CNBC: The Costs of Dumping Obama’s Clean Power Plan

Despite polarization among US lawmakers, the president can accomplish much with executive orders. Donald Trump is dismantling his predecessor’s climate legacy, explains Jason Bordoff, a professor and founding director of the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. Orders announced today “direct agencies to rewrite regulation restricting carbon emissions in the power sector, lift the moratorium on coal leasing on federal lands, reverse rules limiting methane leaks, and revise the way the government calculates the cost of climate change, among other changes.” The moves will harm the health of the country’s citizens as well as the economy, the environment and foreign relations. Many industries and cities rely on a clean environment to stay competitive. As other countries move forward to control emissions and develop renewable energies, the United States will fall behind on innovation. Bardoff explains there are many market-based approaches, but the Trump administration’s plans to end regulations will ultimately increase health, environmental protection and energy costs for US residents and businesses. – YaleGlobal