Keeping Up With Executive Orders: Energy And Environmental Policy

The first two weeks of the second Trump Administration resulted in a series of Executive Orders that signal big changes in the Executive Branch's approach to energy and environmental policy. These orders mark a significant shift in federal environmental priorities and are likely to have far-reaching effects.

These recent orders reflect a distinct shift in federal energy and environmental policy, with potential implications for both state regulators, and private sector initiatives. However, with few notable exceptions, their ultimate impact is still unclear.

Executive Orders that require formal agency action to achieve their goals are likely to face legal challenges in federal courts, which are empowered to stay the effect of many final agency actions until these lawsuits are resolved. As these developments unfold, this could prevent consistency in the application of new federal regulations and actions to revoke old regulations from state to state.