Supreme Court decision increases scrutiny over whether United States will meet COP21 targets

A setback to the Obama administration’s and the EPA’s Clean Power Plan came down from the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday.

But the US Supreme Court’s stay of the rules while it’s challenged by 29 states, including Nebraska, means local energy providers won’t be working with the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality on that state proposal, which was due in September of this year. This is the beginning of our effort to really see more relief for the state of West Virginia.

After passing the House last month, the bill was approved by the Senate this week on a 96-0 vote.

Varner says Tomblin is pleased with the stay. Pennsylvania should continue its planning and progress.

But environmentalists and academic experts are more nervous.

According to its 10-Q filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for 3Q2015, the most recent available, Houston-based Calpine Corp. and its partners own 83 power plants across 18 states in the United States and Canada, with a combined generating capacity of about 27,000 MW.

Heather Zichal served as deputy assistant for Energy and Climate Change for President Barack Obama.

The Clean Power Plan, which requires states to devise plans for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from power plants, has been challenged legally by more than 20 states and energy companies.

“There’s a symbolic value to the Clean Power Plan, and a symbolic problem when the Supreme Court stays it”, said Joanne Spalding, chief climate lawyer with the Sierra Club.

National Grid issued a statement today responding to the Supreme Court’s decision to stay the Clean Power Plan while litigation proceeds. Whichever side loses at the appeals level is nearly certain to petition for review by the high court, nearly certainly freezing any significant action on the plan’s goals until after Obama’s term expires in January 2017.

Obama said the Supreme Court had in fact required the EPA to regulate carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act if they were shown, as scientists had, to be harmful to public health. Climate change now joins immigration atop the list of top Obama priorities delayed indefinitely by the courts. The utility wanted to avoid the cost of retrofitting the aging facilities and is putting its money instead into alternatives such as electricity from natural gas and wind turbines.

Meyer also said that unlike 15 years ago, when President George W. Bush rejected the Kyoto climate accord negotiated under the Clinton administration, the global community would hold a future president accountable for America’s promises if she or he “went rogue” on the Paris accord, likely by blocking cooperation in trade, security, and other arenas. And this country will finish what our leaders have begun.

Observers widely assume the matter will ultimately be decided by the Supreme Court.

Schultz said the USA would continue to take aggressive steps to continue to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, citing other regulations it has put in place to reduce emissions from automobiles, airplanes and the oil and gas sector.

John Pippy, CEO of Pennsylvania’s main coal advocacy group, PA Coal Council, said he was doubly pleased on Wednesday. Environmentalists have been pushing utility companies to stop using coal, while low natural gas prices have led many utilities to switch to that cleaner burning and now cheaper fuel as a power source.

The fight for clean air and an appropriate response to C02-driven climate change is moving forward, whether the U.S. Supreme Court likes it or not.

Less than 48 hours after the Supreme Court’s ruling, at least a dozen governors, from California to Virginia, and from Colorado to Pennsylvania, announced that they will continue developing their plans to limit power plant carbon pollution.