EPA to repeal its own conclusion that greenhouse gases warm the planet | Hacker News Reader

EPA to repeal its own conclusion that greenhouse gases warm the planet

nbcnews.com

34 pointsgeox16 comments

> the EPA’s 2009 decision says that greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane are heating the Earth and that warming threatens public health and welfare

I’ll wait until the actual action is taken before deciding where I stand on this.

The above is actually two statements: that greenhouse gasses cause warming, and that warming is harmful overall. I could see reversing the latter as consistent with this administration’s positions - the former is, as far as I know, not really up for debate.

At this point, time for the world to ignore everything the US Gov. says, assuming they are even paying attention to these agencies.

The big question I have, are there any corresponding agencies in the EU or China we should be paying attention to

Despite being depressing and I imagine a lot of damage can be done in a short time without these protections.

But I would wager long-term large-scale changes to investment/spend is unlikely, especially if the mid-terms swing blue.

So this is obviously dumb and short-sighted. But also ... why do they need it?

- withdrawing the legal scaffolding that allowed the EPA to regulate emissions seems unnecessary if your EPA is already willing to just not actively regulate emissions?

- and the Trump administration has been surprisingly/concerningly successful when just ignoring the law regardless, so why does this corner of regulatory law matter?

> So this is obviously dumb and short-sighted. But also ... why do they need it?

It's more about propaganda and fodder for lawmakers who will try to use it to justify fossil fuel promotion legislation.

It's not fooling anyone though. Most of the world - including the US - is well aware of that increasing GHGs are warming the atmosphere. Those whose livelihood depends on existing climate patterns is already feeling the effects.

Some just don't care because they believe they are insulated from the effects, and gain huge amounts of wealth and power from a short term boost in fossil fuel demand. In their fever dream, they might wish that the world at large somehow forgets the physics of GHG emissions, but that's unlikely.

It is in preparation for the next (non-Republican) administration, to delay them from regulating it under their EPA.

But a Democratic administration could install an EPA head that will just roll this back quickly, right? Unless Congress actually passes something, the whole theory of the executive that Trump is pushing cuts both ways ... if we can still have fair elections.

The Republicans still want to add friction to the process. Every year of regulatory delay is a year in which the fossil fuel industry profits.

Cause ruining everything today isn't enough, they need to ruin everything tomorrow, too.

Because this makes it harder for future administrations.

As long as this was the court approved status quo (this has been through the Supreme Court before) a future reality based administration could re-implement it.

However, now that they’ve removed it a new administration would have to add this or similar language back which could go through the legal process again (citing changed circumstances or something), allowing the current Supreme Court to knock it down.

It's a culture war. Everything that contradicts the maga platform is a target.

This fascism is powered by fossil fuels.

The first time the Supreme Court intervened to quash regulations with no explanation via the so called "shadow docket" was the Clean Power act.

https://legal-planet.org/2024/08/23/clean-air-and-the-turboc...

There is no end to the self-destruction this administration is doing to our country.

The war on truth is the most tiring of all.

Maybe actually, with Trump's growing unpopularity, this might lead to a Streisand-esque convincing that it's actually real.

At least that will only fuck the US's environment, ..., oh wait ...

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