EPA will stop counting health costs in PM2.5 and ozone rules

The EPA announced it will no longer monetize health harms from fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and ozone when assessing regulations, saying current models do not reliably support dollar estimates; critics say that choice could make it easier to relax pollution limits.

The Environmental Protection Agency announced a rule to stop monetizing the health harms of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and ozone in its benefit–cost analyses. The agency said past estimates overstated modeling precision and that lower pollutant concentrations since 2000 make incremental health benefits harder to quantify. An EPA spokesperson told Gizmodo the agency will still consider health impacts but will not assign dollar values at this time. The change reverses a long‑standing EPA practice of including monetized health benefits in regulatory decisions. Key points: - The EPA will not include dollar values for health harms from PM2.5 and ozone in its regulatory benefit–cost calculations. - The agency cites limits in current modeling and smaller incremental impacts as the reason for pausing monetization. - Some legal and policy experts say removing monetized benefits could make it easier to loosen pollution limits tied to industrial sources. Summary: The rule removes assigned dollar values for avoided illnesses and premature deaths from EPA regulatory analyses, which may shift comparisons toward industry compliance costs. Agency officials say they will revisit monetization when modeling is more certain. Undetermined at this time.