In the News

President Biden on Friday announced plans to nominate environmental law expert Richard Revesz to lead the small but powerful White House office in charge of overseeing federal regulations. The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), which sits within the White House Office of Management and Budget, has been without a permanent occupant since Biden took office.  

President Joe Biden has nominated environmental law attorney Richard Revesz to lead the White House’s regulations office, which hasn’t had a permanent leader in nearly two years. Biden nominated Revesz, a New York University law professor who specializes in climate change and regulation, to lead the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. The office is little-known outside Washington but wields tremendous power over how federal agencies execute the president’s agenda.

President Joe Biden is nominating Richard Revesz of New York University (NYU) law school to serve as the administrator of the White House Office of Information & Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), a key office that conducts interagency reviews of EPA and other federal rulemakings before they are released. Revesz, who founded NYU’s Institute for Policy Integrity (IPI), has long been considered a top nominee but could not be reached for comment.

If courts can simply wipe away regulations at their discretion, it will have profound effects on how environmental agencies behave. According to the Institute for Policy Integrity at the New York University School of Law, judicial intervention led to significant setbacks to President Trump’s agenda, with the administration winning a mere 6 percent of cases against it.

Amid the national effort to reduce emissions, state laws play a key role, according to the United States Climate Alliance, a bipartisan coalition of governors working to turn back climate change. The alliance released a resource Monday, “The Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases: A Guide for State Officials,” to help leaders better understand the social cost of greenhouse gas emissions. It was put together by the Institute for Policy Integrity at New York University School of Law and is freely available to public officials.

After a meteoric rise in production over the past decade, the United States has become the largest exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG) in the world. Yet, the analysis behind LNG terminal and export approvals overlooks climate and environmental justice impacts, despite promises of imminent reform. Policy Integrity’s new report provides a comprehensive look at the Department of Energy’s (DOE) and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) past practice in this space and offers recommendations for improving their review of the climate and environmental justice impacts of LNG approvals.

The White House released findings today claiming that the new climate law could cut the economic impact of greenhouse gas emissions by up to $1.9 trillion by 2050. The freshly signed Inflation Reduction Act funneled $369 billion into greening the economy. Estimates have shown it could decrease greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by the end of the decade. “Scientists and economists have been studying this for decades,” said Max Sarinsky of the Institute for Policy Integrity. “Their work is telling us that if you slash emissions the benefits of society will be extraordinary. That’s exactly what the social cost of carbon shows.”

West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey has signaled that he plans to take a page from his recent Supreme Court climate win to challenge the Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposed rule for funds that are marketed as socially and environmentally responsible. New York University’s Institute for Policy Integrity has argued in comments that the SEC has required companies to report other environmentally related risks, including litigation involving companies and the federal government, dating back to the 1970s because such information “could signal wider-spread financial risk.”

The Inflation Reduction Act marks the most significant federal action on climate change yet, with about $370 billion of the $433 billion package teed up for green investments across the country. The IRA includes a slew of tax credits, grants, rebates and financing opportunities to encourage individuals, businesses and local governments to transition to greener energy and greater efficiency. “States that are prepared, that are well positioned, are going to be able to take advantage of this bill better than others,” said Justin Gundlach, a senior attorney at NYU School of Law’s Institute for Policy Integrity. “New York is very, very well positioned to do that.”

Shortly after his inauguration, President Biden promised to reduce climate pollution in every sector of the economy. One obstacle to achieving this goal: the Trump Administration. Although President Trump is no longer in office, the way the Trump Administration approached Obama-era regulations may have developed a blueprint for states and industry groups to challenge climate regulations adopted by the Biden Administration, warn Richard L. Revesz of NYU School of Law and Natasha Brunstein, a student at Yale Law School. Revesz and Brunstein argue that the Trump Administration manipulated what lawyers and judges have come to refer to as a “major questions” doctrine to justify striking down any regulation it disfavored.