Energy & Environment

New EPA chief calls Paris climate accord a ‘bad deal’

by Rebecca Savransky

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt on Sunday blasted the Paris climate agreement, calling it a “bad deal.”

“You know, what was wrong with Paris was not just that it was, you know, failed to be treated as a treaty, but China and India, the largest producers of CO2 internationally, got away scot-free,” he said during an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”

“They didn’t have to take steps until 2030. So we’ve penalized ourselves through lost jobs while China and India didn’t take steps to address the issue internationally,” he continued.

“So Paris was just a bad deal, in my estimation.”  

{mosads}Pruitt said the administration is now focusing on “getting things right here domestically and making sure we operate within the framework of the Clean Air Act.”

Pruitt also during the interview talked about an executive order that will be coming out next week regarding regulations on power plants.

“The president is keeping his promise to the American people this week with respect to this executive order that’s coming out on Tuesday, the Energy Independence Executive Order,” Pruitt said. “And as you indicated, this is about making sure that we have a pro-growth and pro-environment approach to how we do regulation in this country.”

Pruitt said the U.S. for too long has accepted the narrative that if “you’re pro-growth, pro-jobs, you’re anti-environment.”
 
“And that’s just not where we’ve been as a country throughout our existence,” he said.
 
“We’ve made tremendous progress on our environment and we can be both pro-jobs and pro-environment, and the executive order’s going to address the past administration’s effort to kill jobs across this country through the Clean Power Plan.”

Energy & Environment