Attorneys general sue EPA over rollback of chemical safety rule

Attorneys general of 14 states and the District of Columbia are suing the Environmental Protection Agency and its administrator, Andrew Wheeler, in the latest round of litigation challenging the agency’s recent changes to the Obama-era Chemical Disaster Rule. Filed Jan. 29 in the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the lawsuit asks the court to vacate EPA’s Risk Management Program Reconsideration final rule, which went into effect Dec. 19, on the grounds that it is “unlawful.” The new final rule eliminated various provisions of the Chemical Disaster Rule, which amended the Risk Management Program rule for chemical facilities with the intention of: Preventing catastrophic incidents by improving incident prevention program requirements.