Delay of clean power plan stokes worries about Paris treaty

The Supreme Court can put a pause on the Clean Power Plan, but they can’t pause on climate change and they certainly can’t pause climate action.

The EPA rules could have led to the closure of as many as 14 coal-fired power plants in Texas.

But Glen Hooks of the Sierra Club of Arkansas, a leading environmental advocate and supporter of the Clean Power Plan, said in a statement after the Supreme Court issued its order that the benefits of a shift to renewable forms of energy would ultimately be helpful to the state. The first stakeholder meetings on the proposed plan from the Environmental Protection Agency were first held in the summer of 2014. Since Obama took office in 2008, “Republicans have shut Democrats out of the governor’s mansion, both U.S. Senate seats, and five of the state’s six House seats”.

The rule requires North Dakota power plants to cut carbon emissions almost in half by 2030. “But states that rely heavily on coal to produce electricity, including Kentucky and West Virginia, had argued that the plan was unconstitutional”. Requests for the Supreme Court to impose the stay were submitted in January after an appeals court ruled that the plan could proceed while legal challenges were being heard.

Attorney General Reyes said in the press release that he recognizes the Supreme Court stay won’t guarantee an eventual ruling against the EPA but applauds the decision. It says 24 percent of the power it supplies now comes from renewable, emissions-free sources, and two more solar and two more wind projects will be operational by 2017.

But a more dispassionate assessment is that the indefinite delay constitutes a potentially serious blow to Obama’s environmental agenda, and beyond.

The ruling signals the justices were won over by strong arguments against the rules.

Politicians and climate activists in Europe, meanwhile, also spoke out in support of the president, and accused “vested interests” of uniting against the Clean Power Plan. “The entire edifice built at Paris could collapse, much as the Kyoto Protocol was seriously undermined by President George W. Bush’s withdrawal of the USA from that agreement”.

“The Supreme Court decision does not change the path we are on”, said spokeswoman Jennifer Young.

The U.S. has set a standard for EPA regulations, and this could impact the way the rest of the world responds, Tong said.

“Our partners are well aware of the legal tests and hurdles that our policies now have to go through, and they’ve seen it before”, Patron said, describing climate diplomats as having a “sophisticated” level of knowledge about the US political system.

While the Clean Power Plan was expected to be the main tool for the United States to fulfil its part of the pact, White House spokesman Eric Schultz told reporters in a briefing that it was only one part of the nation’s response to climate change.

Under the Plan, states would have had to comply by 2022, but would have presented a plan on how to comply with the EPA by September.

Other states – and utility companies – were pushing ahead to clean up their fleets of power plants, clean energy industry groups said.

“This rule represents a radical transformation of American energy policy and will have a sweeping impact on the American way of life”, Morrisey said. But 27 states sued the EPA, saying the Clean Air Act did not give the agency the authority to implement the rules.