EPA, White House to Finalize Carbon Pollution Plan in Bid to Attack Climate Change

The long-anticipated – and hotly contested – carbon pollution plan is being finalized by the Obama administration Monday, setting off a scramble in the states to comply with it and one in Congress and the courts to stop it.

First proposed a year ago, the plan had been expected to be finalized this summer – a timetable the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency stuck to despite push-back from some states and a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on a separate clean-air rule.

Called the “Clean Power Plan” by the EPA, the rule is a centerpiece of a major push by President Barack Obama to help the United States – and the planet – attack climate change by reducing the amount of carbon pollution pumped into the air.

The rule was announced in draft form amid fanfare in June 2014, and Obama and EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy have talked up its benefits, saying it would be a boon to public health, helping to reduce asthma and other respiratory ailments.

The administration also has rebutted charges from Republicans in Congress and officials in many states that the EPA doesn’t have the legal authority it needs to push the rule.

Details on the plan emerged over the past several days in The Washington Post and other publications – and even in advance of a formal announcement Monday, opponents are preparing a legal and legislative battle to stop it. Its finalization is being accompanied by a big White House push, including a video from Obama.

“Climate change is not a problem for another generation,” the president says in the video. “Not anymore.”

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