On July 13, the Trump administration again clawed back a crucial rule that would have expanded monitoring of hazardous air pollutants in the United States, two days before it was set to go into effect.
Communities living close to facilities producing dangerous air pollution in the US were set to celebrate a victory that would equip them with more information about the deadly pollutants in their backyards, such as benzene and ethylene oxide, but the administration’s announcement instead keeps them further in the dark.
In July 2024, many facilities regulated by the “HON rule” two years to begin real-time and continuous “fenceline” monitoring of six hazardous air pollutants. By July 15 this year, they were meant to be gathering data and by July 2027, communities would start seeing the numbers.
For communities impacted by the petrochemical industry, like those in Cancer Alley, Louisiana, the promise of more information about the air they breathe was a major victory. Residents there describe cancer, adverse birth outcomes, and other reproductive harms that they worry may be linked to pollution from the fossil fuel industries in their backyards. Current methods to calculate emissions have been found to underestimate air pollution.
In 2025 President Donald Trump provided two-year extensions for implementing the rule for many facilities, including in Louisiana. Trump also promised to roll back the regulation, part of a broader deregulatory agenda.
The White House’s announcement this week provides similar extensions for 20 more facilities, including five in Louisiana.
The revised HON rule also required some facilities to reduce emissions and take corrective action if monitoring revealed emissions exceeding standards. The Biden administration had calculated that the revised rule would have also drastically lowered cancer and other health risks caused by air toxics for overburdened communities, such as Cancer Alley.
The HON rule’s promises, now at least partly broken, represented hope and a crucial shift for communities who have fought for decades for more transparency. The sooner this right to information win is restored, and the HON rule fully implemented, the better.
