Within the Department of Energy, the division dedicated to clean energy research and implementation would be eliminated and energy efficiency guidelines and requirements for home appliances would be eliminated. The environmental monitoring capabilities of the Department of the Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency would be significantly limited or eliminated, preventing these agencies from tracking methane emissions, controlling environmental pollutants and chemicals, or conducting climate change research.
In addition to these larger reforms, Project 2025 advocates for the repeal of smaller, lesser-known federal programs and statutes that protect public health and environmental justice. Project 2025 recommends the elimination of “hazard determinations,” a legal mechanism under the Clean Air Act that requires the EPA to curb emissions and air pollutants from industries like automobiles and power plants. It also recommends eliminating government efforts to assess the social cost of carbon, or the damages that occur for every ton of carbon emitted. And it seeks to prevent government agencies from assessing the “multiplier effects” of policies, such as improved air quality, or the cascading positive health impacts.
“When we think about who is hit hardest by pollution — air pollution, water pollution, soil pollution, climate change — it’s often low-income communities and communities of color,” said Rachel Klitas, policy director of the climate and energy program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit science advocacy group. “Weakening these protections is going to disproportionately impact those very communities.”
Other proposals would wreak havoc on the nation’s ability to prepare for and respond to climate disasters. Project 2025 proposes abolishing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Weather Service within it, replacing these organizations with private companies. The blueprint says the National Hurricane Center would remain intact, and the data it collects would be “presented neutrally and without any adjustments intended to favor any side in the climate debate.” But the National Hurricane Center, like most other private weather service companies, gets much of its data from the National Weather Service, and eliminating public weather data could deny Americans access to accurate weather forecasts. “It’s outrageous,” said Rob Moore, a policy analyst with the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Action Fund. “There’s no problem this solution solves. It’s a solution looking for a problem.”
