LANSING, Mich. — Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has joined a coalition of 14 other attorneys general and the City of New York in filing a lawsuit challenging the Department of Energy's (DOE) revisions to its Process Rule, which will reduce energy savings and increase pollutant emissions, according to a news release from the attorney general's office.
The attorney general's office said the Process Rule was adopted in 1996 and ensures the DOE meets an Energy Policy Conservation Act (EPCA) mandate to create energy conservation standards that benefit the public in a timely manner.
The attorney general's office said recent revisions "create a number of roadblocks to the adoption of new standards and the review of existing standards."
Nessel's office said DOE imposes "an unreasonably high threshold for energy efficiency savings--effectively prohibiting the adoption of any standard that does not result in energy savings equivalent to powering eight million homes for an entire year."
“Revisions to this process rule would make it much more difficult for the Department of Energy to create and impose energy efficiency standards,” said Nessel. “Establishing energy efficiency savings standards that encourage steady growth and investment in the environmental arena is working. The revisions to the DOE’s process rule will eliminate the progress that’s been made over the past several years.”
The attorney general's office said DOE's long-standing energy efficiency program "has resulted in substantial economic and environmental benefits, with more than $2 trillion in projected customer savings and 2.6 billion tons of avoided carbon dioxide emissions."
Nessel's office said a lot of these benefits came under the Process Rule, but the revisions that were made could threaten the progress that's been made.
A copy of the lawsuit can be viewed here.
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