Before the ink was dry on the
final rule of the Clean Power Plan posted in Friday's Federal Register, the
expected deluge of litigation got underway. By Monday, 25 states and some 20 businesses and industry groups had already filed lawsuits against the plan, developed by the Environmental Protection Agency under its authority to regulate pollution under the Clean Air Act. Previous lawsuits, dating back to 2014 when the proposed rule was made public, had been dismissed on the grounds they were premature since the final rule had not yet been approved.
Among the backers of the Clean Power Plan is the League of Conservation Voters, which issued the following statement Tuesday:
“This is just another dirty attack on the Clean Power Plan by big polluters and their allies in Congress, and we are confident it will ultimately fail. While they are resorting to radical legislative tactics, a broad and diverse set of stakeholders—including utilities, public health experts, clean energy advocates and others—have embraced these national carbon pollution limits on power plants. This is nothing more than a desperate attempt to undermine the momentum leading into the Paris climate negotiations. Over 150 countries, including all major emitters, have already put forward climate commitments covering 90% of global emissions. These historic safeguards demonstrate the United States’ leadership in the global movement to act on climate change.”
Formal publication of the CPP rule opens a 60-day period during which it is subject to evaluation under the Congressional Review Act. It's not hard to imagine what that review will look like in a Congress like the current one.
On Monday, U.S. Rep. Ed Whitfield—the Kentucky Republican who chairs the Energy and Power Subcommittee and is another in the House's long queue of climate-change charlatans—introduced two Congressional Review Act resolutions to block implementation of the CPP:
“An EPA takeover of the electricity sector is a recipe for higher bills, reduced reliability, and job losses,” Whitfield said. “These resolutions stand up for ratepayers, jobs, and affordable energy in Kentucky and throughout the country.”
Announced in early August, the final CPP rule mandates that by 2030, existing power plants cut their carbon emissions by 32 percent compared with 2005. It also regulates emissions of new power plants. Each state is mandated to come up with its own plan for reducing emissions. A handful have said they will not do so. The EPA developed the plan to give states flexibility, but it has warned from the beginning that any state which does not produce its own plan will have one imposed by Washington.
There is more below.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey is heading up the state effort. He called CPP “the single most onerous and illegal regulations that we’ve seen coming out of DC in a long time” and said what the EPA is doing isn't legal. Twenty-three other attorneys general have joined the lawsuit: Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Wisconsin, Wyoming, Arizona, and North Carolina. North Dakota, where 80 percent of electric power comes from coal, is suing on its own.
Fifteen attorneys general have stated they will intervene on the side of the EPA. Numerous environmental groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club, also have vowed to intervene.
In addition to the state lawsuits, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is also suing, claiming the CPP will harm business and is a “massive executive power grab.” Joining the chamber is a roster of the usual suspects: The National Association of Manufacturers, American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers, National Federation of Independent Business, American Chemistry Council, American Coke and Coal Chemicals Institute, American Foundry Society, American Forest and Paper Association, American Iron and Steel Institute, American Wood Council, Brick Industry Association, Electricity Consumers Resource Council, Lignite Energy Council, National Lime Association, National Oilseed Processors Association, and Portland Cement Association.
Samantha Page reports:
The arguments will likely come down to debates over whether the EPA has overstepped its jurisdiction by allowing flexible state plans to include “outside the fence” measures such as efficiency and renewable energy, and whether another section of the Clean Air Act, which governs mercury emissions from power plants, renders the EPA unable to also regulate carbon.
Even some of the states that are suing are in the midst of coming up with plans to meet the EPA's mandate. They would all do well to look at
Pennsylvania's proposal. It would cut business power bills by $241 million in 2020 alone and attract an additional $17 billion in outside investments in renewable energy to the state.
The Clean Power Plan is a modest effort, and additional measures will be required. But if CPP's obstinately myopic foes are successful now in blocking its implementation, "draconian" will not be strong enough to describe what will have to be done. Action on climate change is essential. While the charlatans can pull out all the stops trying to block such action, even they know they cannot block climate change itself, nor all the harms it will cause, by singing la-la-la to their constituents and tossing snowballs on the Senate floor. Sadly, that fact has yet to change their behavior.