Exclusive | EPA to save more than $1B per year after scrapping Biden-era gas, coal power plant emissions standards

WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is removing Biden administration greenhouse gas regulations — which saddled the energy industry with an extra $1.3 billion per year in costs — in order to provide cheaper coal and natural gas production, The Post can reveal.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin will announce later Wednesday the repeal of two emissions standards that targeted coal and gas power plants generating electricity and had been projected to raise energy costs by up to $20 billion over the next two decades, officials said.

“The sole purpose of these Biden-Harris administration regulations was to destroy industries that didn’t align with their narrow-minded climate change zealotry,” Zeldin said in a statement Wednesday. “Together, these rules were designed to regulate coal, oil and gas out of existence.”

A senior EPA official added that the move will boost US “energy independence,” as President Trump seeks to meet growing demand from manufacturers and artificial intelligence companies for domestic power sources — and to reduce the country’s reliance on imports.

“Affordable, reliable electricity is key to the American dream and a natural byproduct of national energy dominance,” Zeldin said.

During Zeldin’s confirmation hearing, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairwoman Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) had noted “more than half” of the US was at risk of “rolling blackouts in the next decade because of the lack of reliable power capacity.”

One of the emissions standards, developed in 2015 under President Barack Obama from Section 111 of the Clean Air Act, would have forced coal plants to implement carbon-capture technology by 2039 and natural gas plants to implement it by 2032.

Trump’s EPA and other critics have pointed out that the novel tech, which stores emissions underground, captured much less carbon than early estimates predicted — and was expected to cost $19 billion over the next two decades starting in 2026.

A North Dakota Industrial Commission study found that the standard “would increase the severity” of “rolling blackouts” in electricity systems shifting toward solar- and wind-powered alternatives.

In 2022, the Supreme Court struck down the Clean Power Plan, as it was called, but the Biden administration two years later proceeded with a revamped version to impose the carbon pollution standard.

The other Biden administration emissions standard was included in 2024 amendments to the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) for both new and existing coal- and oil-fired power plants.

Even under the last administration, the EPA acknowledged that the updated MATS didn’t meaningfully cut down on emissions more than standards put into practice in 2012.

The final rule was also projected to only cut carbon dioxide emissions by 0.01% by 2035, according to a Regulatory Impact Analysis released by the EPA in April 2024.

Zeldin’s move to scuttle the new MATS standards is expected to save $120 million per year, or $1.2 billion over the next decade, in regulatory costs.