Washington (AFP) – The head of the US Environmental Protection Agency said Monday that President Donald Trump’s administration will move to repeal his predecessor Barack Obama’s plan to restrict greenhouse gas emissions.
Speaking in Kentucky at a political event, EPA chief Scott Pruitt said he would Tuesday “be signing a proposed rule to withdraw the so-called Clean Power Plan of the past administration.”
Pruitt said the rule, enacted in 2015, “was about picking winners and losers.”
“The past administration was using every bit of power and authority to use the EPA to pick winners and losers and how we generate electricity in this country. That’s wrong.”
The Clean Power Plan sought to reduce carbon emissions in the United States from power plants for the first time.
Prior to the finalization of the rules in August 2015, “power plants were allowed to dump unlimited amounts of carbon pollution into the atmosphere,” said the Union of Concerned Scientsts.
“No rules were in effect that limited their emissions of carbon dioxide, the primary driver of global warming.”
The standards were developed under an act of Congress, called the Clean Air Act.
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