Announcing that he was “driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion,” Environmental Protection Agency head Lee Zeldin has issued a series of pronouncements rolling back previous agency regulations.
Zeldin said the agency would be concerned with “living up to our promises to unleash American energy, lower costs for Americans, revitalize the American auto industry, and work hand-in-hand with our state partners to advance our shared mission.”
The roll back applies to emission regulations on coal, oil, and gas production, as well as redirecting the agency’s “core mission to relieve the economy of unnecessary bureaucratic burdens that drive up costs for American consumers.”
Zeldin additionally announced that the EPA is working to review the “Waters of the United States” as part of the Clean Water Act that has defined which waterways in the country require permits for construction and stormwater discharge projects.
“The previous Administration’s definition of ‘Waters of the United States’ placed unfair burdens on the American people and drove up the cost of doing business,” continued Zeldin.
A press release from the EPA particularly focusing on the “Waters of the United States” regulations said that the agency will “move quickly to ensure that a revised definition follows the law, reduces red-tape, cuts overall permitting costs, and lowers the cost of doing business in communities across the country, while protecting the nation’s navigable waters from pollution.”
Revising the “Waters of the United States” rules, said the Associated Builders and Contractors, will “enable developers and contractors to efficiently comply with these important environmental regulations while avoiding unnecessary delays to critical infrastructure projects.”
Amanda Leland, executive director of the Environmental Defense Fund, however, condemned the rollback in a statement, declaring that it will lead to the “greatest increase in pollution in decades.” Leland added that the EPA action will result in “more toxic chemicals, more cancers, more asthma attacks, and more dangers for pregnant women and their children.”
From a different perspective, West Virginia Republican Senator Shelly Moore Capito said that the EPA is doing “exactly what needs to be done to secure American energy dominance and restore the communities who have been negatively impacted by regulations and overreach from the Biden administration.”
In appraising the historic EPA action, the Washington Post noted that the roll back has the potential of easing restrictions “on nearly every sector of the economy.” But the paper also added that “revisiting many of the rules could take the agency months or even years.”
March 13, 2025
By Garry Boulard
Photo courtesy of the Environmental Protection Agency
