Van Hollen Joins Whitehouse, Senate Democrats in Investigation into EPA’s Decision to Disregard Health Impacts in Air Pollution Standards

Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) joined Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (EPW), and over 25 Senators in launching an investigation into the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) decision to cease counting health benefits when conducting cost-benefit analysis for Clean Air Act rules that limit dangerous pollutants. The decision was announced in a recent rulemaking concerning power plant regulations and reveals EPA's intention to apply this policy to fine particulate matter (PM_2.5) and ozone, two of the most harmful air pollutants.

"EPA's new policy is irrational. Even where health benefits are 'uncertain', what is certain is that they are not zero. It will lead to perverse outcomes in which EPA will reject actions that would impose relatively minor costs on polluting industries while resulting in massive benefits to public health - including in saved lives. It is contrary to Congress's intent and directive as spelled out in the Clean Air Act. It is legally flawed. The only beneficiaries will be polluting industries, many of which are among President Trump's largest donors," wrote the Senators.

The decision is based on EPA's claim that calculating benefits for PM_2.5 and ozone is too "uncertain," yet the agency has long been able to quantify both the costs and benefits of human health effects in Clean Air Act standards. For decades, EPA and other federal agencies have conducted robust cost-benefit analyses under Executive Order 12866, comparing monetized health benefits with compliance costs as a foundational part of rulemaking. Both pollutants covered by the new rulemaking are well-documented drivers of serious health harms.

By factoring in only the costs to industry-and not the costs to human life-the Trump EPA risks Americans' health and could cost billions in higher health care spending. Should EPA apply this policy when reconsidering the current nationwide PM2.5 standards, the agency risks costing Americans "between $22 and $46 billion in avoided morbidities and premature deaths in the year 2032," the Senators wrote. "The total compliance cost to industry, meanwhile, [would] be $590 million-between one and two one-hundredths of the estimated health benefit value." The Senators pointed out that "EPA has frequently overestimated cost to industry when promulgating regulations in the past," but even if the $590 million estimate is correct, "the expense of forgoing the $22 to $46 billion benefit would burden Americans across the country in lives lost, more frequent and severe illnesses, missed school days and lost labor productivity, [while] the $590 million in savings would go mostly into the pockets of a small group of Trump's fossil fuel donors."

The Senators emphasize that the shift contradicts EPA's core obligation to protect health, the Clean Air Act's directive to "protect and enhance the quality of the Nation's air resources so as to promote the public health and welfare," and commitments Administrator Zeldin himself made during his confirmation hearing, where he testified that, "the goal, the end state of all the conversations that we might have, any regulations that might get passed, any laws that might get passed by Congress" is to "have the cleanest, healthiest air, [and] drinking water." Administrator Zeldin's action now flies in the face of his earlier testimony.

"That EPA may no longer monetize health benefits when setting new clean air standards does not mean that those health benefits don't exist-it just means that [EPA] will ignore them and reject safer standards, in favor of protecting corporate interests," concluded the Senators.

This change also paves the way to looser controls on other pollutants, including coal-burning power plants.

In addition to Senators Van Hollen and Whitehouse, the letter was signed by Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Senators Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Angus King, Jr. (I-Maine), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).

The Senators are requesting documents and information related to this decision, including draft and final analyses, cost-benefit modeling, scientific justifications, communications with industry representatives, and any White House involvement, by February 24, 2026.

Full text of the letter is available here and below.

Dear Administrator Zeldin,

We write in response to EPA's apparent decision that it will no longer count health effects when conducting cost-benefit analysis for Clean Air Act rules limiting dangerous pollutants. In a recent rulemaking concerning power plant regulations, EPA has specifically announced its intention to apply this policy to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and ozone, alleging that the benefits calculus for these pollutants is particularly "uncertain".

