Supreme Court limits Biden's power to cut emissions
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has lost some of its power to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The landmark ruling by the US Supreme Court represents a major setback to President Joe Biden's climate plans.
He called it a "devastating decision" but said it would not undermine his effort to tackle the climate crisis.
The case against the EPA was brought by West Virginia on behalf of 18 other mostly Republican-led states and some of the nation's largest coal companies.
They argued that the agency did not have the authority to limit emissions across whole states.
These 19 states were worried their power sectors would be forced to move away from using coal, at a severe economic cost.
In a 6-3 ruling, the court sided with the conservative states and fossil-fuel companies, agreeing that the EPA did not have the authority to impose such sweeping measures.
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Attorney General Eric Schmitt for Missouri - one of the 19 states - called it a "big victory... that pushes back on the Biden EPA's job-killing regulations".
The court hasn't completely prevented the EPA from making these regulations in the future - but says that Congress would have to clearly say it authorises this power. And Congress has previously rejected the EPA's proposed carbon limiting programmes.
Environmental groups will be deeply concerned by the outcome as historically the 19 states that brought the case have made little progress on reducing their emissions - which is necessary to limit climate change.
The states made up 44% of the US emissions in 2018, and since 2000 have only achieved a 7% reduction in their emissions on average.
"Today's Supreme Court ruling undermines EPA's authority to protect people from climate pollution at a time when all evidence shows we must take action with great urgency," said Vickie Patton, general counsel for Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
It means President Biden is now relying on a change of policy from these states or a change from Congress - otherwise the US is unlikely to achieve its climate targets.
This is a significant loss for the president who entered office on a pledge to ramp up US efforts on the environment and climate.
On his first day in office he re-entered the country into the Paris Agreement, the first legally-binding universal agreement on climate change targets.
And he committed the country to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 52% by 2030 against 2005 levels.
"While this decision risks damaging our nation's ability to keep our air clean and combat climate change, I will not relent in using my lawful authorities to protect public health and tackle the climate crisis," he said.
The outcome of this case will be noted by governments around the world, as it will affect global efforts to tackle climate change. The US accounts for nearly 14% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. Read original full article
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Atlantis Viewpoint
It is crazy to see individual states and companies bringing legal cases to stop regulations against fossil fuel use and even worse winning these cases. There is absolutely no question of the damage to human health and to our planet that is being caused by using these fuels.
Yet we see state governors in the United States pushing the idea that changing the way we produce energy will lose jobs!? Surprisingly creating and delivering energy takes a lot of work, there will always be thousands of people required in all different areas to build, sustain and deliver our energy needs. We cannot fearmonger saying change will lose jobs or money. If something is damaging to us, we have to change how it is done, as we have done hundreds of times with other processes, treatments and systems, over the last decades and centuries.
Our future is with clean fuels, clean energy and clean air. We need to make this happen right now.
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