NATION/WORLD
Tuesday, August 21, 2018
East Oregonian
Trump ready to ease rules
on coal-fired power plants
By MATTHEW DALY
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The
Trump administration is set
to roll back the centerpiece
of President Barack Obama’s
efforts to slow global warm-
ing, the Clean Power Plan
that restricts greenhouse gas
emissions from coal-fired
power plants.
A plan to be announced
Tuesday would give states
broad authority to determine
how to restrict carbon diox-
ide and other greenhouse gas
emissions that contribute to
global warming. The Envi-
ronmental Protect Agency
announced late Monday
that acting administrator
Andrew Wheeler planned to
brief the news media by tele-
phone Tuesday on what the
administration is calling the
“Affordable Clean Energy”
rule — greenhouse guide-
lines for states to set perfor-
mance standards for existing
coal-fired power plants.
President Donald Trump
is expected to promote the
new plan at an appearance in
West Virginia on Tuesday.
The plan is also expected
to let states relax pollution
rules for power plants that
need upgrades, according to
a summary of the plan and
several people familiar with
the full proposal who spoke
to The Associated Press
on condition of anonymity
because they weren’t autho-
rized to discuss the plan
publicly.
Combined with a planned
rollback of car-mileage stan-
dards, the plan represents
a significant retreat from
Obama-era efforts to fight
climate change and would
stall an Obama-era push to
shift away from coal and
toward less-polluting energy
sources such as natural
gas, wind and solar power.
Trump has already vowed
AP Photo/Andrew Harnik
President Donald Trump speaks during an event to sa-
lute U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement offi-
cers and U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents
in the East Room of the White House in Washington
on Monday.
to pull the U.S. out of the
Paris climate agreement as
he pushes to revive the coal
industry.
Trump also has directed
Energy Secretary Rick Perry
to take steps to bolster strug-
gling coal-fired and nuclear
power plants to keep them
open, warning that impend-
ing retirements of “fuel-se-
cure” power plants that rely
on coal and nuclear power
are harming the nation’s
power grid and reducing its
resilience.
A three-page summary
being circulated at the White
House focuses on boost-
ing efficiency at coal-fired
power plants and allow-
ing states to reduce “waste-
ful compliance costs” while
focusing on improved envi-
ronmental outcomes. Critics
say focusing on improved
efficiency would allow util-
ities to run older, dirtier
power plants more often,
undercutting potential envi-
ronmental benefits.
The White House rejects
that criticism.
“Carbon dioxide emis-
sions from the power sector
will continue to fall under
this rule, but this will hap-
pen legally and with proper
respect for the states, unlike”
the Clean Power Plan, the
summary says. The AP
obtained a copy of the sum-
mary, which asserts that the
Obama-era plan exceeds the
EPA’s authority under the
Clean Air Act.
Obama’s
plan
was
designed to cut U.S. carbon
dioxide emissions to 32 per-
cent below 2005 levels by
2030. The rule dictated spe-
cific emission targets for
states based on power-plant
emissions and gave officials
broad latitude to decide how
to achieve reductions.
The Supreme Court put
the plan on hold in 2016 fol-
lowing a legal challenge by
industry and coal-friendly
states, an order that remains
in effect.
Even so, the Obama plan
has been a factor in a wave
of retirements of coal-fired
plants, which also are being
squeezed by lower costs
for natural gas and renew-
able power and state man-
dates that promote energy
conservation.
Trump has vowed to end
what Republicans call a “war
on coal” waged by Obama.
Prosecutors preparing charges against Cohen
NEW YORK (AP) —
Michael Cohen, President
Donald Trump’s former per-
sonal lawyer, could be charged
before the end of the month
with bank fraud in his deal-
ings with the taxi industry and
with committing other finan-
cial crimes, two people famil-
iar with the federal probe said
Monday.
The people confirmed
reports that federal prosecutors
in Manhattan were considering
charging Cohen after months
of speculation over a case that
has been a distraction for the
White House with the midterm
elections approaching.
The people, who weren’t
authorized to discuss the case
and spoke on Monday on con-
dition of anonymity, refused to
answer questions about spec-
ulation that Cohen still might
strike a plea deal with prosecu-
tors requiring his cooperation.
