Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Associated Press file At a time when Americans are facing higher utility bills and the grid is under growing strain, getting energy policy right is crucial. The End EPA Abuse Act, introduced by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.), would prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from imposing rules that undermine reliability, raise costs, and restrict consumer choice while still protecting the environment.
Over the past decade, the EPA has increasingly used the Clean Air Act not just to regulate pollution, but to reshape the nation’s energy system. Consider the Obama-era Clean Power Plan’s “generation shifting” approach.
Under the Clean Air Act, the EPA determined that the “best system of emission reduction” required not just efficiency improvements at individual plants, but changes across the entire power sector. In practice, that meant pushing utilities to shift electricity production away from coal and toward “green” sources such as wind and solar. The Supreme Court ultimately rejected that theory of authority in West Virginia v. EPA, holding that Congress had not authorized the agency to restructure the nation’s electricity mix.
Further, the EPA’s original 2024 tailpipe emissions rule for model years 2027 through 2032 set emissions targets so stringent that conventional gasoline vehicles cannot meet them at scale. While this rule is currently being reevaluated, automakers faced a forcible and dramatic increase in electric vehicle production to comply with the proposed rule.
EPA’s own projections indicated that electric vehicles would need to account for roughly 30 to 56 percent of new vehicle sales by the early 2030s, with earlier proposals suggesting even higher levels. While framed as “technology neutral,” the practical effect of such a rule is to steer the market away from internal combustion engines, regardless of consumer demand or producer readiness.
The same pattern appears in the EPA’s 2024 power plant rule requiring carbon capture. This requires certain coal and natural gas facilities to meet emissions limits equivalent to capturing up to 90 percent of their carbon emissions, effectively mandating the use of carbon capture technology or forcing early retirement. Industry groups warn the technology is not ready for wide-scale deployment within the required timeframe, and that enacting the plan would increase costs.
Those requirements remain in effect for now, but they are being challenged in court and are under active reconsideration by the EPA, which has proposed repealing the rule.
The End EPA Abuse Act is designed to draw a clearer line by prohibiting rules such as these that would force fuel switching, restrict the use of gas-powered vehicles, undermine grid reliability, or require technologies that are not economically or practically feasible.
Critics will likely characterize the legislation as an attack on environmental protections. In reality, it leaves the EPA’s traditional authority to regulate known pollutants intact. What it does not allow is for the agency to use that authority as a vehicle for imposing major energy and transportation policies that Congress never enacted.
The need for reforms such as the End EPA Abuse Act is especially clear because the U.S. is in a period of rapidly growing electricity demand. Federal analysis warns that the grid could require roughly 100 gigawatts of additional peak capacity by 2030 to keep pace with rising demand from artificial intelligence, data centers, and industrial growth, even as the system faces increasing reliability risks from the retirement of dispatchable generation.
Data centers, artificial intelligence, and advanced manufacturing are placing new and constant pressure on the grid, and even short outages can have severe consequences for their operation. These facilities require electricity that is available around the clock, something intermittent resources like wind and solar cannot provide on their own because they depend on weather conditions and are not always available when demand is highest.
At the same time, energy supply is facing new constraints. Analyses of the grid warn that rising demand, combined with the forced retirement of baseload power generation and increased reliance on intermittent sources such as wind and solar, will lead to shortfalls in available capacity.
One federal assessment again finds that about 100 gigawatts of new capacity will be needed to maintain reliability. Yet despite thousands of proposed projects, more than 2,300 gigawatts of generation and storage capacity were waiting in interconnection queues in 2024. Of these, only a small share will ultimately be built.
When dependable generation is forced offline without adequate replacement, the result is less supply, higher prices, and greater risk of outages. For American families and businesses, the consequences of bad energy policy show up in higher utility bills, fewer choices, a less reliable power system, and, eventually, electricity rationing. Americans should be free to choose the vehicles they drive and the energy that powers their lives.
The End EPA Abuse Act offers a practical path forward. It preserves environmental protections while ensuring that major decisions reshaping America’s energy system are made by Congress, not imposed through regulation.
By forbidding mandates that force fuel-switching or rely on unproven technologies, the bill would restore certainty for energy producers, encourage investment in reliable capacity, and strengthen both the grid and the broader economy.
At a time of rising demand, Congress should act to keep energy affordable, reliable, and driven by consumer choice.
Sarah Wagoner is a Policy Analyst in Environmental and Energy Policy at the Heritage Foundation.
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