft. 'Sad update' he wrote on X, outlining his view of the changes. 'Nothing is set in stone yet, there's still time for Congress to do the right thing. Tell your Senator,' he added.
E&E News
a day ago
- Business
- E&E News
Did Trump's assault on regs just knock out CCS?
The Trump administration is telling the world that carbon capture and storage at power plants is not ready for prime time, delivering a major setback to a technology that's struggling to find a foothold. EPA proposed a repeal last week of the Biden administration's climate rule on electricity producers, which called CCS the 'best system of emission reduction' for long-running coal plants and new gas turbines. In a new proposed rule, EPA said capturing 90 percent of carbon emissions at power plants hasn't been 'adequately demonstrated and its costs are not reasonable.' It's 'extremely unlikely that the infrastructure necessary for CCS can be deployed' by a 2032 compliance date set under the Biden rule, EPA said. Advertisement The Trump administration's proposed rollback — which EPA touted in a news release Friday with more than 50 supportive quotes from lawmakers and trade groups — comes amid scant deployment to date of carbon capture projects on U.S. power generation. Fewer projects in the electricity sector could impede broader CCS efforts nationwide, whether they involve storing carbon dioxide underground or using it to pump out more oil and gas. 'Power plants are large emitters, and sequestering CO2 from these facilities would have required significant investment in transport and storage infrastructure, most likely in the form of [carbon capture] hubs or clusters,' Brenna Casey, an associate at BloombergNEF, said in a recent note to clients. 'Other industrial emitters, like cement plants and petrochemicals producers, could have piggybacked on the infrastructure built to serve these power plants.' In a report last fall, the Global CCS Institute — a think tank that supports the industry — said 19 commercial-scale CCS facilities were operational in the United States. Only one, the Petra Nova facility in Texas, is on power generation, the assessment showed. Analysts offered mixed views on how much of a setback the proposed repeal of the Biden rule could deliver to power sector CCS — with some saying it could push plant operators to rethink investing in the technology or hold off on plans, while others said they didn't expect the Biden rule to speed up CCS deployment on fossil power plants. Under the Biden rule, new combined-cycle natural gas plants that run more than 40 percent of the time would also have needed to curb their emissions by 90 percent by 2032. EPA's repeal 'could be a large blow' to the U.S. CCS sector, Brendan Cooke, vice president for new energies at research firm Rystad Energy, said in a statement. 'A little over half of the announced capture capacity for the power sector is for plants that would be regulated under the rules put in place last year' by former President Joe Biden's EPA, Cooke said. 'For these plants, the absence of regulation, plus challenging economics, may be enough for operators to reconsider investments.' Others, however, see a more muted effect from retracting the Biden rule, in part because of the current interest in developing natural-gas-fueled power plants known as peakers that typically only run during periods of high demand. 'Our original view was that the EPA regulations would not accelerate CCS deployment on power plants as we expect the majority of future gas plants to be peakers and expected the rule to cause coal retirements to accelerate rather than install CCS,' said Jeffery Jen, a senior analyst with Enverus Intelligence Research, in an email. 'Based off this, the repealing of the regulation should not materially impact CCS deployment on power.' The 'most prominent business case' for CCS deployment on power plants is helping to give data centers 'clean' and 'dispatchable' baseload power, according to Jen. In an analysis last June, the Rhodium Group research firm came to a similar conclusion, finding that fossil generation 'with carbon capture generally plays a small role on the grid in 2035.' While there's been 'limited' announcements of CCS for new gas-fired power generation so far, 'the impact to potential growth in this area would be the most significant as all new baseload gas generation would have been mandated to install CCS,' said Cooke at Rystad. 'Without regulation we should not expect near term growth in this area.' While the federal 45Q tax credit — the main incentive for CCS projects in the United States — has stayed relatively unharmed thus far in Congress' reconciliation package, high costs and difficulty building new pipelines to carry captured CO2 are also headwinds that have blunted deployment. The U.S. power sector is responsible for nearly a quarter of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions — behind only the transportation sector. Last week, the Carbon Capture Coalition, a group that works to build federal policy support for carbon management projects, highlighted announced CCS plans in the U.S. power sector. 'Regardless of the administration's decision on how or if to regulate CO2 emissions from the power sector, carbon capture and storage technologies are here to stay,' said Jessie Stolark, the coalition's executive director, in a statement. Still, Stanford University professor Rob Jackson said companies won't pay for CCS when they can pollute for free. Jackson is a senior fellow at Stanford's Woods Institute for the Environment, as well as its Precourt Institute for Energy. Last week, Alex Bond, executive director of legal and clean energy policy at the Edison Electric Institute, said the group supports CCS technology but 'appreciates EPA's acknowledgment that carbon capture and storage technologies are not yet viable for widespread deployment.' 