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By Sharon Kimathi, Energy and ESG Editor, Reuters Digital

Hello!

Ready yourself for another riddle. 

‘I’m invisible, yet essential? What am I?’. 

The answer, dear reader, is air and today’s newsletter focuses on air pollution policies and regulations in the United States and the European Union.

The U.S. Supreme Court heard a bid by three Republican-led states and several energy companies to block an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulation aimed at reducing ozone emissions that may worsen air pollution in neighboring states.

Ohio, Indiana and West Virginia, as well as pipeline operators including Kinder Morgan, power producers and U.S. Steel Corp, are seeking to avoid complying with the EPA’s “Good Neighbor” plan restricting ozone pollution from upwind states, while they contest its legality in a lower court.

Also on my radar today:

• Young activists lobby for Australian law on climate harm
• UK set to miss near, long term emissions targets, DNV predicts
• Zalando to overhaul sustainability claims, European Commission says

General view of high-rise buildings shrouded in smog in Milan, Italy. REUTERS/Claudia Greco

The Supreme Court did not immediately act on emergency requests filed in October by the challengers to halt enforcement, opting instead to hear arguments first, including on whether the EPA rule’s emissions controls are reasonable.

The challenge comes after a major 2022 ruling, powered by the court’s conservative majority, imposing limits on the EPA’s authority to issue sweeping regulations to reduce carbon emissions from coal and gas-fired power plants under the Clean Air Act.

The current dispute focuses on an EPA rule finalized in June by President Joe Biden’s administration, regulating ozone, a key component of smog, in 23 upwind states.

The EPA said these states’ own plans did not satisfy the “Good Neighbor” provision of the Clean Air Act requiring steps to reduce pollution that drifts into states downwind.

The agency implemented a federal program to reduce emissions from large industrial polluters in those states – although separate challenges in lower courts have already paused enforcement in 12 of them, including West Virginia.

Some of the industry requests were specific. Kinder Morgan asked the justices to block the regulation as it applies to natural gas pipeline engines. U.S. Steel sought to prevent its enforcement against iron and steel mill reheating furnaces and boilers.

In Europe, the European Parliament and EU member states said they had agreed on a deal to strengthen air quality standards across the 27-nation bloc.

The new rules set out air quality standards for 2030 in the form of pollutant limits and target values that are closer to the guidelines of the World Health Organization (WHO).

The European Environment Agency said in November that pollution caused by fine particulate matter (PM2.5), which affects people with heart diseases in particular, led to 253,000 deaths in the EU in 2021.

Pollution from nitrogen dioxide (NO2), most harmful to people with diabetes, resulted in 52,000 deaths and short-term ozone (O3) exposure led to 22,000 deaths.

Severe smog has been affecting people like Pietro De Luca who lives in Italy’s finance and fashion capital Milan, but often thinks of moving to a cleaner city with his wife and three children to escape high pollution and associated health risks.

“It stinks! I smell a constant stench of smog , I cough, I feel my throat burning,” said De Luca, who lives in a second-floor apartment in Milan’s eastern Città Studi district.

Levels of fine particulates and other pollutants in Milan rank among the highest in Europe , data from the EU’s Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service and Italian environmental lobby Legambiente showed this month.

A man stands near damaged houses following a tornado at Sukadana village in Sumedang, West Java province, Indonesia. Antara Foto/Raisan Al Farisi/via REUTERS 

Professor Prashant Kumar, founding director of Global Centre for Clean Air Research (GCARE) at the University of Surrey, shares his thoughts on air pollution:  

“Air pollution doesn’t respect city boundaries – and so it must be tackled at regional level. 

“If cities like Delhi want to avoid the lethal smog seen in recent years, they’ll need neighboring rural areas to help them. 

“We know this approach works – we’ve seen success in places like Mexico City and Los Angeles. By working together, we can tackle air pollution. 

“In most Indian cities (60%), the air is over seven times more polluted than it should be. This has huge health implications.  

“Some of this pollution comes from neighboring rural areas – from crop burning, wood stoves, or power plants.  

“Yet measures to tackle urban smog usually ignore rural sources. Instead, they focus only on measures within the city limits – like boosting public transport or controlling pollution from industry and building sites. 

“The GCARE review recommends tackling air pollution at a regional level instead. This means identifying the wider area where a city’s pollution is produced – its so-called ‘airshed’.”  

Electric vehicle drivers unable to install a charger at home are turning instead to stopgaps offered by U.S. and European firms as alternatives to often expensive or inconvenient public charging points.

The solutions include online platforms allowing people to rent out their chargers, “pavement gullies” for properties with no driveways and even mobile charging.

While such services could put a dent in the global public charging infrastructure problem, they will not achieve the massive scale required to solve it any time soon.

Guests release an initial batch of tagged adult horseshoe crabs into Tung Chung Bay for a pilot tracking study of endangered horseshoe crabs, in Hong Kong, China. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu

Today’s spotlight focuses on an endangered crab conservation effort in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong conservationists began underwater tracking of endangered horseshoe crabs, which date back to before the dinosaurs, in a bid to help them survive.

Known as “living fossils”, they serve an important role in coastal ecology, the understanding of evolutionary science as well as being a major food source for wading birds.

Of four species worldwide, the Chinese horseshoe crab (tachypleus tridentatus) and the mangrove horseshoe crab (carcinoscorpius rotundicauda) are found in Hong Kong coastal waters.

The Ocean Park Conservation Foundation (OPCFHK) said it had initiated the first underwater automated acoustic “telemetry system” for a pilot tracking study.

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