Rule. In 2012, Manchin supported a GOP effort to "scuttle Environmental Protection Agency regulations that mandate cuts in mercury pollution and other toxic emissions from coal-fired power plants", while West Virginia's other senator, Jay Rockefeller, did not. In December 2014, Manchin was one of six Democratic senators to sign a letter to the EPA urging it to give states more time to comply with its rule on power plants because the final rule "must provide adequate time for the design, permitting and construction of such large scale capital intensive infrastructure", and calling for an elimination of the 2020 targets in the final rule, a mandate that states take action by 2020 as part of the EPA's goal to reach a 30% carbon cut by 2030. Manchin criticized Obama's environmental regulations as a "war on coal" and demanded what he called a proper balance between the needs of the environment and the coal business. The Los Angeles Times wrote that while professing environmental concerns, he has consistently stood up for coal, saying "no one is going to stop using fossil fuels for a long time." Manchin "does not deny the existence of man-made climate change", the Times wrote, but "is reluctant to curtail it." In February 2017, he was one of two Democratic senators to vote to confirm Scott Pruitt as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. In June 2017, Manchin supported Trump's withdrawal from the Paris climate accord, saying he supported "a cleaner energy future" but that the Paris deal failed to strike "a balance between our environment and the economy." In June 2017, Manchin introduced the Capitalizing American Storage Potential Act, legislation ensuring a regional storage hub would qualify for the Title XVII innovative technologies loan guarantee program of the Energy Department. He argued the Appalachian Storage Hub would grant West Virginia and its neighboring states the ability "to realize the unique opportunities associated with Appalachia's abundant natural gas liquids like ethane, naturally occurring geologic storage and expanding energy infrastructure" and that the regional storage hub would "attract manufacturing investment, create jobs and significantly reduce the rejection rate of natural gas liquids." The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved the bill in March 2018. In April 2018, Manchin and Capito introduced the Electricity Reliability and Fuel Security Act, a bill providing a temporary tax credit for existing coal-fired power plants that would help cover a part of both