President Donald Trump is set to dismantle a cornerstone of his predecessor’s climate policy by repealing limits on greenhouse gas emissions from coal and gas plants.
The move rolls back rules introduced by President Joe Biden in 2024 that required existing coal plants to sharply reduce carbon emissions by storing them underground, or face being shut down.
The rules also required any new gas plants built after the rules went into effect to use cleaner fuels such as hydrogen.
The Biden administration estimated the rules would deliver $120 billion in health benefits by 2047. It projected that by 2035, the rules could prevent up to 1,200 premature deaths, 870 hospital and emergency-room visits, 360,000 asthma attacks, 48,000 missed school days and 57,000 lost workdays.
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin is expected to finalize the rollback on Monday at a G20 energy ministers’ meeting in Texas, Bloomberg News reported.
If the power-plant rollback survives expected court challenges, it could also make it harder for future administrations to impose similar limits.
Power plants are responsible for nearly a quarter of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, which trap heat in the atmosphere, raising global temperatures and making extreme weather worse.
The power sector’s emissions are so vast that, if it were a country, it would rank as the world’s fifth-largest greenhouse gas polluter — behind China, the U.S., India, and Russia.
The move is part of Trump’s broader push to unwind climate regulations introduced under Biden and President Barack Obama.
Over the years, Trump has repeatedly denied that climate change is real, declaring it a “hoax,” and his administration is now moving aggressively to unwind the regulations designed to curb it.
The EPA has rolled back limits on pollution from cars and power plants, weakened rules covering mercury and other pollutants.
It also scrapped the landmark 2009 Endangerment Finding, brought in under Obama, which concluded that greenhouse gases pose a threat to public health and welfare. The finding had provided the legal basis for federal regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles.
At the time, Trump described the action as “the single largest deregulatory action in American history,” and described the endangerment finding as a “giant scam.”
The administration has also changed how it measures the impact of clean-air rules. Rather than fully counting the public health benefits of cutting pollution, the agency has focused its cost-benefit analysis on the financial burden rules place on businesses.
Global carbon dioxide emissions from energy use climbed 1.1 percent in 2025, with the U.S. accounting for around one-third of the increase.
The Daily Beast has contacted the EPA and the White House for comment.
