What will happen to the major environment, health protections Biden is set to leave unfinished?

From heat protections for workers to restrictions on toxic chemicals, the Biden administration is set to leave several of the significant environmental and health protections it has floated unfinished.

The fate of many of these regulations likely depends on the outcome of November’s election, as a Harris administration would probably continue them, while a Trump administration likely would not. 

While even finished rules are vulnerable under a new administration, it may take a lengthy process with significant scrutiny to undo some of the progress the Biden administration has made on climate and health. 

However, rules that are not yet on the books can simply be abandoned. 

The Biden administration has completed a number of significant actions aimed at combating climate change and improving environmental health. These include the passage of billions of dollars for climate-friendly energy in the Inflation Reduction Act and regulations restricting planet-warming and toxic emissions from a variety of sources.

But it has not completed everything it set out to do — and probably will not before President Biden’s term is up in January.

Here's a breakdown of some of the unfinished business he's likely to leave behind.

Heat protections for workers

One of the highest profile items that is unlikely to be finished this term is Biden’s effort to protect workers from extreme heat. His administration announced in 2021 that it planned to require companies to provide employees with such protections, but it didn’t propose to do so until this year.

The proposed rule would make companies give employees access to water and breaks in times of high heat. Those breaks would need to include access to shade or air conditioning for outdoor workers or cooler areas with fans, ventilation or air conditioning for indoor workers. 

The dwindling time before January's inauguration leaves little room to complete a rule before Biden is out of office, however.

“The rulemaking process can span multiple years, and in many cases, multiple administrations. We are proud to be one step closer to helping indoor and outdoor workers secure the heat protections they need,” a Labor Department spokesperson said in an email. 

But Juley Fulcher, worker health and safety advocate at the group Public Citizen, said that if former President Trump is elected and doesn’t support the unfinished rule, his administration could “very easily just shelve it.”

“Workers die because of this, and the problem is only getting worse, as we see summers getting hotter and hotter and longer and longer,” Fulcher said. “We are talking about a very real danger, and workers are suffering and without any kind of federal protection —  that puts a lot of workers in danger.”

Limitations on gas plant emissions

The Biden administration has also punted on a major piece of one of its landmark climate rules. 

It proposed last year to limit planet-warming emissions from existing coal-fired power plants, new gas-fired power plants and, for the first time, some existing gas plants. 

But the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ultimately stripped out the limitations for existing gas plants, saying that it would set climate standards for these power generators through a separate rule. 

By this point, completing such a rule seems like a tall task, and one that would probably have to fall to the next administration.  

Trump has said he’d roll back the Biden administration’s existing power plant rule, calling it part of an “anti-American-energy crusade,” so it’s highly unlikely that he’d pursue anything further if reelected.

'Forever chemicals' restrictions

A third rule that Biden is unlikely to complete is an effort to restrict releases of toxic chemicals known as PFAS.

PFAS, which stands for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a class of thousands of chemicals whose uses include making products nonstick and waterproof. Exposure to the toxic substances, which have become pervasive in the environment and in Americans' bodies, has been linked to health problems including cancer.

In 2021, the EPA issued a notice that it planned to set limits on how much PFAS can be discharged by companies that make the substances — but it has yet to even propose a rule to do so, let alone finish one. 

The EPA did set drinking water limits for some PFAS earlier this year, requiring water providers to filter them out, but this rule didn’t address ongoing emissions. 

“There's so much PFAS that has been released over the last 60, 70 years that because they're forever chemicals are still in the environment, and we shouldn't be adding to that problem,” said Melanie Benesh, vice president of government affairs at the Environmental Working Group.

“Stopping PFAS at the source is really one of the most critically important things that any administration could do ... to try to mitigate this PFAS crisis,” Benesh said.

An EPA spokesperson said the agency “is focused on developing and implementing policies that will stand the test of time” and that are “rooted in the best available science and technical records and are informed by robust and inclusive stakeholder engagement.”

What would a Harris or Trump administration do?

The Harris campaign did not respond to a question from The Hill about whether Vice President Harris would continue to pursue these protections if she wins the presidency, though the policy positions taken by her campaign seem largely in line with Biden's.

Asked the same question, the Trump campaign did not address the specific regulations The Hill asked about. However, spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a written statement that Trump will “make America energy independent again, bring down prices for American consumers and drill baby drill!”

Beyond the rules that have already been floated, environmental activists have also called for even more climate action.

Craig Segall, vice president of climate advocacy group Evergreen, told The Hill that the next administration ought to do more to advance the decarbonization of transportation and industry. 

“We've taken a lot of steps to start moving money into demonstration projects, into rebuilding manufacturing at home,” Segall said. “All that's great, but now it's really important that we have federal standards that affirmatively drive decarbonization of our industry.”