Industrials Regulatory News and Trends - March 25, 2025

Welcome to Industrials Regulatory News and Trends. In this regular bulletin, DLA Piper lawyers provide concise updates on key developments in the industrials sector to help you navigate the ever-changing business, legal, and regulatory landscape.

Administration says it is considering rollback of industrial plant safety rules. The Trump Administration intends to roll back a set of EPA regulations that aims to reduce accidents at chemical and industrial facilities. A March 6 filing in the consolidated lawsuit Oklahoma v. EPA asks the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit to hold the consolidated case in abeyance “while the Agency undertakes a new rulemaking to reassess elements of the underlying rule challenged here.” The agency is reviewing “Accidental Release Prevention Requirements: Risk Management Programs Under the Clean Air Act; Safer Communities by Chemical Accident Prevention,” a rule finalized in May 2024 that significantly expanded the Clean Air Act Risk Management Program. Under the rule, businesses that handle certain chemicals are required to adopt stringent new safety measures, such as implementing safer technologies, and to create response plans protecting workers, first responders, and communities in case of natural disasters. The program also created a searchable public index that allows the public to look up data about the chemicals that local facilities may be storing as well as data about past accidents. At this writing, that index is still online.

Reinstatement of DOT workers. Department of Transportation (DOT) probationary employees who lost their jobs in the mass firings by the Trump Administration on February 14 have learned they are being reinstated. The fired workers received memos on March 17 informing them of the reinstatement, with pay and benefits, including back pay. The rehirings come following several sweeping court orders, issued by the US District Court for the District of Maryland and the US District Court for the District of Northern California (ND Cal), deeming the firings illegal and calling for workers to be reinstated. The memos informed DOT workers they would be placed on administrative leave “to effectuate an orderly return to DOT.” At many agencies, returning probationary workers who have been reinstated have found themselves on such leave, meaning they are being paid but are not being allowed to carry out any work. Late on March 17, ND Cal issued another order requiring that fired probationary workers be returned to their old jobs rather than being placed on administrative leave. A fresh wave of firings is reportedly expected in the coming days, in keeping with a February 26 Administration memorandum, “Guidance on Agency RIF and Reorganization Plans Requested by Implementing The President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Workforce Optimization Initiative.”

Helicopters banned around Reagan National Airport as FAA looks into safety issues involving near-collisions in the skies. In the wake of a deadly mid-air collision in January between a passenger jet and a US Army helicopter, the Federal Air Administration (FAA) on March 14 banned almost all helicopter flights around Ronald Reagan National Airport. Exceptions to the airport’s helicopter flight ban will be made for emergency helicopter flights and presidential transport. The ban came two days after the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) released a preliminary report on the accident that called helicopter flight patterns around that airport “an intolerable risk to aviation safety by increasing the chances of a midair collision.” The NTSB investigation found 85 instances at National Airport between October 2021 and December 2024 in which helicopters and planes experienced a “close call” – defined as a separation of less than 1,500 feet laterally and 200 feet vertically. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy each called on the FAA to implement changes that will improve safety around the airport.

Related, on March 6, the FAA held a “Call to Action” meeting with aviation industry leaders to discuss recent safety incidents. Following the meeting, the FAA announced several measures intended to make general and business aviation safer. This includes initiating a safety-risk analysis of close encounters between pilots flying visually and pilots flying under air traffic control, increasing communications with pilots through various outlets, and exploring additional tools for pilots to assess operational risk and their own performance. The agency said it will continue to work with industry officials to identify and address safety issues. The FAA also announced it will begin studying offshore helicopter operations along the Gulf Coast as well as at other major airports around the country where different types of aircraft share the same busy airspace. Among those are eight metropolitan areas: Baltimore-Washington, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, and New York.

Two Executive Orders impact national forests, US wood products industry. President Trump has issued a pair of Executive Orders (EOs) that classify the wood products industry as essential to US national security and aim to increase logging targets across 280 million acres of national forests and other public lands. The first EO, Addressing The Threat To National Security from Imports of Timber, Lumber, begins by calling the wood products industry “a critical manufacturing industry essential to the national security, economic strength, and industrial resilience of the United States.” It then goes on to state that “the United States faces significant vulnerabilities in the wood supply chain from imported timber, lumber, and their derivative products being dumped onto the United States market,” then orders the Secretary of Commerce to report to the President on “recommendations on actions to mitigate such threats, including potential tariffs, export controls, or incentives to increase domestic production.” The second EO, Immediate Expansion of American Timber Production, directs the US Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to increase logging targets across 280 million acres of national forests and other public lands. The EO also specifically points to the Endangered Species Act (ESA), directing the Department of the Interior’s Endangered Species Committee to identify “obstacles to domestic timber production infrastructure specifically deriving from implementation of the ESA” and to recommend “procedural, regulatory, and interagency improvements” that would accelerate “the speed of approving forestry projects.” The EOs come as the Administration is planning 25 percent tariffs on Canadian lumber, a move expected to affect the US paper, pulp, furniture, and construction industries.

Uflex announces FDA approval for novel recycling process. On March 12, India-based packaging manufacturer UFlex, Ltd. announced it has received FDA approval for its recycling process. The process, categorized as “super-clean recycling,” removes more than 95 percent of the ink from post-consumer recycled materials, resulting in recycled polyethylene that is safe for food contact packaging. The company states that this is the first-ever approval from the FDA for an Indian company in food-contact recycling.

Reports from DLA Piper.

• Extended producer uncertainty: Groundbreaking California packaging law faces setbacks. Two significant developments have recently emerged concerning California’s Extended Producer Responsibility law, SB 54, which aims to phase out single-use plastics. The March 7, 2025 deadline for finalizing its regulations has passed without action from the governor’s office. Meanwhile, an anonymous ethics complaint has been filed against Rachel Wagoner, the former director of CalRecycle and current Executive Director of the CAA for California. Our concise alert tells you more.


• White House Council on Environmental Quality issues memorandum on NEPA implementation: Top points. The Trump Administration has begun operationalizing its regulatory strategy for projects requiring evaluation under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). In this alert, we discuss two key Administration moves and discuss some key takeaways for companies.


• Supreme Court limits EPA's permitting authority under the Clean Water Act. Reversing a lower court ruling, the Supreme Court recently found that the Clean Water Act does not authorize the EPA to impose “generic” or “end-result” prohibitions in National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits for receiving waters. The decision in San Francisco v. US Environmental Protection Agency marks a significant shift in the regulatory landscape by rendering existing NPDES permit end-result provisions potentially unenforceable. Find out more.