Appeals court: Clean Power Plan can proceed pending review

“It will chart the basic course for Montana to develop an energy plan for the state”, Baker said.

Preparing a state plan along these lines wouldn’t mean giving up on stopping the CPP, either through the courts or through the political process. “We remain hopeful that the court’s ultimate decision will be in favor of the best interests of the nation”.

In a two-page letter to Environmental Protect Agency Administration (EPA) Gina McCarthy, Keogh and Thomas cite Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s dual strategy of seeking compliance options to the wide-ranging federal mandate while pursuing legal challenges through the office of Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge.

Spangler said the DEQ has already begun work on the state’s clean power implementation plan in order to have a first draft ready for a September 2016 deadline. This December, the United States signed the Paris Agreement alongside almost 200 other countries, a move that reaffirmed the country’s commitment to managing emissions. The EPA is engaging in federal overreach of the worst kind.

In all, more than a hundred parties have filed almost 40 petitions challenging the plan, which have been consolidated into a single case, State of West Virginia, et al., v. EPA. Arkansas and other states can also choose to submit an initial plan with a two-year extension request, regardless of whether Arkansas chooses to go it alone or join a multi-state plan.

The court order sets an expedited briefing schedule for the case that will culminate in oral arguments on June 2.

USA coal exports in the third quarter of 2015 dropped 25.6 percent to 16.9 million short tons, compared to the same period in 2014, due to slowing global demand and financial troubles in the US coal sector. The issue is expected to make it to the Supreme Court by 2017.

In a statement Thursday, Morrisey said that he would consider asking the U.S. Supreme Court to step in and halt the rule. The U.S. District Court in Washington dismissed the lawsuit, saying it was unprecedented for a court to review a rule that wasn’t yet finalized.

The court said the challengers “have not satisfied the stringent requirements” for a stay of a regulation pending the court’s review.

One of the larger issues has been whether the EPA will issue a mass-based and rate-based method for compliance wherever the agency must issue a federal plan for states that did not submit an adequate plan of their own.

The Clean Power Plan, Obama’s most ambitious effort to combat climate change, requires states to slash carbon emissions from power plants however they see fit – accelerating a shift from coal that started years ago.

“We are pleased that the court has rejected petitioners’ attempts to block the Clean Power Plan from moving forward while litigation proceeds”, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said in a statement. “It’s really frustrating. We need our leaders to step up”.