'Electric companies need standards for natural gas facilities that are attainable to plan and permit new facilities, along with flexible regulatory approaches that help maintain dispatchable generation,' Bond said in a statement. In a statement Monday, an unnamed EPA spokesperson said the agency's regulatory agenda under Biden 'was to kill off the coal, oil and gas sectors with costly regulations and mandates.' The U.S. hit record oil and gas production levels during the Biden administration, however. DOE didn't provide comments to POLITICO's E&E News on the outlook for the CCS industry. The Global CCS Institute, however, said some customers will continue to look for low-carbon power, regardless of EPA's position, and will be interested in natural gas plants with CCS. 'Some states may also continue to promote policies that require or incentivize CCS, and the administration is prioritizing Class VI primacy, which will help states move forward where CCS is a priority,' the institute said in a statement. 'Strong market signal' On Earth Day this year, the White House used the term 'cutting-edge' to describe CCS. The emissions-trapping technology was on a list of sectors — including nuclear and geothermal energy — that the Trump administration said it supports in pursuit of greater energy production and 'environmental innovation.' The inclusion of CCS didn't go unnoticed among industry members or its proponents, including the developer of a major carbon dioxide pipeline project in the Midwest. Since that April proclamation, however, the administration's mashup of policies around carbon capture has elicited both praise and disappointment. One development cheered by CCS supporters has been EPA's push to grant top oversight of wells used for geologic storage of carbon dioxide to state agencies. This year, EPA has bestowed that authority to West Virginia and proposed doing the same for Arizona and Texas, clearing the path for those states to issue permits for CO2 storage wells instead of the federal government. The Department of Energy, meanwhile, has announced its intention to remove carbon management from its Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management; proposed cutting the office's budget by about $270 million; and said its work would include 'promoting carbon capture, transport and storage with a focus on enhanced oil and gas recovery,' where CO2 is used to produce more oil. In May, DOE terminated nearly $3.7 billion in awards — including several on carbon capture projects. Carbon management backers called the cancellations a 'major step backward' for national deployment. Then came EPA's proposed rule last week, which said greenhouse gas emissions from fossil-fuel-fired power plants don't contribute significantly to dangerous air pollution. Although it's 'disappointing to see the [Trump] administration send mixed signals on its support for carbon management, the industry has proven that it's still 'all in', including through an unprecedented number of announced projects and pending Class VI wells,' said Stolark at the Carbon Capture Coalition in an email Friday. There's a 'strong market signal' for CCS deployment through the 45Q credit, as well as bipartisan support from lawmakers on Capitol Hill, Stolark also said. Peter Findlay, director of carbon capture, use and storage (CCUS) economics at research firm Wood Mackenzie, said the Trump administration's exact strategy on carbon capture isn't crystal clear. But he said it's one of three decarbonization target areas the administration backs, along with nuclear and geothermal. As far as CCS can help to foster energy independence, the Trump administration 'sees it as favorable, but not invest vast sums in the technology development,' Findlay said. While the United States remains a leader in operational CCS projects globally, Findlay said the potential is there for China to move past the U.S. if there's not sufficient federal support for early stage technologies. The Trump administration hasn't prioritized carbon capture in terms of its budget, said Ryan Fitzpatrick, senior director of domestic policy for the climate and energy program at Third Way, a national think tank and advocacy organization. 'I think a lot of the support that it's had and the protection that it's had in things like the reconciliation bill has come from Congress,' Fitzpatrick said. 'But I do think the administration is missing the bigger picture here, that whether it's the U.S. or other countries, CCS is going to be deployed and equipment is going to be purchased, technology is going to be licensed. 'There is money to be made, and the U.S. is currently well situated to compete for that, but that's not guaranteed,' he added. 'We have to have public support for this as well.' This week, the Senate Finance Committee's portion of the Republican reconciliation bill included some changes to the 45Q credit, including increasing the credit value for CO2 used in products or enhanced oil recovery. Promoting CCS tied to enhanced oil recovery fits into President Donald Trump's focus on expanding oil production, Fitzpatrick said. Still, he said, if CO2 storage via enhanced oil recovery is how Trump can support carbon capture, that's not the worst thing, as that will still prove beneficial for the sector overall. Project ups and downs Despite the fanfare, the only operational CCS facility at a U.S. power plant has less than six years combined under its belt. The Petra Nova project, which captures CO2 from a coal-fired unit at a power plant southwest of Houston, started operating around the beginning of 2017. While DOE put out a happy third birthday to the facility in January 2020, the CCS facility would soon shut down. Beginning that May, Petra Nova took a hiatus of more than three years after low oil prices, induced by the Covid-19 pandemic, hurt the project's economics. The Petra Nova facility, which has cumulatively captured 5 million metric tons of CO2 since it started up, is owned by ENEOS Xplora, formerly JX Nippon Oil & Gas Exploration. Meanwhile, at least one CCS project in the power sector is no longer moving ahead. Project Diamond Vault — a CCS retrofit of a Louisiana plant mainly fueled by petroleum coke announced in 2022 — is no more. 