The US Senate confirmed President Donald Trump's pick to run the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday over the objections of Democrats and environmentalists worried he will gut the agency, as the administration readies executive orders to ease regulation on drillers and miners.
The installation of Scott Pruitt, an environmental sceptic and nay sayer, who sued the agency he intends to lead more than a dozen times as Oklahoma attorney general, reinforces expectations on both sides of the political divide that America will cede its position as a leader in the global fight on climate change.
Senators voted 52-46 to approve Pruitt, who was to be sworn in later on Friday afternoon at the White House.
Pruitt begins what is likely to be a controversial tenure with a clear set of goals. He has been outspoken in his view, widely shared by Republicans, that the EPA zealously overstepped its legal authority under President Barack Obama, saddling the fossil-fuel industry with unnecessary and onerous regulations. He used his position as attorney general for six years to repeatedly sue the Environmental Protection Agency for its efforts to regulate mercury, smog and other forms of pollution.
But rolling back the environmental actions of the previous administration won’t happen quickly or easily. Even if President Trump issues executive orders aimed at undoing Obama initiatives to combat climate change, oversee waterways and wetlands and slash pollution from power plants — as he is expected to do as early as next week — existing regulations won’t disappear overnight.
To reverse or revamp existing rules around vehicle fuel standards, mercury pollution or a range of other environmental issues, Pruitt would have to repeat the lengthy bureaucratic process that generated them. Other initiatives, such as the so-called Clean Power Plan aimed at regulating emissions from power plants, remain tied up federal courts. In addition, Pruitt will encounter a quietly hostile EPA workforce, very much on edge. Employees are understandably nervous about the direction he plans to take the agency and fearful he might adhere more to ideology than science. Science always tells the truth.
Environmental groups also are likely to oppose him at every turn, eager to sue over any rollback of existing regulations. For his part, Pruitt has said he intends to return the agency to its central mission of protecting the quality of the nation’s air and water while respecting the role of states as primary enforcers of environmental laws. “It is our state regulators who oftentimes best understand the local needs and the uniqueness of our environmental challenges,” he said during his confirmation hearing last month. This statement was for the benefit of all the energy , oil and coal producing states.
So far Trump has already tweaked the EPA website page
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s website has begun to transform under the Trump administration.
A group of researchers have found what are likely the first steps in a major overhaul of a site that’s been closely watched since President Trump’s inauguration. Federal climate plans created under former President Obama, tribal assistance programs, and references to international cooperation have been stricken from the site.
A mention of carbon pollution as a cause of climate change has also been removed, and adaptation has been emphasized, indicating an attempt to separate the cause of climate change from the results. Some of the changes—like removing mentions of programs and task forces that have run their course as well as broken links—are just housekeeping, according to an government statement.
Putting the webpage changes together with Trump's statements dismissing climate change gives a clearer picture of his vision of "America First." It likely signals that the United States will be stepping back from addressing global climate change. And by removing the information, it could give Trump and Scott Pruitt more leeway to decimate funding for programs they see as incompatible with America First. “If the public is unaware of partnerships depending on the EPA, it may be easier to shrink the EPA without raising as much concern,” said Gretchen Gehrke, a data-quality manager at Public Lab and a member of the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative (EDGI).
The changes were shared exclusively with Climate Central by EDGI, a group of scientists tracking federal websites and data. They first noticed the changes on January 22 on a page formerly called “Federal Partner Collaboration” but now dubbed “EPA Adaptation Collaboration.” Researchers spotted further changes on January 26 to climate and water and international cooperation pages. All the pages are subpages of the EPA’s climate change page.
Obama’s legacy is being wiped away.
One common theme running through the alterations is removing references to Obama-era projects such as the Climate Action Plan and other federal roadmaps to address climate change. The international partnership page also lost a paragraph affirming the U.S. commitment to the United Nations climate negotiations. “They’re mostly scrubbing it of anything that has a hint of Obama,” said Gretchen Goldman, the research director for the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists. “The United Nations stuff being removed is also maybe not surprising but definitely not positive.”
Trump campaigned on a promise to revoke much of Obama’s legacy, including on climate change. He’s made good on that promise and it is bad news for America and the rest of the world which will be negatively affected by global warming and climate change.
Original document and new Trump document .. enlarge to read
A group of researchers have found what are likely the first steps in a major overhaul of a site that’s been closely watched since President Trump’s inauguration. Federal climate plans created under former President Obama, tribal assistance programs, and references to international cooperation have been stricken from the site.
A mention of carbon pollution as a cause of climate change has also been removed, and adaptation has been emphasized, indicating an attempt to separate the cause of climate change from the results. Some of the changes—like removing mentions of programs and task forces that have run their course as well as broken links—are just housekeeping, according to an government statement.
Putting the webpage changes together with Trump's statements dismissing climate change gives a clearer picture of his vision of "America First." It likely signals that the United States will be stepping back from addressing global climate change. And by removing the information, it could give Trump and Scott Pruitt more leeway to decimate funding for programs they see as incompatible with America First. “If the public is unaware of partnerships depending on the EPA, it may be easier to shrink the EPA without raising as much concern,” said Gretchen Gehrke, a data-quality manager at Public Lab and a member of the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative (EDGI).
The changes were shared exclusively with Climate Central by EDGI, a group of scientists tracking federal websites and data. They first noticed the changes on January 22 on a page formerly called “Federal Partner Collaboration” but now dubbed “EPA Adaptation Collaboration.” Researchers spotted further changes on January 26 to climate and water and international cooperation pages. All the pages are subpages of the EPA’s climate change page.
Trump campaigned on a promise to revoke much of Obama’s legacy, including on climate change. He’s made good on that promise and it is bad news for America and the rest of the world which will be negatively affected by global warming and climate change.
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