EPA retaliating against Louisiana with 'Really strong' pollution reduction measure

Looks like it's going to target Louisiana specifically too. Apparently this is in retaliation for Louisiana filing a lawsuit against the EPA for demanding lower emissions in minority communities and investigating permits based on unquantifiable civil rights impacts.

The state of Louisiana not only had the nerve to challenge the EPA's over reach, but the EPA had to drop their Civil Rights investigations.

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'Really strong' pollution reduction measure planned for Louisiana, EPA head says



The Advocate

PHILADELPHIA -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency plans to announce a major regulatory change aimed at reducing air emissions at chemical plants in the industrial corridor between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, the agency's administrator announced Friday.

“I’m excited to say that in the coming weeks, we’re going to announce a really strong regulation addressing those chemical plants in Cancer Alley," EPA Administrator Michael Regan told an audience of nearly 750 journalists, business trade activists and environmentalists at the Society of Environmental Journalists annual conference at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

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Regan, who has visited Louisiana twice since taking office, did not explain what regulation or regulations he was referring to. The agency had announced four proposed regulations last year that would require reductions of emissions at more than 80 chemical plants, including many in Louisiana, such as the controversial Denka Performance Elastomers plant in St. John the Baptist Parish.

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Regan's announcement came in response to a question from Bloomberg Law senior reporter Jennifer Hijazi, who was moderating his talk, about the status of several lawsuits filed by the Louisiana Attorney General's Office to block EPA regulations.

One of those suits, first filed by Gov. Jeff Landry when he was attorney general, challenged the EPA's use of civil rights regulations to require the state to enforce greater reductions in emissions in minority and low-income areas to correct past years of discrimination, even if unintentional.

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The EPA dropped civil rights investigations into the state Departments of Health and Environmental Quality for their actions involving chemical plant permitting soon after that suit was filed last year.

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The EPA delaying and setting up roadblocks like this could have a severe impact on job growth in the region. Industrial expansions would likely look elsewhere rather than get caught up in a political battle between a state hungry for new jobs and an EPA desperate to prevent job growth.