'In 2022, Cleco Power announced it would be initiating a two-year study to explore retrofitting the company's existing Madison 3 plant to reduce carbon emissions' through CCS, the power company said in a statement this week. In 2024, Cleco Power 'discontinued the study because it was found that the project wasn't economic and in the best interest of our customers.' But other projects are still working to join Petra Nova's ranks. Those include a CCS project at a California Resources (CRC) gas plant in California's Kern County, which announced plans to start construction in the second quarter of this year and begin CO2 injection before the end of 2025. The project was hit with a lawsuit in November over allegations that Kern County officials didn't properly weigh its environmental risks. On Monday, CRC spokesperson Richard Venn said construction of the CCS project is expected to begin in the next several weeks and will last roughly six months. That work includes well drilling, grading, trenching, foundations and installation of CO2 capture equipment, he said. 'CRC remains focused on advancing CCS as a critical tool for reducing emissions in California and supporting the state's ambitious climate goals,' Venn said in an email. Other proposals to tack on CCS technology are further out on the horizon. Developers of Project Tundra, which would add carbon capture to the coal-fired Milton R. Young Station in North Dakota, have declined to say when they could reach a final investment decision on the project. They failed to reach that milestone in 2024 and the project lost energy company TC Energy as one of its developers last year. 'We remain focused on Project Tundra and look forward to a final investment decision when the necessary conditions align, ensuring that the project fits our long-term goals,' said Ben Fladhammer, a spokesperson for Minnkota Power Cooperative, which operates the Young plant and is a developer of Project Tundra. Fladhammer said the estimated cost of Project Tundra is now $2 billion, up from an earlier estimate of $1.4 billion. Minnkota had opposed the power plant rule finalized by EPA last year. Fladhammer criticized the Biden rule as 'unworkable,' pointing to 'aggressive timelines and requirements' that would 'push dependable power plants toward retirement at a time when electricity demand is rising and the grid is already under strain.' 'Project Tundra was initiated well before the current power plant regulations were finalized,' Fladhammer said, adding that the project 'remains an option under active evaluation as we assess technologies that can support reliable, lower-carbon energy production.' Meanwhile, a natural gas power plant in West Virginia with CCS — the CPV Shay Energy Center — 'remains in active development,' said Matthew Litchfield, vice president of external and regulatory affairs at Competitive Power Ventures, in a statement Friday. Announced in 2022 shortly after Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, the plant would have a capacity of about 2,000 megawatts. It's in the process of working through the interconnection process with regional grid operator PJM Interconnection, according to Litchfield. Construction on the plant is slated to begin in the fourth quarter of 2026. 'We look forward to continuing to advance the project and help the region address the critical need for more large dispatchable power projects like CPV Shay,' he said. Meanwhile, utility Duke Energy is working on a front-end engineering and design study for a CCS project at the Edwardsport coal-to-gas plant in Indiana, and that's expected to wrap in the third quarter of 2026. Duke welcomed EPA's announcement last week. 'Last year's power plant rule unnecessarily puts pressure on customer affordability and grid reliability with little to no environmental benefits,' Duke spokesperson Angeline Protogere said in an email Friday. 'We appreciate EPA's ongoing efforts to address these concerns.' Separately, Entergy said an engineering study for a potential CCS project at the Lake Charles Power Station in Louisiana is still ongoing and is expected to be completed this summer. 'While we are currently reviewing EPA's proposal for fossil fuel-powered generating plants, Entergy has long supported the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions and we remain committed to transitioning to modern low- and zero carbon-emitting generating resources,' said Neal Kirby, an Entergy spokesperson, in a statement about EPA's proposed repeal. In Florida, Tampa Electric spokesperson Cherie Jacobs said the utility currently has 'no plans to move forward with CCS,' but is planning to drill two test wells near the Polk Power Station in central Florida to better understand the area's geology. Tampa Electric could decide to pursue CCS in the future 'if it's in the best interest of our customers,' Jacobs said. This story also appears in Climatewire. Correction: A previous version of this story misstated the timing of Project Tundra's cost increase.
