EPA launches Biden climate policy
Agency’s proposal is first attempt to limit potent HFCs
Agency’s proposal is first attempt to limit potent hydrofluorocarbons in planet’s atmosphere.
WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday moved to sharply cut down on the use and production of powerful greenhouse gases used in refrigeration and air conditioning, part of the Biden administration’s larger strategy of trying to slow the pace of global warming.
The first significant step taken by the EPA under President Joe Biden to curb climate change, the proposed regulation focuses on hydrofluorocarbons, a class of human-made chemicals that is thousands of times more potent than carbon dioxide at warming the planet.
Michael Regan, the EPA administrator, said the agency aimed to reduce the production and importation of hydrofluorocarbons in the United States by 85% over the next 15 years.
“This action is good for our planet and our economy,” Regan said in a statement. He framed the move as good for U.S. businesses, saying it would “help promote American leadership in innovation and manufacturing of new climate-safe products.”
The move is important because it will be the first time the federal government has set national limits on HFCs, which were used to replace ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons in the 1980s but have turned out to be a significant driver of global warming. More than a dozen states have either banned HFCs or are formulating some restrictions.
The EPA’s action is backed by both environmental groups and the business community, which jointly championed bipartisan legislation passed by Congress in December to tackle HFCs.
But the speed with which the EPA crafted language and moved forward with the proposed regulation is unusual and underscores the urgency that the Biden administration is placing on climate change, said Francis Dietz, vice president for public affairs at the Air-Conditioning, Heating and Refrigeration Institute, a trade group.
“They’re really moving swiftly,” he said. “It says they’re very serious about this.”
In communicating the gains it says will be realized by tackling climate change, the EPA estimated that the HFC rule would result in $283.9 billion in health and environmental benefits by the middle of the century.
The effort is part of Biden’s ambitious strategy to cut the country’s greenhouse gas emissions roughly in half by 2030. It also puts the United States in line with an international goal to reduce HFCs, which the Biden administration has said it will honor as part of its effort to revive American leadership in tackling climate change.
Like methane, HFCs have short-term warming effects far more powerful than carbon dioxide, but they don’t stay in the atmosphere as long. Scientists have estimated that reducing these types of greenhouse gases can have a palpable impact, slowing the pace of global warming by 0.6 degrees Celsius by midcentury.
“This is incredibly significant,” said Kristen Taddonio, a senior climate and energy adviser for the Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development, an environmental nonprofit group. “By taking fast action on these short-lived climate pollutants, of which HFCs are the most potent, we can buy ourselves some time and actually help avoid climate tipping points.”
As part of a sweeping coronavirus relief bill, Congress last year approved language directing the EPA to curb HFCs.
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who at the time was the minority leader, called it “the single biggest victory in the fight against climate change to pass this body in a decade.”
The EPA estimates that, from 2022 to 2050, the rule will eliminate the equivalent of 4.7 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, or about three years’ worth of emissions from America’s power sector.
Under the plan, the EPA will set a baseline for the amount of HFCs that are produced and consumed, and use that to establish a cap on the levels that can be created and imported into the United States. The agency will then establish a methodology for allocating allowances to companies to continue producing and importing HFCs for the years 2022 and 2023, as well as developing an enforcement system.
Under the law, allowances to companies will gradually decrease as the market for alternatives grows.
Echoing an economic theme that Biden has repeatedly promoted when discussing his climate plans, the EPA said that U.S. manufacturers were at the forefront of developing HFC alternatives and that the new regulations would position these companies to succeed at home and abroad.
Dietz said he hoped that federal regulation meant companies would not face a patchwork of HFC prohibitions in different states.
In the last days of the Obama administration, 197 nations, including the U.S., signed an accord in Kigali, Rwanda, agreeing to phase out HFCs. President Donald Trump never brought the agreement to the Senate for ratification. Biden, who has returned the United States to the Paris Agreement on climate change, has pledged to send the Kigali amendment to the Senate for approval.