EPA Unveils Proposal to Revoke Parts of Good Neighbor Plan

(Washington, D.C. – January 28, 2026) The Trump EPA today unveiled a proposal to revoke part of the Good Neighbor Plan, a life-saving public health protection that was issued to safeguard people living in areas that have unhealthy levels of ground level ozone (smog) from pollution emitted by power plants and industrial smokestacks that crosses state lines.  

“The Trump EPA is turning its back on millions of Americans who are suffering from pollution they did not create and cannot control by allowing states out of their legal obligation not to dump pollution on their downwind neighbors,” said Noha Haggag, senior attorney, clean power, at Environmental Defense Fund. “These protections are vital because smog does not respect state lines.” 

The Good Neighbor Plan was issued in 2023. It was designed to significantly reduce smog-forming nitrogen oxides (NOx) pollution from fossil fuel power plants and industrial sources in 23 states – protecting millions of Americans living in areas with unhealthy levels of smog. At the time it was issued, EPA estimated the Good Neighbor Plan would save 1,000 lives, prevent more than 6,600 new asthma cases and avoid 2,000 hospital emergency visits every year – yielding hundreds of billions of dollars in net economic benefits. EPA later proposed in January 2024 to expand these protections to five additional states.  

Today’s action by the Trump EPA would reverse its prior determinations that ten of these states have failed to adequately address this smog-forming pollution. If finalized, this rollback will exempt these states from the Good Neighbor Plan and its limits on smog-forming pollution from power plants and industrial facilities. The Trump EPA also announced that it intends to address the remaining states in the Good Neighbor Plan in a separate action, which means that EPA may soon take further steps to undermine this program’s life-saving protections.  

The proposal provides no analysis of the impacts of removing these states from the Good Neighbor Plan on emission reductions, air quality or public health. 

“We have widely available technology to protect people from the pollution that causes smog, and the Good Neighbor Plan is designed to make sure those technologies are implemented to protect public health,” said Haggag. “Congress enacted the Good Neighbor Provision to protect air quality and public health in downwind communities – and now the Trump EPA is abandoning that responsibility. Millions of Americans will suffer as a result.” 

The Good Neighbor Plan takes its name from a long-standing part of the Clean Air Act, known as the “Good Neighbor” provision, which requires that upwind states eliminate emissions that significantly contribute to unhealthy levels of pollution in downwind states. If an upwind state fails to meet its Good Neighbor obligations through an adequate state plan, the Clean Air Act requires that EPA issue federal requirements to safeguard people in downwind states. EPA has a decades-long history of taking action under the Good Neighbor provisions – across both Republican and Democratic administrations – to reduce unhealthy levels of air pollution  through widely available and cost-effective controls.  

Smog damages people’s lungs and is linked to asthma attacks and other serious lung and heart diseases.  According to the American Lung Association, more than 125 million people lived in an area with unhealthy ozone pollution in 2025. That’s about 37% of the nation’s population.