President Biden promised to cut global warming pollution in half by 2030, and to "net zero" by 2050. His EPA Administrator, Michael Regan, promised to prioritize environmental justice, and to protect overburdened communities like those in Louisiana’s cancer alley.

Today, the EPA is breaking both promises – abandoning the people of Louisiana and Gulf south in general to the fossil fuel industry and their false solutions to climate change.

First, the EPA gave up on a civil rights lawsuit to protect frontline Environmental Justice communities. We are disappointed, because the lawsuit had already uncovered substantial evidence that the fossil fuel industry bought, bribed, captured, and controlled local environmental regulators – to the specific, systemic, disadvantage of black, indigenous, and other people of color. But we're not surprised because after Willow, Alaska LNG, and the Mountain Valley Pipeline this is just the latest example of the Biden Administration, and the EPA in particular, giving up on Environmental Justice at the first sign of a fossil fuel industry lawsuit.

At the literal exact same time, the EPA is rushing through a comment period to turn Louisiana into the carbon dumping ground of the South; And guess who they want to give explicit control of it? That's right the EPA is considering giving the fossil fuel industry and the exactly same Louisiana regulators they were just investigating total power over where, whether, and how to approve a new carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) industry that could become a model for the rest of the country. And after receiving nearly unanimous local opposition to the plan, they've only given the rest of us until July 3 to send a comment.

Enough – tell the EPA and President Biden that giving up on Environmental Justice is not a climate solution. They need to do better, starting with rejecting the dangerous, dirty, and unnecessary plan to give Louisiana local control over carbon capture and storage projects.

There's a lot going on, and there's a longer break down in the blog, but here's a quick break down for your busy inbox:

The EPA is considering a risky, untested, and locally-unpopular plan to let the state of Louisiana take over and sub-contract all rules and regulations related to the capture and storage of carbon dioxide.

This is an unnecessary move by EPA Administrator Regan, who has promised to prioritize environmental justice, and over-burdened communities like those in Louisiana. And the timing is very suspicious given that the EPA is also planning major new power plant rules that will rely heavily on carbon capture technology to work; And that the rules for Louisiana could be finalized just days after the EPA and Department of Justice dropped a civil rights lawsuit agains the same exact people for polluting the same exact communities where all this new CCS is planned.

Two major factors are at stake in the CCS decision:

First and foremost, local concerns over public health and community safety. Carbon dioxide is dangerous at the high concentrations used in CCS, and there's a real chance of pollution, death, and destruction if and when it leaks. Just as bad, the heart of this EPA plan is not to make rules for CCS at all, but to gives the authority to a local regulator with a proven history of environmental destruction and out-and-out racism that was, until this very week, under investigation by the EPA for civil rights violations.
The second concern is that this EPA docket is a trial run for CCS across the south, and across the United States. The Biden administration is relying too much on the idea that carbon capture can reduce emissions to “net zero” at fossil fuel facilities. Its at the heart of this EPA rule, and of new power plant rules the EPA is considering to reduce global warming pollution in the electricity sector. The EPA’s proposed rule assumes Louisiana, of all places, can figure out carbon capture on new, fracked gas facilities. A bunch of the projects they want sole jurisdiction over don’t even make electricity or power- they make plastics or other petrochemicals.

This whole EPA plan and docket isn't just a mistake, it's an insult. And it's time to demand they do better. Click here to get connected to the Biden Administration and the EPA staff in charge of this EPA carbon capture plan before the July 3 deadline.

Thanks for taking action,

Drew and the 198 methods demand real solutions, not false solutions, to climate chaos crew

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