California sues Trump administration over soot regulation rollback
California announced a lawsuit against the Trump administration for violating the Clean Air Act and failing to regulate soot, fine particulate matter that can damage the respiratory system.
Attorney General Rob Bonta and the California Air Resources Board filed a joint lawsuit Friday against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, part of a series of legal actions the state has taken against the administration for its climate and environmental policy rollbacks.
“When air quality worsens, hospital visits rise. Children struggle to breathe. Lives are cut short. And these devastating impacts fall most heavily on lower-income communities and communities of color. This is the reality when the life-saving national soot standard is not implemented,” said Bonta in a news release on Tuesday.
“The Trump EPA must comply with the law and take the actions that Congress mandated to help protect Americans from deadly soot pollution.”
Soot, a known carcinogenic fine particle, can be emitted through the burning of fossil fuels, including diesel engines, coal-fired power plants and industrial boilers, while it can also be emitted through natural sources such as wildfires. The EPA is required to set National Ambient Air Quality Standards for six key air pollutants under the Clean Air Act, which include particulate matter, like soot, ozone, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide and lead.
The push to strengthen soot regulation yielded a major win in 2024, when the Biden-era EPA tightened the annual standard and adopted a 25% reduction in allowable fine particulate matter levels. That momentum hit a major roadblock when the Trump administration moved to roll back the 2024 standard and missed its February deadline to designate areas across the country that were violating the strengthened limits.
In a 2024 statement celebrating the finalization of the strengthened standard, the EPA said the tightened rule would prevent up to 4,500 premature deaths and generate up to $46 billion in net health benefits by 2032. “Today’s action is based on the best available science, as required by the Clean Air Act, and sets an air quality level that EPA will help states and Tribal Nations achieve over the coming years,” the agency said back in 2024.
