Regan, who will be the first black man to run the EPA, tells Rolling Stone that rebuilding the agency is his number one priority. “We have world-renowned experts at EPA,” he says. “We should listen to them and we will.”
With the Biden administration pledging to use all executive power to tackle climate change, a revitalized EPA will be central to its ambitious goals to reduce emissions. “I will be working with laser focus to limit methane emissions,” Regan says of the powerful greenhouse gas released from natural gas operations.
He cites environmental justice and water quality as his other priorities, but guiding all of these ambitions is the belief that what’s good for the planet can be good for workers and business – a belief that Biden shares. “All of those priorities I just set out are good for people, the planet and profit,” says Regan.
His personal philosophy is to “try to meet people where they are, understand everyone’s challenges, be it an individual or a company, and then think, ‘How do you arrive at the solution in a way that could potentially work? ? ‘