It’s believed that prosecu-
tors would put off a decision
on how to go forward with the
case until after the election in
compliance with an informal
Justice Department policy of
avoiding bringing prosecutions
that could be seen as political
and influence voters.
“This is really a plan to
prop up coal plants — or try
to,” said David Doniger, a
climate expert at the Natural
Resources Defense Council,
an environmental group.
The Trump plan “will
make no meaningful reduc-
tions” in greenhouse gas
emissions “and it probably
will make emissions worse,”
Doniger said.
Gina McCarthy, who
served as EPA administrator
when the Clean Power Plan
was created in 2015, said that
based on draft proposals and
news reports, she expects
the plan will not set specific
federal targets for reducing
emissions from coal-fired
plants. The plan is expected
to address power plants indi-
vidually rather than across
the electric grid as the EPA
proposed under Obama. The
new plan would give utilities
and states more flexibility in
achieving emissions reduc-
tions, but critics say it could
harm public health.
“They are continuing to
play to their base and fol-
lowing industry’s lead,”
McCarthy said of the Trump
administration
and
its
new acting administrator,
Andrew Wheeler, a former
coal industry lobbyist. “This
is all about coal at all costs.”
Michelle
Bloodworth,
president of the American
Coalition for Clean Coal
Electricity, a trade group
that represents coal pro-
ducers, called the new rule
a marked departure from
the “gross overreach” of
the Obama administration
and said it should prevent a
host of premature coal-plant
retirements.
“We agree with those pol-
icymakers who have become
increasingly
concerned
that coal retirements are a
threat to grid resilience and
national security,” she said.
Page 7A
Wall Street nears
record bull market
in United States
By BERNARD CONDON
AP Business Writer
NEW YORK — The
bull market in U.S. stocks
is about to become the
longest in history.
If stocks don’t drop
significantly by the close
of trading Wednesday, the
bull market that began in
March 2009 will have
lasted nine years, five
months and 13 days, a
record that few would
have predicted when the
market struggled to find
its footing after a 50 per-
cent plunge during the
financial crisis.
The long rally has
added trillions of dol-
lars to household wealth,
helping the economy, and
stands as a testament to
the ability of large U.S.
companies to squeeze out
profits in tough times and
confidence among inves-
tors as they shrugged off
repeated crises and kept
buying.
“There was no manic
trading, there was no
panic buying or selling,”
said Jack Ablin, chief
investment officer of
Cresset Wealth Advisors.
“It’s been pretty steady.”
The question now is
when the rally will end.
The Federal Reserve is
undoing many of the stim-
ulative measures that sup-
ported the market, includ-
ing keeping interest rates
near zero. There are also
mounting threats to global
trade that have unsettled
investors.
For such an enduring
bull market, it shares little
of the hallmarks of prior
rallies.
Unlike earlier ral-
lies, individual inves-
tors have largely sat out
after getting burned by
two crashes in less than a
decade. Trading has been
lackluster, with few shares
exchanging hands each
day. Private companies
have shown little enthusi-
asm, too, with fewer sell-
ing stock in initial public
offerings than in previous
bull runs.
Yet this bull market
has been remarkably resil-
ient. After several blows
that might have killed
off a less robust rally —
fears of a eurozone col-
lapse, plunging oil prices,
a U.S. credit downgrade,
President Donald Trump’s
trade fights — investors
soon returned to buy-
ing, avoiding a 20 per-
cent drop in stocks that by
common definition marks
the end of bull markets.
“I don’t think anyone
could have predicted the
length and strength of this
bull market,” said David
Lebovitz, a global mar-
ket strategist at JPMorgan
Asset Management.
One of the market’s
biggest winners in recent
years, Facebook, wasn’t
even publicly traded when
the bull market began.
Facebook’s huge run-up
of more than 350 per-
cent since going public
in 2012, Apple’s steady
march to $1 trillion in
value, and huge gains by
other tech companies like
Netflix have helped push
the broader market higher.
Since the rally offi-
cially began on March 9,
2009, the Standard and
Poor’s 500 has risen 321
percent. In the 1990s bull
market, the current record
holder for the longest,
stocks rose 417 percent.
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