Originally published on Legal Planet.

To do its part in keeping climate change to tolerable levels, the United States needs to cut its carbon emissions at least 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. That’s not just a matter of decarbonizing the electricity sector; it means changes in everything from aviation to steel manufacture, and reducing not only CO2 but also other pollutants like HFCs and black carbon.

In a new book, Michael Gerrard and John Dernbach have assembled a team of authors to look at 35 different issue areas and figure out the legal actions that will be needed to drive this change. Their work builds on earlier planning efforts, particularly in California. The book runs more than 1100 pages and weighs in at over four pounds. Even the title has heft: Legal Pathways to Deep Decarbonization in the United States. I can’t claim …

This op-ed was originally published by The Revelator. It is reprinted under Creative Commons license BY-NC-ND 3.0.

Climate change has already had serious effects, but as we know from the steady and increasingly loud drumbeat of projections from various scientific bodies, the dangers will grow much greater in future decades.

But what does this actually look like?

Projections of life in 2050 or 2100 seem like the stuff of science fiction, yet those seemingly distant decades are not so far off. The 22nd century is roughly one lifetime away. The great majority of today’s young adults will see 2050, and many children currently in your local daycare or elementary school will see 2100.

It seems difficult for us to plan for developments that are decades away, but climate science is clear that our actions today and over the next few years will make a profound …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

Every day seems to bring more news of the Trump administration's dogged efforts to reduce environmental protections and accelerate climate change with increased carbon emissions. But, as has been true since Trump took office, the picture at the state level is much different. State governments across the country have accelerated their efforts to decarbonize while efforts to save the coal industry have foundered. Here are some of the latest developments.

Earlier this month, Maryland's legislature adopted a 50 percent renewable energy mandate for 2030. The law also doubled the target for obtaining power from offshore wind. Governor Larry Hogan had vetoed an earlier increase in the renewable energy mandate in 2017 but was overridden by the legislature. Hogan, a possible primary challenger to Donald Trump, is still thinking over his next move at this writing.

In mid-April, New Jersey adopted a 50 …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

Every day, it seems that there is a headline about some investigation involving campaign finance violations, the White House, or the actions of some foreign power. Perhaps that's all the bandwidth that Congress has. But there are other areas calling out for inquiry. Here are just a few:

CAFE Standards. The car industry asked for delays and modifications in fuel efficiency standards. The administration came back with a drastic rollback that went far beyond what industry requested, to the dismay of at least some major car firms. How did that happen? Outside economists scoff at the analysis Department of Transportation officials ran roughshod over EPA staff, whose complaints were squelched by the White House. Who exactly was responsible for those decisions? And what role did the oil companies play behind the scenes? There are already indications that oil companies were somewhat involved …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

Cost-benefit analysis has long been the target of environmentalist ire. But one lesson of the Trump years has been that economic analysis can be a source of support for environmental policy — it is the anti-regulatory forces who have to fudge the numbers to justify their actions. Most energy and environmental economists are aghast at Trump's assaults on climate change regulations — many of them would instead favor stricter regulation over the status quo. Maybe it's time for at least a temporary ceasefire while we are allies in resisting Trump's rollbacks.

There is little doubt that the Reagan administration adopted cost-benefit analysis as a tool for reaching its own preferred deregulatory outcomes. The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) was put in charge of cost-benefit analysis with the expectation that it would be a death trap for regulations. OIRA seemed happy to oblige …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

EPA pollution regulations are based on an assessment of the risks posed by pollutants. This can be a complex scientific judgment. The Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC), the agency's scientific advisory board, is pushing for major changes in the way that EPA approaches this analysis. The effect would be to make it much harder for EPA to prove that a risk exists.

Currently, risk assessment is based on a "weight of the evidence" approach that considers all of the peer-reviewed literature, rather than limiting itself to studies using specific methodologies. Tony Cox, the industry consultant who now heads CASAC after Scott Pruitt purged most academic scientists, has been pushing for a radical change. He wants to limit risk assessment to studies that use a specific set of methods to establish that a substance actually causes harm. In particular, he rejects studies …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

The Washington Post has a list of false statements by Trump, which turns out to be searchable by topic. They've found, "In the first eight months of his presidency, President Trump made 1,137 false or misleading claims, an average of five a day." As of March 17, he was up to 9,179 false statements. There were 200 false statements about the environment – that's about one every four days, which compares favorably to the number of misrepresentations on some other topics. They're quite repetitive, but I've picked out some of the most frequent ones. By the way, if you're interested, the Post also explains why each of these statements is wrong. I shudder to think what people who follow him on Twitter are picking up in the way of misconceptions.

Air and Water

• "Some of the best farmland in the …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

What is EPA’s mission? To what extent is minimizing regulatory costs part of the core mission, as the Trump Administration seems to believe? Does the Trump-Pruitt/Wheeler view comport with original intent? History makes it clear that the answer is “no.”

The title of the agency itself suggests that the core mission is protecting the environment, just as the core mission of the Defense Department is presumably national defense (though cost isn’t irrelevant in either setting). It’s worthwhile, however, to take a closer look at the marching orders given to the agency when it was formed. As it turns out, we do have clear evidence of what Congress and the President had in mind.

EPA wasn’t established by a statute. It was established through a special process that no longer exists for government reorganization, which allowed the President …

Originally published on Legal Planet.

The possibility of declaring a national emergency to address climate change will probably remain under discussion for the next couple of years, particularly if the courts uphold Trump's "wall" emergency. For that reason, I thought it might be helpful to pull together the series of blog posts I've written on the subject. I want to emphasize three key points at the beginning:

1. Declaring a climate emergency should be off the table if the Supreme Court rules against Trump.  
2. An emergency declaration is not a magic wand that gives presidents a blank check. A declaration would allow some constructive steps to be taken, but within limits.  
3. The ultimate goal has to be congressional action, and an emergency declaration should only be considered as part of a larger legislative and administrative agenda.

Even if the Court upholds Trump, using this precedent to fight climate …