Nominee sending mixed signals on climate change
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s nominee to lead the Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday called climate change “a huge issue” but not the “greatest crisis,” drawing fire from Democrats at his confirmation hearing over the regulatory rollbacks he’s made in six months as the agency’s acting administrator.
Republicans on the GOPmajority Senate Environment and Public Works Committee mostly had praise for Andrew Wheeler, who has served as the agency’s acting head since Scott Pruitt’s resignation amid ethics scandals in July. The committee chairman, Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., called Wheeler “very well qualified” to take the job.
But Democrats pressed Wheeler about his work as a lobbyist helping an influential coal magnate meet with Trump administration officials before his nomination to the EPA, his moves on deregulation and for what they said was his inattention to the growing dangers from climate change.
“You seem to be consistently doing things that undermine the health and safety of this nation,” Sen. Ed Markey, DMass., told Wheeler.
Markey asked him why he was pulling back on regulations that proponents say protect human health and the environment.
“I believe we are moving forward” on protections, Wheeler responded.
Wheeler cited changes he had initiated to roll back future mileage standards for cars and autos and to ease Obamaera clampdowns on dirtierburning coal-fired power plants.
He said EPA staff, whom he did not identify, had concluded that those rollbacks would ultimately lead to health gains. Environmental groups and formal assessments from the EPA and other agencies have contested that, saying the changes would increase pollution and increase harm to people and the climate.
Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., said the rollbacks in car mileage standards and toxic mercury emissions under Wheeler were examples of unsafe deregulation and went beyond what industries themselves wanted.