Behind the case for cheaper electricity lies a far broader confrontation over emissions, public health, and the very power of the federal government to regulate greenhouse gases.
In the United States, the EPA erases CO2 limits imposed on power plants
On September 14, 2026, the Environmental Protection Agency, or the EPA, signed the final partial repeal of federal standards governing emissions from fossil-fuel power plants. The announcement was made in Houston, on the sidelines of the G20 Energy Ministers’ meeting. “Americans are demanding more common sense from federal agencies under the Trump presidency,” said Lee Zeldin, the EPA administrator.
The scope of the announcement, however, requires a distinction. A substantial portion of the Carbon Pollution Standards adopted under President Biden is being permanently rolled back. By contrast, the component aimed at eliminating remaining federal requirements on greenhouse gases and curbing the ability of a future administration to regulate these emissions is still only a proposal, as the EPA notes.
Coal-fired power plants: the EPA dismantles CO2 limits
The first component targets directly the constraints put in place in 2024 for existing coal-fired units and certain new gas-fired facilities. The Biden rules were expected to cut about 1 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions by 2047. For coal plants slated to run long-term, the regulation would have required capturing the bulk of the carbon emitted by 2039; otherwise they would have been forced to shut down.
The Trump administration frames this constraint as a threat to electricity supply at a moment when data centers, artificial intelligence, and new industrial capabilities are driving network demand. The EPA says that rolling back the rule would save more than $300 billion in costs, or more than €260 billion. The additional, still proposed component would represent about $370 million, or nearly €320 million, in direct cost savings for compliance, Lee Zeldin argued. This regulatory rollback would obviously shift the emissions trajectory by adding about 123 million metric tons of CO2 over the coming decade.
United States: the battle over greenhouse gas emissions scales up
The stakes go beyond the price tag of a few pieces of equipment. The electric sector accounts for nearly a quarter of the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions and ranks among the country’s top emitters, behind transportation. Its emissions also rose by 4% in 2025. Note that power plants are the leading industrial source of greenhouse gases in the United States. With its 2022 emissions, the American electric sector, if treated as a country, would have ranked sixth worldwide among emitters.
The Trump administration is not merely repealing technical thresholds. Its accompanying proposal aims to erase the foundations allowing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases from power plants under Section 111 of the Clean Air Act. The agency had already, in February 2026, reversed the federal finding from 2009 that greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare, a decision that particularly affected vehicle regulation. The new push translates that legal offensive to the electricity sector.
This terrain is familiar to American courts. The Obama-era Clean Power Plan was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2022, while the rule that followed under the first Trump administration was also rolled back by the courts. The new regulatory architecture is therefore likely to face challenges. Asked by Bloomberg, Maggie Coulter, an attorney at the Climate Law Institute of the Center for Biological Diversity, calls it “a clear gift to fossil fuel polluters, and the courts should see it that way.”
