The Supreme Court ruled Thursday to limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to strictly regulate emissions from power plants, a move that signals a major setback in the fight against the climate crisis.
In a 6-3 opinion along ideological lines, the nation’s highest court ruled in West Virginia v. EPA that the federal agency lacks the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from industry. The case stems from former President Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which would have imposed mandates on how many emissions power plants could emit. The plan was never formally implemented as it faced legal challenges and was canceled under the Trump administration.
The court’s opinion states that when it comes to limiting carbon dioxide emissions, “it is implausible that Congress would have given EPA the authority to adopt such a regulatory scheme on its own.” He also said that “a decision of this magnitude and consequence” should be taken by Congress.
In a statement, President Biden called it a “devastating decision” that “risks harming our nation’s ability to keep our air clean and fight climate change.”
He added: “I will not back down from using my legal powers to protect public health and address the climate crisis.”
Some Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, applauded the decision, but climate action advocates quickly condemned it.
Climate and health behavioral scientist Swetha Chakraborty, president of the climate solutions group We Don’t Have Time, told CBS News that the court has “struck one of the EPA’s most important tools.”
“We’re talking about increased air pollution that has impacts on human health, the environment and overall our future trajectory towards a warming planet that we desperately need to move away from,” she said, later adding: “Fossil fuel interests behind it, this case, claiming victory today, takes us back 50 years, when Big Oil and other corporations could pump deadly pollution into our air and water without any restrictions.”
And it’s not just carbon emissions. The Supreme Court decision also sets a “dangerous precedent” that other EPA regulations could be overturned, she said.
“It really goes against all the evidence and science that we know calls for more regulation,” Chakraborty said. “Having this type of decision actually means that we can actually unapologetically support the pollution of our communities across the United States.” And that’s an extremely dangerous road to be on.”
A ‘true failure’ to tackle climate change
Power plants and smokestacks are “one of the biggest sources” of national and global climate pollution, according to Environmental Defense Fund chief counsel Vicki Patton. That is the purpose of the provisions at issue in this case.
“Today’s Supreme Court decision undermines the EPA’s authority to protect people from climate pollution from smokestacks at a time when all the evidence shows we need to act with great urgency,” she said Thursday. “This is a judicial offence.
While the case was still under review by the Supreme Court, Patton told CBS News, the EPA was “absolutely clear” that all regulations would come from a clean slate and involve all stakeholders in developing pollution standards. “A number” of energy companies have also expressed support for the EPA’s authority, as have the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, among others, she said.
The industrial sector, according to the EPA, accounts for 24 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions—most of which come from burning fossil fuels. Greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide, trap heat in the atmosphere, raising global temperatures.
The United Nations and scientists around the world have warned for years that failure to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions will lead to “extreme” and “unprecedented” impacts around the world, including more catastrophic storm damage, devastating droughts and health threats and global economy.
“Decisions like today’s … make it harder to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement for a healthy, livable planet,” Stéphane Dujarric, a spokesman for the UN secretary general, said in a statement, CBS News correspondent Pamela Falk reports. “But we must also remember that an emergency as global as climate change requires a global response and the actions of a single nation should not and cannot affect or derail whether we achieve our climate goals.” ”
Danger to human health
The UN has warned that the world must stay below 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming compared to pre-industrial levels to minimize the worst impacts of climate change. This is critical, Chakraborty said, because “human health and global warming are inextricably linked.”
“If we actually discuss this in terms of the impact on human health, the more we increase the temperature of the planet, the more we increase air pollution, which has negative health effects,” she said, adding, “those most likely to to experience it first and foremost, our vulnerable communities.”
A 2021 study found that air pollution from fossil fuels is responsible for causing nearly 1 in 5 deaths worldwide each year. This year, the World Health Organization found that 99% of the world breathes poor quality air, mostly due to emissions from fossil fuels.
In the US, the impacts of climate change have historically affected low-income communities and people of color the most. These areas are often home to industrial facilities that pollute the air and cause health problems for the people who live nearby.
Along with poorer air quality, people in these areas are also more likely to bear the brunt of higher global temperatures, Chakraborty said. And increasing fossil fuel emissions in the absence of federal regulation will only exacerbate these conditions.
“Those red-lined areas are experiencing, on average, several degrees to five or six degrees warmer than their more affluent communities. And it is dangerous to human health,” she said. “…These communities will continue to suffer. We see a continuing legacy of environmental racism with the Supreme Court’s decision.”
For Michele Roberts, co-coordinator of the Environmental Justice and Health Alliance for Chemical Policy Reform, it’s an issue that hits home. CBS News spoke with her while she was with her family in Wilmington, Delaware, where people of color have long felt the effects of climate resilience.
Residential segregation and redlining resulted in predominantly black and brown communities suffering from flooding and other weather and health related problems. Without adequate steps to reduce rising temperatures, these problems will only worsen.
“For me, as a black woman, after Freddie Gray and ‘I Can’t Breathe’ and Black Lives Matter and all that stuff, I hope this is the push that the whole country needs,” she said of the Supreme Court decision. . “My father died a week ago knowing these things were happening. My father was 87 years old and said, “Now it’s up to you.” But he said, “the good news is that if you all have the sense to work together, you can do it.”
“Self-regulation does not exist”
Without federal oversight, many experts don’t have much faith that industries will reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Chakraborty said the efforts being made to do so were “too few and far between”.
“Self-regulation does not exist in the fossil fuel industry,” she said. “…I think it’s very clear that the primary motivation for oil and gas executives is to continue to line their pockets to continue to get shareholder support so that conservatives in Congress can introduce legislation that continues to allow oil and gas drilling.”
The only way to ensure emissions are reduced is to impose tough regulations, Chakraborty said, noting that overhauled policies, including clean energy tax credits and ending oil and gas subsidies, are essential to addressing the crisis .
“With this decision handed down by the Supreme Court, we are actually going back to supporting dirty energy. … We allow a free-for-all,” she said. “And it couldn’t be a worse time. We are in a climate emergency.”
Patton said the answer requires “everyone to be ready,” especially when it comes to the Biden administration’s plans and the president’s pledge to cut climate pollution in half by 2030.
“This is the commitment we all have an interest in working towards to save lives and build a stronger clean energy economy for all,” she said.
Roberts said he hopes the setback from the court will be “further impetus” for change.
“We came together because of climate failures and inconsistencies and climate policies that really don’t affect everyone,” she said. “…After decisions like these have been made, now is the time to organize, educate, mobilize and take action. And that’s what we’re willing to do.”
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Lee Cohen is a social media producer and current affairs reporter for CBS News focusing on social justice issues.
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