This report has been updated frequently since the first version was released early in 2011. Many of the issues that were raised then regarding specific regulations have now been resolved—at least to the extent that proposed rules have been finalized. Still, the broader question of whether the Obama Administration’s EPA is “overreaching” in its regulatory efforts has not gone away. Critics both in Congress and outside of it regularly accuse the agency of overkill. In April 2013, in a case involving four of EPA’s greenhouse gas regulatory actions, for example, a dozen states led by Texas asked the Supreme Court to “rein in a usurpatious agency and remind the President and his subordinates that they cannot rule by executive decree.”24
What is different three years after our first report is that there is now a more detailed record of EPA actions to be evaluated. Reviewing that record, we find—
• Many of the proposals that were controversial when our first report was released are now final.
• In general, the proposed versions of these rules served as “high water marks”: none of the final rules is more stringent than what was proposed and the final versions of many of the most controversial rules were made less stringent.
• In revising proposed rules, EPA often relied on data submitted by industry and other stakeholders, acknowledging that it had inadequate or incomplete data when it proposed the rules.
• In several instances, the regulated community was given more time to comply than originally expected.
• Regardless of modifications in the final rules, many of the regulations have been challenged in court by a variety of groups—some seeking more stringent rules, others less stringent.
• Although many of these challenges remain to be heard by the courts, thus far the courts have upheld EPA decisions on the final regulations in most cases.
• The pace of new regulation has slowed considerably since 2011. In part, this may be because a backlog of rules that were remanded to the agency during the Bush Administration has been largely addressed; other rules were delayed until after the 2012 election, perhaps due to political considerations.
• A number of EPA proposals remain under development, with planned or court- ordered promulgation dates on the horizon; many of these remain controversial.
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