E&E News
a day ago
- Politics
- E&E News
How Trump's assault on science is blinding America to climate change
President Donald Trump long ago decided climate change was a 'hoax.' Now his administration is trying to silence government research that proves him wrong. Since Trump returned to the White House in January, his administration has fired or let go hundreds of climate and weather scientists — and cut ties to hundreds more who work in academia or the private sector. His team has eliminated major climate programs, frozen or cut grants for climate research and moved to shutter EPA's greenhouse gas reporting program. The Trump administration has slow-walked climate-related contracts — including one for the upkeep of two polar weather satellites. And it's begun to wall off the United States from international climate cooperation. Advertisement That's not all. Trump's blitzkrieg on federal climate work is only a start — as his budget strategy calls for even deeper cuts in the months and years ahead. That includes billions of dollars in cuts to climate and weather research at NOAA and NASA, widely considered two of the world's top science agencies. All told, it's an unprecedented assault on humanity's understanding of how global warming is transforming the planet, scientists say. And they warn that Trump's actions will blind the United States and the world to the ways people are rapidly heating the planet by burning fossil fuels. 'They certainly are trying to create lasting damage,' said Andrew Dessler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University. The White House has framed the moves as cost-cutting measures designed to shrink the size of government. Trump officials have said too that a retreat from climate science is necessary, as the research underpins regulations that could hinder U.S. production of fossil fuels — a top goal of the administration. 'Climate alarmism has had a terrible impact on human lives and freedom,' Energy Secretary Chris Wright wrote Thursday on the social media site X. 'It belongs in the ash heap of history.' Wright, who led a fracking services company before joining the administration, added, 'Hydrocarbons are and will continue to be essential to improving the wealth, health, and lives of all human beings.' The White House echoed that sentiment in response to questions that POLITICO's E&E News sent to NOAA, NASA and the Office of Management and Budget. 'The last Administration wasted billions on 'research' and fake science in Green New Scam and culturally Marxist programs,' OMB spokesperson Rachel Cauley said. 'Under President Trump, our science agencies are actually doing science again,' she added. But scientists say the Trump team is doing just the opposite by jettisoning climate scientists and abandoning respected climate programs. Among the actions taken so far by administration: Dismissing hundreds of scientists who were working on the next version of the National Climate Assessment, a congressionally mandated report that is used to prepare U.S. communities for extreme weather and sea-level rise. Dismantling the U.S. Global Change Research Program, a 35-year-old effort to track global climate change that was established by Congress and signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. Eliminating the State Department's Office of Global Change, which oversees climate negotiations. For U.S. climate science, each week of the Trump administration seems to bring new losses, by design. The National Science Foundation's funding for climate research at universities has now evaporated after severe Trump administration cuts. Spacecraft in orbit that have cost billions of dollars to launch — and a fraction of the cost to maintain — will be mothballed if they monitor climate change, under Trump's budget proposal. NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, one of the world's leading space and climate research labs, was kicked out of its longtime building. The scientists who work there now face an uncertain future under a proposed NASA budget that cuts science research nearly in half. 'It's humiliating and it debilitates our standing in the world community,' said Michael Mann, a climate scientist at the University of Pennsylvania and director of its Penn Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media. Climate science at EPA, the CDC, and the Interior, Agriculture and Energy departments has been proposed for elimination. That includes research that monitors human harms from pollution, climatic conditions that can devastate farmers' crops and the health risks of intense heat waves. Yet Russ Vought — who leads the White House OMB — wants more. Vought is attempting to strip away Congress' budget authority and its ability to block some of the proposed cuts to climate science. Agencies such as NOAA and NASA have been ordered by the White House to freeze billions of dollars in funding — including money that goes toward climate research — before Congress has a chance to act. And that's just a small sample of the first wave of Trump climate attacks. 'Despite the claims to the contrary, this isn't being done to cut costs,' Mann said. 'It's being done because climate science — and simply measuring our climate — has proven inconvenient to certain special interests who hold sway today in Washington.' 