The Environmental Protection Agency’s 2009 “Endangerment Finding” established this, stating that “greenhouse gases threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations.” This finding grounded our government’s mobilization, across multiple administrations of both parties, to regulate greenhouse gas pollution (which we call shmirat ha’adamah or protecting Creation) and to save lives (our moral imperative known as pikuach nefesh).
The Environmental Protection Agency, whose stated mission “is to protect human health and the environment,” proposed repealing this finding this past summer. During that time, teens from our own Adamah Jewish Youth Climate Movement shared testimony to convey their concern:
“As a community, our sacred texts, traditions, and history compel us to care for people and the planet in a manner diametrically opposed to actions such as repealing this landmark environmental precedent.”
On Thursday, February 12, 2026, the 2009 Endangerment Finding was repealed.
Right away, Adamah’s Jewish Youth Climate Movement staff started hearing from the devoted teens who mobilize around this work. The teens expressed anger, devastation, and yet also hope. They always knew not to put all their eggs in the sole basket of federal regulation. This backsliding only strengthens their resolve to organize, speak out, and pull every climate action lever they can possibly reach. And they implore us all to do the same.
And we do still have levers to pull:
• In our daily choices as consumers and energy users.
• Leveraging the business and financial arenas to build the world we want to see, like the work being done by Adamah’s Jewish Green Business Network
• In our tzedakah, or charitable giving
• In our religious life, via our new initiative to declare a #FastForClimate on Ta’anit Esther or creating a sustainable Mishloach Manot package
• And as Adamah boldly sets out to decarbonize American Jewish life, a good place to start is making sure that your synagogue, JCC, Hillel, Federation, or other group is among the growing hundreds of Jewish organizations building a community of practice – and building power – in Adamah’s Jewish Climate Leadership Coalition.
Levers, in every aspect of our lives.
Together let’s make our voices heard and “do the right (yashar) and the good (tov),” as it says in the Torah, Deuteronomy 6:18.
Want to learn more?
Contact Rabbi Fred Scherlinder Dobb
Director of Climate Partnerships and Advocacy