US President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order directing agencies to look for ways to speed up building of highways and other major projects by scaling back environmental reviews, invoking special powers he has amid a COVID-19 national emergency.
Separately on Thursday, the US Environmental Protection Agency formally proposed overhauling how it evaluates new rules on air pollutants.
The actions are the latest efforts from the Trump administration to emphasize reduced regulatory burdens on businesses.
The executive order would direct federal agencies to pursue emergency workarounds from bedrock environmental laws, such as the US National Environmental Policy Act and the US Endangered Species Act, to hasten completion of infrastructure projects.
Trump said in the order that the economic lockdown and accompanying massive unemployment required the action.
“Unnecessary delays in timely agency actions will deny our citizens opportunities for jobs and economic security, and will hinder our economic recovery from the national emergency, keeping millions of Americans out of work,” the order says.
Meanwhile, finding additional funds for new roads and bridges has proved elusive as lawmakers and the president fail to agree on the choices that are necessary to raise more money for transportation projects without adding to the already soaring national debt.
In anticipation of Trump’s executive order, environmental groups said sidestepping environmental review requirements would hurt many of the same communities already suffering the most amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Americans are crying out for leadership to confront racist violence and stop the spread of a deadly pandemic. This administration is not only ignoring those cries, but piling on the burden. We will not let this stand,” Natural Resources Defense Council president Gina McCarthy said.
“By using the coronavirus pandemic to justify fast-tracking potentially wasteful, dangerous or destructive infrastructure programs, the president has proven once again his utter contempt for our laws, for the health of our communities and for the future of our children,” US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said.
The separate EPA proposal — now going up for the legally required public comment period before any adoption — would require cost-benefit analyses for every major new regulation under the US Clean Air Act. It would also tighten consideration, in weighing any new pollutant limits, of broader benefits to clean air that would come from regulating the primary targeted pollutant.
Japanese technology giant Softbank Group Corp said Tuesday it has sold its stake in Nvidia Corp, raising US$5.8 billion to pour into other investments. It also reported its profit nearly tripled in the first half of this fiscal year from a year earlier. Tokyo-based Softbank said it sold the stake in Silicon Vally-based Nvidia last month, a move that reflects its shift in focus to OpenAI, owner of the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT. Softbank reported its profit in the April-to-September period soared to about 2.5 trillion yen (about US$13 billion). Its sales for the six month period rose 7.7 percent year-on-year
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AI BOOST: Next year, the cloud and networking product business is expected to remain a key revenue pillar for the company, Hon Hai chairman Young Liu said Manufacturing giant Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday posted its best third-quarter profit in the company’s history, backed by strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers. Net profit expanded 17 percent annually to NT$57.67 billion (US$1.86 billion) from NT$44.36 billion, the company said. On a quarterly basis, net profit soared 30 percent from NT$44.36 billion, it said. Hon Hai, which is Apple Inc’s primary iPhone assembler and makes servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s AI accelerators, said earnings per share expanded to NT$4.15 from NT$3.55 a year earlier and NT$3.19 in the second quarter. Gross margin improved to 6.35 percent,
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