A federal appeals court has rejected the Trump administration’s attempt to abandon a Biden-era rule restricting deadly soot pollution. The unanimous ruling by a three-judge panel is a setback for the Trump administration’s deregulatory agenda and its repeated efforts to boost coal, a reliable but polluting energy source.

Background

The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit leaves intact, for now, a tighter standard set in 2024 on pollution from coal-fired power plants, factories, and other industrial sources. The EPA under President Donald Trump asked the appeals court last year to invalidate the Biden-era rule, arguing that the agency under previous leaders had exceeded its statutory authority and acted unreasonably by failing to consider costs to businesses affected by the rule.

The court denied the Trump administration’s request, saying in a decision written by Senior Judge Douglas Ginsburg that the agency’s arguments “lack merit.” The ruling leaves in place an annual limit of 9 micrograms of fine particle pollution — often called soot — per cubic meter of air, down from 12 micrograms established more than a decade ago.

Impact

The EPA rule sets an air quality level that states and counties must achieve in the coming years to reduce particle pollution from power plants, vehicles, industrial sites, and wildfires. Environmental groups hailed the ruling as a victory for public health and a rebuke of EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin.

“Clean air is not a luxury. The 2024 soot standard is a critical advancement for public health, projected to save thousands of lives every year,” said Patrice Simms, vice president of healthy communities at Earthjustice, an environmental law firm.

Original reporting: KTBS 3 (Shreveport) — read the source article.