The United States Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a plan by President Joe Biden’s Administration to reduce air pollution and haze across state lines, in the latest high court decision that undermines the federal government’s power to protect environment.
The decision is a victory for Republican-led states and industry groups that had challenged the federal Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) so-called “good neighbor” plan. The initiative imposed strict limits on emissions from power plants and industrial sources in windward states—the part where the wind comes from, relative to a given point or location—to reduce pollution from their leeward neighbors.
Although the decision does not technically put an end to the initiative, it does leave the application of Biden’s program on hold and leads it into a complicated legal battle that will almost certainly continue after the November elections. A victory for Republican Donald Trump, with his promise, among many others, to boost fossil fuels, could definitively derail the measure.
The Supreme Court’s decision was very close and was adopted by five votes in favor and four against, those of the three liberal judges, who were joined by the conservative Amy Coney Barrett, appointed by Trump and who on moral issues always aligns with the mayority. “Our emergency agenda requires us to quickly evaluate the merits of the requests without the benefit of a full report and reasoned opinions from the lower courts,” Barrett wrote in justifying her dissent. “Given those limitations, we must proceed with greater caution in cases like this, with voluminous, technical files and thorny legal issues.”
The Biden Administration and leeward states – the opposite side of where the wind comes from with respect to a given point or place – such as New York, Connecticut and Delaware, had warned of “dangerous ozone peaks” that would affect the health of residents, especially children and the elderly, if the court ruled in favor of Ohio, Indiana and West Virginia, the States that presented an urgent appeal.
The “good neighbor” plan initially applied to 23 states. Under the proposal, factories and power plants in western and midwestern states were to reduce ozone pollution that spreads to eastern states. These emissions cause smog and are linked to asthma, lung disease and premature death, among other public health consequences.
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It was an ambitious effort to fill a void left by 23 states. The so-called Clean Air Act allows states to develop their own plans, with EPA approval. But the federal agency concluded in February 2023 that 23 states had not developed adequate plans to reduce pollution. The EPA then published its own plan, followed by a flurry of litigation, and seven federal appeals courts blocked the EPA’s rejection of plans submitted by a dozen states, leaving 11 bound by the federal rule.
Along with Ohio, Indiana and West Virginia, energy companies and trade and lobby groups challenged the federal plan before the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. When a tie occurred in that instance, the States and energy companies asked the Supreme Court to intervene. The EPA then warned that state plans should not affect the national standard and that blocking them would have serious consequences.
The decision marks the Supreme Court’s latest major setback to environmental regulators, as well as President Joe Biden’s climate and environmental agenda. In 2022, the Court’s conservative majority limited the EPA’s ability to regulate carbon emissions from power plants. Last year, it limited its authority to regulate wetlands. The ruling published this Thursday comes in a decisive election year, in which many young voters, in particular, expect the White House to act against climate change. One of the pillars of the so-called Project 2025, Trump’s ideology for reelection, is to limit or completely reduce the power of regulatory agencies and, by extension, jibarize the size of the federal Administration, which Republican-dominated States consider an interference in their powers and powers. If Trump, whose advisors include well-known oil industry businessmen, is re-elected in November, few doubt that the EPA will be one of the first victims.
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