EPA has requested that the public provide comment on its wide-ranging greenhouse gas advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) by November 28, 2008, 120 days from the date the ANPR was published in the Federal Register.

As ClimateIntel previously noted, the EPA Administrator released advance copies of the ANPR on July 11, 2008, as part of a widely-reported announcement that EPA would defer any concrete regulatory action on climate change under its Clean Air Act authority until the next Administration.  The ANPR provides a detailed look at EPA’s regulatory authority under the various provisions of the Clean Air Act (stationary source provisions, mobile source provisions, stratospheric ozone, etc.) and analyzes both options and impediments to using that authority to address greenhouse gas emissions.  Because EPA published its lengthy analysis as an “advance” notice, any future Administration will need to start with a separate proposed rulemaking.  The 120-day comment period, however, provides stakeholders with an early opportunity to frame issues that a future Administration may want to consider if and when EPA revisits the issue of regulating climate change.

For further information about this topic, please contact Akin Gump.