A Supreme Court greenhouse gases petition worth watching
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey is leading 19 states seeking Supreme Court review of the scope of EPA's authority over greenhouse gases.
Driving the news: The petition asks the high court to review January's appellate ruling that struck down a Trump-era rule on power plant CO2 emissions.
The big picture: The Trump rule adopted a narrow view of EPA's Clean Air Act authority that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected.
- So if the high court accepts the case, it would set up an extremely high stakes legal battle before the court's 6-3 conservative majority.
- "If EPA lacks such expansive authority, as we argue, the Supreme Court should make that clear now," Morrissey said in a statement alongside the petition from conservative-leaning states.
Why it matters: "The case, if granted, would be the biggest climate question to reach the Supreme Court in more than a decade," Bloomberg Law notes.
The intrigue: The Supreme Court takes just a tiny fraction of petitions. E&E News (subscription) reports that while this effort may face long odds, it’s a preview of challenges coming against Biden administration regulatory efforts around power plants.
Catch up fast: The high court's 2007 ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA gave EPA the power to regulate heat-trapping emissions.
- It's unlikely the current court would overturn this recent precedent.
- But legal observers say it could support significant constraints on federal regulators' running room under current law.
- The new petition comes as the Biden administration plans wide-ranging climate initiatives.
Go deeper: The Supreme Court's coming rightward shift on climate
