Just 6.6 percent of EPA employees are 'essential'

Are fewer than one of every 10 Environmental Protection Agency employees essential to its work?

Only federal employees classified as “essential” can work during a government shutdown. At EPA, that means just 6.6 percent of its workforce, according to Reuters.

Of the agency’s 16,205 employees, a mere 1,069 will work through the shutdown. That means that taxpayers employ 15,181 people at the EPA who are “non-essential.”

Because of the shutdown, the EPA will not be able to work on the rules requested by President Obama in his climate plan, but Dina Kruger, a consultant and former climate change director at the EPA, said the agency would be able to complete the rules on time. It might just have to “work a little harder” once the shutdown ends.

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