Trump’s Large Cuts to the EPA
We are going to put together accounts of the orders that Trump has given to the EPA to perform deep and oil and coal company motivated cuts. The EPA has 15,000 employees, and is supposed to cut their staff by 3,000, or 20%. The EPA has a budget of $8.1 billion, and is supposed to cut that by $2 billion, or 25%.
From Business Insider, “74% of the EPA budget are grants to states, tribes, and government contractors for cleanup and preparedness efforts.” The EPA is also supposed to cut Climate Change and the Clean Energy Plan. Trump said that he was going to give climate change a hearing, and that we needed more time to settle it. It is quite clear that Trump has made up his mind and is so sure, that he is killing the Clean Energy Plan funds. The grants to states are to be cut 30%, including some air pollution and cleanup grants. Capital investments are favored in clean water projects, water treatment facilities, and Superfund sites. There are conflicting reports about brownfield sites, which are abandoned factories.
The original story was from E&E News, which is a great site for energy and environment news. The plan is to completely cut 38 state programs. Included in cuts are environmental justice programs, climate change initiatives, and funding for native Alaskan villages. The directive cuts out the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP).
Update: Saturday, May 4, from AP. The proposed budget will reduce the the climate protection budget by 70% to $29 billion. The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative will be almost completely eliminated to $10 million. When the agency and Congress points out that Trump’s key winning states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, which he only squeaked by with less than a 1%, are on Lake Michigan and a bit of Lake Erie, Trump may want to reverse this particular cut.
The USGCRP coordinates the research of 13 government agencies, see Wikipedia on this. They also contribute to the UN IPCC seven year reports on climate change. They have 12 interagency working groups. USGCRP is the coordinator of Federal global change research. They put out the National Climate Assessments. This is really hitting the nail on the head for climate research, knowledge, and education.
The agencies are: AID, Agriculture, NOAA, DOD, DOE, NIH, State, Transportation, USGS, EPA, NASA, NSF, and the Smithsonian.
This is being covered at all on TV compared to Jeff Sessions two conversations with the Russian ambassador during the campaign. In a survey of important issues to voters, the Environment had only a thin slice of the graph of issues by area.
By the way, I had no contact with Russian officials during the campaign. But I do take a recurring OLLI class about Russia. I also go to talks about Energy and Environment in China.
