In the News

Max Sarinsky, a senior attorney at New York University School of Law's Institute for Policy Integrity, said there will be some factors on an agency's side as well during future litigation. He said that for one thing, the estimates, which have already been used in many rules and other decisions, go through an extensive process before finalization that incorporates a public comment period, a peer review process and the best available science at the time. "To win an argument that the standard is high, you have to show that it's arbitrary and capricious to use these numbers," Sarinsky said. "So to say that it's arbitrary and capricious to use Nobel Prize-winning work seems a little difficult to me."

The White House on Thursday revised the way agencies weigh regulatory costs and benefits for the first time in 20 years. It resulted in new guidance that experts say will make it tougher for industries to challenge rules on the basis of their economic costs, and easier for agencies to justify stronger safeguards for public health and the environment... “This update certainly supports higher valuations of the social cost of carbon because it is broadly consistent with the approach that EPA is taking,” said [Max] Sarinsky of NYU.

Burcin Ünel, executive director of the Institute for Policy Integrity at New York University School of Law, says the new guidance “will help government agencies catch up to best practices in economics [and] guidance will help ensure that regulators do not ignore equity concerns, which have long been a blind spot in most rulemakings.

The change is consistent with voluminous academic research into discounting, and is “actually a conservative estimate,” said Peter Howard, economics director at the New York University School of Law’s Institute for Policy Integrity. A future administration could raise the discount rate again, but would “have to provide a rational justification” for doing so, Howard said.

Large parts of the eastern United States are at an elevated risk of electricity outages if extreme storms cripple power grids this winter, according to the U.S. grid monitor. The FERC/NERC report suggests an independent research group analyze whether more natural gas pipelines and gas storage facilities are needed to improve grid reliability and the gas heating system. A study about pipeline needs should account for the fact that other less-expensive infrastructure could be used instead, said Jennifer Danis, federal energy policy director at the Institute for Policy Integrity, a think tank at NYU School of Law.

Environmental justice organizations and local municipalities had an opportunity to learn about a new resource designed to help them identify, navigate, and pursue federal funding for environmental justice by attending a webinar on Monday. This webinar introduced attendees to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Environmental Justice Thriving Communities Technical Assistance Center (TCTAC) for EPA Region 2, from Harlem to Newark. Among the speakers was Al Huang, Environmental Justice Director at the New York University School of Law Institute for Policy Integrity

Three agencies that are the backbone of U.S. banking regulation have developed joint guidance, released today, on how banks should manage the monetary risks of the climate crisis. Previously, EDF partnered with NYU School of Law’s Institute for Policy Integrity to submit joint comments to all three agencies – the FDIC, the Federal Reserve Board and the OCC. 

On October 11, 2023, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) for a sweeping prohibition of “hidden” and “misleading” fees across all industries. This “Rule on Unfair or Deceptive Fees” can be traced back to the FTC publishing a petition (86 FR 73207) for rulemaking from the Institute for Policy Integrity on “drip pricing” on December 27, 2021. The petition defined drip pricing as “the practice of advertising only a part of a product’s price upfront and revealing additional charges later as consumers go through the buying process.”

After stumbling twice at the Supreme Court, Republicans still want to make the case that the administration has its math wrong on climate change's financial toll. The justices "make it very clear that you can't challenge these valuations in the abstract," said Max Sarinsky, a senior attorney at the Institute for Policy Integrity. "You have to challenge them in their application."

Breaking the law soon could get more expensive for companies and people who violate U.S. environmental regulations. That’s based on a White House directive from last month that looked at a complex calculation known as the social cost of greenhouse gases. Max Sarinsky, a senior attorney at the Institute for Policy Integrity at New York University School of Law, co-wrote a 2021 report that said basing penalty calculations in part on the social cost of greenhouse gases “internalize the climate-related harms from noncompliance, thereby punishing violators based on the damage caused and efficiently deterring future violations.” Sarinsky told E&E News in an interview that agencies may not be confined to considering traditional factors such as inflation when setting penalties.