These Companies Avoided Clean-Air Rules. It Took a Single Email. [View all]

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https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/climate/epa-air-pollution-exemptions-emails.html

These Companies Avoided Clean-Air Rules. It Took a Single Email.
Sites including at least 15 coal plants sought exemptions from environmental rules using a new Trump administration system to fast-track requests, documents show.
By Maxine Joselow
July 29, 2025, 11:01 a.m. ET

In March, the Trump administration created a novel way for companies to potentially avoid complying with environmental rules: Simply send an email to the Environmental Protection Agency and request an exemption.

In response, representatives of at least 15 coal-burning power plants, four steel mills, four chemical facilities and two mines wrote emails to the E.P.A. this spring, according to documents reviewed by The New York Times.

All 15 coal plants were ultimately exempted from requirements to curb several hazardous air pollutants, including mercury, a neurotoxin that can cause developmental problems in infants and children. All four chemical facilities were exempted from restrictions on other harmful air pollutants, including ethylene oxide, a gas linked to several types of cancer.

Those email exemptions were part of a broader wave of more than 100 granted so far by the Trump administration to facilities across the country, including oil refineries and sites that process a type of iron ore. The exemptions apply to rules that were set to take effect in the coming years.

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