Juliet Eilperin

Bernhardt had been leading private after-hours tours of the monument for associates. Several park employees who were present during those tours are now quarantined, creating a staffing shortage.

With Democrats poised to take control of both houses of Congress, Biden’s opportunities to tackle climate change and other major environmental problems have greatly expanded. But given the closely divided Senate, the question is by how much.

Wheeler wants his successor to “build off” his work. Biden is pledging to reverse many of his most significant policies.

The Trump administration went on a final spree of environmental rollbacks with just days left in office, scaling back standards for equipment Americans use to heat their homes, habitat for the northern spotted owl, and protections for conservation lands in California and Utah.

President-elect Joe Biden plans to sign a slew of executive orders Wednesday afternoon aimed at unwinding President Trump’s environmental legacy, from restoring boundaries to national monuments to rejoining the Paris climate accord to reviving the government’s role in protecting the air, water and endangered species.

President Biden is unwinding Donald Trump’s environmental legacy while forging his own. The Washington Post is chronicling every step.

Empowered by new legislation and the White House, the United States is setting up a program to curb climate-warming refrigerants. But a new undercover survey suggests that leaks of these refrigerants are more common than regulators have assumed.

The struggle over a top Interior Department leadership post is just one example how the agency has become the first major battlefield in the brewing fight over President Biden’s climate change.

The Environmental Protection Agency proposed on Monday a rule that would sharply cut the use and production of hydrofluorocarbons, powerful greenhouse gases used widely in refrigeration and air conditioning. The proposal, a phase down of 85 percent over the next 15 years, marks the first time the Biden administration has used the power of the federal government to mandate a cut in climate pollution.

The Interior Department moved to cancel several oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge on Tuesday, arguing the Trump administration rushed to auction off drilling rights just days before President Biden took office.