In addition, the court reduced the agency’s powers as a whole, citing the so-called “fundamental issues” doctrine, a decision that would affect the federal government’s power to regulate other areas of climate policy, as well as Internet and worker safety regulations.
The score was 6-3. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the Conservative majority, with the three Liberal judges opposing it. Roberts said “our precedent is skeptical of the EPA’s claim” that the law “allows it to design carbon ceilings based on a generational change approach.”
“According to our precedents, this is a big issue,” Roberts wrote, adding that “there is little reason to believe that Congress has assigned such decisions to the Agency.”
Roberts wrote that limiting carbon dioxide emissions to a level that would require a nationwide transition from coal use could be a “reasonable” solution.
“But it is unlikely that Congress would give the EPA the power to adopt such a regulatory scheme on its own,” according to the law in question.
“A decision of this magnitude and consequences depends on Congress itself or on an agency acting in accordance with a clear delegation from that representative body,” he wrote.
This story has been broken and will be updated.
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