Will Richardson argues the US voluntarily dismantled its climate authority through deregulation, even though major oil and gas companies warned it would create costly chaos. Businesses didn't ask for the rollback; they wanted the certainty existing rules provided.
The world's second-largest polluter just deleted its own power to fight climate change. Not lost it in court, not had it voted away, chose to delete it. And here's the bit that should stop you: the businesses that supposedly benefit from this, they didn't ask for it. In fact, most of them told the government not to do it. Even the so-called winners here are worried. Oil and gas trade bodies actually warned the US government that a national rollback would create a patchwork of different state-level laws, meaning companies would have to juggle different rules in California, Texas, Texas, New York, and every other state. When your own industry lobby is asking the government to keep the rules, that tells you the rules are doing something useful. Here's the lesson: regulatory certainty is an asset. Chaos is a liability.
