EPA accused of driving up energy costs

 Just the News:

Twelve attorneys general have submitted comments to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan expressing concerns about a new proposed rule they argue will increase energy costs and risk Americans’ safety.

At issue is the EPA’s proposed rule, “Accidental Release Prevention Requirements: Risk Management Programs under Clean Air Act; Safer Communities by Chemical Accident Prevention.” (87 Fed. Reg. 53,556), which Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton argues is another attempt by the Biden administration to revive an Obama-era “environmental justice” regulation. If implemented, it would far exceed the statutory authority of the EPA, the attorneys general argue, which was curtailed by the Supreme Court earlier this year.

The rule would require a range of American facilities and industries to implement costly new processes to minimize “climate change risks,” which the EPA hasn’t proved will reduce such risks, they argue. Those impacted by the regulations would include petroleum refineries, chemical manufacturers, water and wastewater treatment systems, chemical and petroleum wholesalers and terminals, food manufacturers, packing plants, cold storage facilities, agricultural chemical distributors, midstream gas plants, among others.

The proposed rule would impose “burdensome new regulatory requirements that do not lead to improvements in preventing accidental releases or minimizing the consequences any such releases,” they write, and “would come at the cost of a greater regulatory burden without providing sufficient corresponding benefits.”

It would also cripple the U.S. energy industry and subsequently create a serious national security risk, the attorney generals from Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Utah, and led by Oklahoma, argue.

Worse still, another requirement would jeopardize Americans’ safety, they argue, because it requires certain facilities to publicly disclose information about specific locations of dangerous chemicals. This would only expose Americans to “risks of intentional releases by bad actors,” they write. “There is an inherent security risk in requiring public disclosure of information of sensitive information about chemical facilities without protections sufficient to mitigate that risk.”
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 The Biden administration has embraced the anti-energy left trying to drive up the cost of fossil fuels while pushing inefficient and unreliable green energy.  Green energy is a threat to US consumers and to US national security.  It is unreliable and costly.