WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Friday upheld the Biden administration’s rules aimed at curbing methane emissions from oil and gas facilities, a major contributor to climate change.
In separate proceedings, the court also rejected an attempt to block a scheme aimed at curbing emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from coal-fired power plants.
In both cases, the court denied the emergency motions without comment and with no dissenting opinions. The lawsuits against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will continue in lower courts.
A separate emergency request to block Biden regulations on carbon emissions from coal- and gas-fired power plants is still pending.
“The Supreme Court wisely rejected two industry attempts to eliminate critical safeguards,” said David Doniger, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. “The court should do the same with the effort to block EPA’s power plant carbon pollution standards.”
A spokesman for Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, who led the methane regulation challenge, expressed disappointment in the decision. “But we respect the court’s decision,” he added.
The court’s ruling in the methane case means that an EPA regulation finalized in March and intended to reduce methane emissions by as much as 80 percent over the next fourteen years will remain in effect.
Methane is a greenhouse gas that is 80 times more powerful than carbon dioxide and traps heat once it is emitted into the atmosphere, contributing to global warming.
The regulations have been challenged by Republican states led by Oklahoma and several oil and gas industry groups.
The challengers portray the regulation in stark terms, with industry groups calling it an “authoritarian national order by the EPA” in their lawsuits. They say the regulations go beyond what is allowed under the Clean Air Act, which gives states a role in implementing emissions reduction programs.
The states similarly argued in lawsuits that the government is using provisions of the Clean Air Act, which were never intended to address climate change, to “shut down power plants in favor of other energy sources.”
Attorney General Elizabeth Prelogar, representing the Biden administration, has dismissed those concerns, saying in her own filing that the agency has not trampled states in issuing its emissions guidelines.
“Like all EPA emissions guidelines under that provision, these guidelines allow states to decide which specific regulations to adopt,” she wrote. New presumptive standards issued by the EPA “simply give states a model they can rely on if they choose,” she added.
According to the EPA, mercury regulations have less drastic consequences.
In that case, the court rejected an emergency request filed by conservative states and industry groups seeking to block the EPA regulation issued this year.
Under the Clean Air Act provision in question, the EPA is required to restrict hazardous pollutants while taking costs into account.
The regulation tightens existing regulations on mercury and other metals, such as arsenic and chromium.
In announcing the rule, the EPA said in April that the previous 2012 regulation, introduced by the Obama administration, “has produced a sharp reduction in harmful air pollutants.” The new regulations would further limit emissions of mercury and other pollutants, providing health benefits of $300 million by reducing exposure to carcinogens, the report said.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