'There will be a lot to rebuild' Climate denialists, including conservative politicians, foundations and think tanks that oppose regulations, long have pined for a day when the U.S. government stops providing clear evidence that global warming poses a threat to America's economy, national security and way of life. With Trump, their wishes are on the way to being granted. It's the culmination of decades of funding from the oil, gas and coal industry to tear down climate science. Weakening scientific research and creating long-term damage is the goal, said Steve Milloy, who was part of Trump's EPA transition team in his first term and has spent decades trying to shatter federal climate science and regulations. 'If Democrats ever get back in power, there will be a lot to rebuild,' he said. That reconstruction likely will include pillars of the nation's climate research infrastructure. Take, for example, the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. Last month, it measured the highest level of atmospheric carbon dioxide recorded in modern human history, at 430.2 parts per million. For scientists, it's a troubling benchmark. For the Trump administration, it may identify the observatory as another target for cuts — the facility is being considered for closure, and its lease may be canceled. Other data streams are in danger too. More than a dozen spacecraft or space-based instruments that capture climate data are proposed to be shut down in the White House spending plan. The Trump administration justifies cost-cutting measures such as these by saying they're intended to stop waste, fraud and abuse. But eliminating the functions of satellites already in orbit — which represent decades of work and billions of dollars in sunk-cost spending — makes neither financial nor scientific sense, said Rick Spinrad, who served as NOAA chief during the Biden administration. 'So many of the observations that are made in support of understanding climate are also being made to support the more immediate weather and ocean applications,' he said. 'To say 'there's the word climate, shut that down' means the same satellite isn't available to give you an improved four to five day forecast on hurricane landfall.' And it's not just that valuable data would be lost — whatever federal research remains will be sidelined and blocked from informing government policy and procedure. Last month, Trump issued an executive order on a new 'gold standard' for scientific research that effectively blocks much of the science on greenhouse gas emissions, human health harms from pollution and environmental degradation from being used by federal agencies. As part of that process, political appointees would effectively determine which scientific research can be used by the federal government. In effect, the moves would blind the country to the consequences of the administration's actions to cut pollution regulations and increase the country's reliance on fossil fuels while making it harder to build out clean energy, Texas A&M's Dessler said. 'They hate science because it leads to regulation, so they want to do everything they can to stop science from being used to regulate,' he said. The plan to eradicate climate science throughout the government is reminiscent of the way Trump and his officials attacked Covid data collection, which clearly showed cases and death rates rising in his first term, said Spinrad, the former NOAA administrator. 'The Trump administration said we can reduce the number of cases by not testing anymore,' Spinrad said. 'That's what is going on here. 'We can reduce the impact of climate change by not monitoring anymore.' That's what they're saying, which is just totally incomprehensible.'
E&E News
a day ago
- Politics
- E&E News
Greens push back on Trump effort to keep coal plant running
Environmentalists are pushing back against the Trump administration's move last month to force a coal plant to keep operating past its planned retirement. On Wednesday, Earthjustice and other environmental groups challenged the Energy Department to reconsider its decision in May to force the J.H. Campbell coal plant, an aging, 1,560-megawatt coal plant on the shores of Lake Michigan, to keep running through the summer. The groups say the DOE move will raise costs for consumers. Advertisement 'The order is unlawful, unreasonable and unnecessary,' Shannon Fisk, an attorney with Earthjustice, told POLITICO's E&E News. 'The administration is concocting an emergency to try to step in and disrupt a planned retirement that has been agreed to by all the major players in Michigan.'
E&E News
a day ago
- Business
- E&E News
Fossil fuel booster meets with Republicans on megabill
A fossil fuel advocate briefed Senate Republicans during a meeting at the Capitol on Wednesday, as leadership looks to iron out disagreements over clean energy credits in the GOP megabill. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said the issue of energy tax credits 'is not totally settled' after the Finance Committee released text Monday. The legislation targeted wind and solar incentives but extended the runway for other sources like geothermal, hydropower and nuclear. It would also get rid of tax breaks for electric vehicles, rooftop solar and other residential energy-saving incentives. Advertisement Alex Epstein, an author and longtime supporter of fossil fuel expansion, met with Senate Republicans during a lunch. White House chief of staff Susie Wiles was also at the Capitol on Wednesday.
