US EditionTrump EPA to weaken rule limiting harmful mercury, air toxics from coal plants
The rollback weakens the Mercury and Air Toxics Standard, risking increased health costs despite EPA claims of lowering utility expenses amid rising AI data center power demand.
- At an event in Kentucky on Feb 20, the EPA said it will weaken regulations limiting mercury and toxic air pollutants from coal-fired power plants.
- The EPA argued easing pollution standards would lower costs for utilities that run older coal plants as power demand rises with expanding data centers used for artificial intelligence.
- The MATS rule would have cut mercury pollution by 70% and reduced nickel, arsenic, and lead by two-thirds, with the Environmental Defense Fund estimating $420 million in health savings through 2037.
- Last spring the administration issued a proclamation inviting coal plants to request two-year exemptions from MATS, and sixty-eight plants were granted exemptions while last week the White House directed the Pentagon to buy coal power as the EPA repealed the endangerment finding.
- Environmental and public-health groups warned weakening mercury limits will raise health-related costs, noting coal-burning power plants generate less than 20% of U.S. electricity, per the Energy Information Administration.
40 Articles
40 Articles
Trump administration eases limits on coal plant emissions of mercury and other toxins
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Today, Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency dismantled a bedrock environmental and public health standard that protects Americans from mercury and other dangerous toxic air pollutants, such as arsenic, lead, and chromium. Rolling back the new and more protective Mercury and Air Toxics Standards will allow coal- and oil-fired power plants to emit more damaging pollution that puts the public at greater risk of heart and lung disease, can…
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Click to expand Image A coal-fired plant in the town of Poca near the Kanawha River, in West Virginia, US, August 28, 2018. © 2018 John Ray/AP Photo US President Donald Trump’s administration today rolled back another air-pollution protection, this time for one of the most toxic substances on earth: mercury.The action reverses then-President Joe Biden’s decision in 2024 to reduce the levels of allowable mercury air emissions for coal-fired powe…
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