EPA's new policy is irrational. Even where health benefits are "uncertain", what is certain is that they are not zero. It will lead to perverse outcomes in which EPA will reject actions that would impose relatively minor costs on polluting industries while resulting in massive benefits to public health - including in saved lives. It is contrary to Congress's intent and directive as spelled out in the Clean Air Act. It is legally flawed. The only beneficiaries will be polluting industries, many of which are among President Trump's largest donors.

The purpose of the Clean Air Act, as confirmed repeatedly by the text of the statute, is to promote clean air. In 1967, on the opening page of the Act, Congress stated that "air pollution…has resulted in mounting dangers to the public health and welfare" and determined that it was therefore the purpose of the Act to "protect and enhance the quality of the Nation's air resources so as to promote the public health and welfare..." You yourself affirmed this directive under oath in your own confirmation hearing in January 2025, when you testified to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that "[EPA's] mission is simple, but essential: to protect human health and the environment." You can't "protect human health" if you don't count it.

Since the Clean Air Act's inception, EPA has implemented its health-protecting mission through rulemaking and enforcement. For several decades, since the issuance of Executive Order 12866, EPA and other federal agencies have conducted robust cost-benefit analyses, comparing monetized expected health benefits against compliance costs, as an often-foundational component of rulemaking. Indeed, cost-benefit analyses are often relied upon by courts to determine if a rulemaking was reasonable and not "arbitrary and capricious".

It is true that a cost-benefit analysis is an inexact metric for evaluating the value of a human life. It is also true that some health benefits are difficult to quantify to their full extent. But these points simply show that health benefits are often destined, even when monetized, to be undervalued-which makes it more important than ever that EPA at a minimum weigh those health benefits that are monetizable. Putting a minimum dollars and cents value on health assures the public that EPA is doing the work it is obligated to do; protecting the public health and considering compliance costs in the context of overall benefits, including the benefits that the Clean Air Act is designed to achieve. This assurance is doubly important now, when your EPA has shown time and time again that it values corporate profit over protecting the public. Instead of giving this assurance, your EPA now intends to set health benefits to zero.

EPA has declared that it will no longer monetize the benefits of reducing PM2.5 and ozone pollution, on the basis that the benefits of their reduction are "uncertain". But the benefit of reducing air pollution is demonstrably not zero. PM2.5 pollution causes heart attacks, asthma, bronchitis, lung cancer, strokes, premature births, and death. Ozone pollution causes lung disease, asthma attacks, nervous system and cardiovascular problems, and reproductive issues. Economists and scientists have long established workable metrics for monetarily quantifying the health benefits of reduced pollution. The method for calculating PM2.5 benefits, according to a former EPA economist who worked at the agency from 1998 until 2025, is "one of the most heavily reviewed processes probably ever in the federal government, and [it] has been through many iterations in both Democratic and Republican administrations." In setting its updated PM2.5 national ambient air quality (NAAQs) standards in 2024, EPA calculated a benefit of between $22 and $46 billion in avoided morbidities and premature death in the year 2032. The total compliance cost to industry, meanwhile, was calculated to be $590 million-between one and two onehundredths of the estimated health benefit value. Moreover, as EPA itself acknowledges, compliance cost values themselves are subject to a significant degree of uncertainty. EPA has frequently overestimated cost to industry when promulgating regulations in the past. Finally, even assuming $590 million is correct, it must be noted that while the expense of forgoing the $22 to 46 billion benefit would burden Americans across the country in lives lost, more frequent and severe illnesses, missed school days and lost labor productivity, the $590 million in savings would go mostly into the pockets of a small group of Trump's fossil fuel donors.

