Agency’s final rule will slash the use and production of hydrofluorocarbons — often found to be leaking from U.S. supermarket freezers — by 85 percent over the next 15 years
By Dino Grandoni Washington Post
The Biden administration will finalize its first new climate rule Thursday, slashing the use of greenhouse gases warming the planet at a rate hundreds to thousands of times higher than carbon dioxide.
The Environmental Protection Agency regulation, which establishes a program to cut the use and production of chemicals known as hydrofluorocarbons in the United States by 85 percent over the next 15 years, implements a law passed by Congress last year. There is broad bipartisan support for curbing these super-pollutants, which are used in refrigeration and air conditioning and often found to be leaking from U.S. supermarket freezers.
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White House officials said the new rule tackles global warming while supporting jobs to manufacture new alternatives.
“It’s a win on climate and a win on jobs, and American competitiveness,” Gina McCarthy, the White House national climate adviser, told reporters in an online briefing Wednesday evening. “It’s really — frankly, folks — a very big deal.”
But the measure comes at a fraught moment for President Biden, who is struggling to shepherd the rest of his climate agenda through Congress. Democrats are trying to pass a pair of bills aimed at expanding the adoption of solar panels, wind turbines, and electric vehicles, but divisions between the party’s moderate and liberal wings have complicated their passage.
Thursday’s announcement, by contrast, shows how much easier it is for federal agencies to tackle greenhouse gas emissions when empowered by legislation.
