In the News

Two of the most important health standards ever adopted by the Environmental Protection Agency to reduce harmful air pollution from power plants had their day in court last week. Actually two courts: the Supreme Court heard arguments on EPA’s Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) while the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, a three-judge panel heard challenges from industry, conservative states and some environmental groups to EPA’s Mercury and Air Toxic Standards (MATS) for coal- and oil-burning power plants. Professor Richard Revesz, director of the Institute for Policy Integrity at the New York University School of Law, “thought that the argument went very well for the government, for EPA” during the CSAPR hearing in the Supreme Court. Getting to the heart of the matter, he observed that “the government was able to engage the justices on its core point, which is that costs can be taken into account in setting the pollution control burden between upwind and downwind states, and that’s the core of the case.”

In what topsy-turvy world would we find large energy companies like the Ohio Valley Coal Corporation suing in the Supreme Court to ask for more stringent, complicated, and expensive environmental regulations? Our world, it turns out. Yesterday, several large energy companies argued against EPA’s use of a flexible, market-based approach to cutting air pollution that crosses state lines. Their argument prevailed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, where it derailed an EPA regulation that provides enormous benefits (estimated at $120 and $280 billion per year at the time the rule was proposed, including tens of thousands of lives saved and over a million missed days of work or school avoided per year) with a cost of under $1 billion per year.

After the Supreme Court’s December 10th arguments on the EPA’s cross-state air pollution rule, what precedent could the court set with its decision? During this segment of OnPoint, Richard Revesz, director of the Institute for Policy Integrity at the New York University School of Law, gives his impressions of the arguments and justices’ reactions. He also talks about the impact the court’s decision could have on the Obama administration’s climate and energy agenda.

by Richard Revesz and Michael Livermore
This morning, the Supreme Court handed a significant victory to the President and to EPA. The justices let stand the foundational element of the EPA’s greenhouse gas regulations — the scientific finding that these gases “endanger” public health — as well as the agency’s ambitious controls on trucks and automobiles.

Jason Schwartz and Michael Livermore at Policy Integrity are first-rate Clean Air Act scholars and I’m honored to have the chance to debate with them. We agree on the most important points – above all that the EPA has ample authority under the existing statute to craft real, flexible, and effective carbon regulation. We do disagree some over the best way to get there. For some, this seems like legal arcana, but it matters. EPA’s choice of regulatory tool will do more than any other decision to shape the environmental ambition, cost-effectiveness, and legal vulnerability of its carbon regulation.

Last week, the Institute for Policy Integrity staked out its position in a formal petition submitted to the agency, which argues that EPA should move to increase the coverage and efficiency of its regulatory response by building a more comprehensive, market-based approach. Policy Integrity’s petition argues that certain largely ignored but potentially powerful provisions of the Clean Air Act—in particular, Section 115—are ideally suited for greenhouse gas regulation. Section 115 was designed specifically to address U.S. emissions that harm the health or welfare of foreign countries—i.e., international air pollution.

An environmental group affiliated with New York University’s law school is petitioning the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to wield a seldom-used section of the Clean Air Act to require greenhouse gas emissions curbs.

The petition urges EPA to act under Section 115 of the air law, which enables EPA to demand action to curb pollution that’s endangering public health or welfare in foreign countries.

Seizing on signals the White House could move unilaterally to combat climate change, a New York think tank petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday to pursue far-reaching antipollution measures, arguing that such action is required under the Clean Air Act.

The Institute for Policy Integrity and the New York University School of Law sought in a brief filed yesterday to rebut industry claims that EPA’s economic analysis of the rule’s costs and benefits was flawed.

“While EPA did not rely on cost-benefit analysis to justify the [rule], the Agency acted consistently with federal law and best economic practices by assessing all significant economic impacts — both direct and indirect, quantifiable and unquantifiable — in its regulatory impact analysis,” the group wrote in the brief to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

On Tuesday, a three-judge panel threw out an EPA rule that would have dramatically decreased interstate air pollution. The EPA’s rule had enormous benefits, estimated between $120 and $280 billion per year, with low costs that total less than $2.5 billion. The rule was anticipated to save tens of thousands of lives and prevent over a million missed days of work or school per year.