It seems self-evident that where EPA does conduct a cost-benefit analysis, it would be irrational to consider only the cost of setting standards, while ignoring the monetized public health benefits of those standards. Self-evident or not, we can rely on the edict of the Administrative Procedure Act, confirmed by Supreme Court precedent, which holds that agency rulemaking is arbitrary and capricious, and therefore invalid, when the agency fails to consider an important aspect of the problem. The devastating and astronomically expensive impacts that PM2.5, ozone, and other dangerous pollutants have on the public health is clearly an "important aspect" of the problem of regulating them. This clear conclusion is further supported by the Ninth Circuit case Center for Biological Diversity v. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), in which that court vacated Bush-era vehicle standards after NHTSA failed to consider the benefits of reduced greenhouse gases in an associated environmental review. The court held that "NHTSA's reasoning is arbitrary and capricious for several reasons. First, while the record shows that there is a range of values, the value of carbon emissions reduction is certainly not zero."

The Supreme Court has also recognized that considering health benefits is of fundamental importance. In Michigan v. EPA, the Supreme Court rejected an EPA power plants rule promulgated under section 112 after the agency determined that it need not consider cost of compliance when determining that it was "appropriate and necessary" to regulate the source in question. The Court disagreed, expressing its concern that it would not be rational or "appropriate" to "impose billions of dollars in economic costs in return for a few dollars in health or environmental benefits", and further that EPA's interpretation was legally flawed because it could "preclude[] the Agency from considering any type of cost", including harms to "human health or the environment". The Court did not specifically direct EPA to monetize health benefits in Michigan, but its reasoning and dicta throughout suggested an underlying understanding that such a calculation is an important aspect of reasonable rulemaking. Crucially, the Court noted, "[c]onsideration of cost reflects the understanding that reasonable regulation ordinarily requires paying attention to the advantages and the disadvantages of agency decisions." This statement, read both ways, reflects the logical understanding that where EPA estimates compliance costs in dollars, it should also monetize associated public health benefits - what matters are the relative costs and benefits, and the agency needs to calculate both in order to compare them.. EPA might contest that "paying attention" to health benefits does not require monetizing them, but failing to do so risks comparing apples and oranges and, as discussed above, vastly underestimating the dangers of deregulation.

When you appeared before the Committee at your confirmation hearing, you testified: "the goal, the end state of all the conversations that we might have, any regulations that might get passed, any laws that might get passed by Congress" is to "have the cleanest, healthiest air, [and] drinking water." And when Senator Blunt Rochester asked you to confirm that it was still your position that "EPA's mission is to protect the health of the public and the environment," you responded simply "yes." Yet now, faced with the opportunity to consider quantifiable statistics about human health, you choose to ignore them entirely. That EPA may no longer monetize health benefits when setting new clean air standards does not mean that those health benefits don't exist-it just means that you will ignore them and reject safer standards, in favor of protecting corporate interests.

To help us better understand EPA's decision-making process, please respond to the following requests for information and documents no later than February 26, 2026:

1. On what basis did EPA make the decision to no longer quantify health effects of PM2.5 and ozone pollution when undertaking the cost-benefit analysis as part of its Clean Air Act rulemaking? In your answer, please include a discussion of all EPA experts and offices consulted as part of the decision-making process.

2. What exactly will EPA take into account when undertaking Clean Air Act rulemaking cost-benefit analyses? Please clearly identify all factors it will consider as "costs" and all factors it will consider as "benefits."

3. Has EPA discussed ceasing to quantify health effects of other pollutants, in addition to PM2.5 and ozone? If so, which pollutants?

4. Before making the decision to no longer take health effects into account when undertaking clean-air rulemaking cost-benefit analyses, did EPA consult with any third parties, including but not limited to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Surgeon General, public health experts, and interested civil society groups such as the "Make America Healthy Again" movement?

a. If yes, please provide the date of each such meeting and a description of the matters discussed.

b. If no, why not?

5. Please produce any documents, including contemporaneous notes, memorializing any internal or external discussions and communications concerning items (1) through (4). Please also produce all communications between and among EPA and third parties, including but not limited to the White House, the Office of Management and Budget, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Office of the United States Surgeon General, and the fossil fuel industry concerning items (1) through (3), including but not limited to emails, briefing materials, talking points, calendar entries, reports, memoranda, internal analyses, and correspondence.

Sincerely,