Alabama is about to make it illegal for state regulators to adopt pollution limits stricter than federal standards.
The bill — which passed the state Legislature this week — is the latest from Republican-governed states to tie climate rules to a federal ceiling. It comes as President Donald Trump lowers that ceiling by unraveling federal rules for greenhouse gases and limiting how regulators can use the government’s own science.
Tennessee enacted a similar law last year, and Republicans in Michigan and Utah are pursuing bills to do the same. But Alabama’s legislation, S.B. 71, goes farther, limiting the research regulators can use and setting a new standard for any limits on pollutants that the federal government doesn’t regulate.
The effort takes cues from the Trump administration’s push for so-called gold standard science, which critics say could put fringe climate conspiracy theories on equal footing with peer-reviewed research.
