You should read what you write before posting. Obviously, SCOTUS seems to care what Biden intended to do. And, again, the court did NOT tell him CO2 could not be classified as a pollutant. If you disagree, I suggest you try to find the text in the majority opinion which says that because I like to see you wasting your time.
Crick said:
This whole SCOTUS action was political theater as they were ruling against a plan that had never been enforced and which the current administration had already announced would not be enforced.
That it was political theater says unflattering things about the conservative majority of the court. That the court chose to act on a measure that wasn't going to be used is simply evidence supporting my contention that it was political theater. That, of course, makes no difference to you, but then, what would?
Crick said:
The majority opinion states that the EPA CAN impose limits on CO2, they just can't do so at "the grid level" but must do so facility by facility. Congress has already given the EPA permission to do what it was doing. It is only SCOTUS that thinks otherwise.
Subtle, thy name is not. From Justice Kagan's dissenting opinion:
The limits the majority now puts on EPA’s authority fly in the face of the statute Congress wrote. The majority says it is simply “not plausible” that Congress enabled EPA to regulate power plants’ emissions through generation shifting. Ante, at 31. But that is just what Congress did when it broadly authorized EPA in Section 111 to select the “best system of emission reduction” for power plants. §7411(a)(1). The “best system” full stop—no ifs, ands, or buts of any kind relevant here. The parties do not dispute that generation shifting is indeed the “best system”—the most effective and efficient way to reduce power plants’ carbon dioxide emissions. And no other provision in the Clean Air Act suggests that Congress meant to foreclose EPA from selecting that system; to the contrary, the Plan’s regulatory approach fits hand-in-glove with the rest of the statute. The majority’s decision rests on one claim alone: that generation shifting is just too new and too big a deal for Congress to have authorized it in Section 111’s general terms. But that is wrong. A key reason Congress makes broad delegations like Section 111 is so an agency can respond, appropriately and commensurately, to new and big problems. Congress knows what it doesn’t and can’t know when it drafts a statute; and Congress therefore gives an expert agency the power to address issues—even significant ones—as and when they arise. That is what Congress did in enacting Section 111. The majority today overrides that legislative choice. In so doing, it deprives EPA of the power needed—and the power granted—to curb the emission of greenhouse gases.
AND
Section 111(d) thus ensures that EPA regulates existing power plants’ emissions of all pollutants. When the pollutant at issue falls within the NAAQS or HAP programs, EPA need do no more. But when the pollutant falls outside those programs, Section 111(d) requires EPA to set an emissions level for currently operating power plants (and other stationary sources). That means no pollutant from such a source can go unregulated: As the Senate Report explained, Section 111(d) guarantees that “there should be no gaps in control activities pertaining to stationary source emissions that pose any significant danger to public health or welfare.” S. Rep. No. 91–1196, p. 20 (1970). Reflecting that language, the majority calls Section 111(d) a “gap-filler.” Ante, at 5. It might also be thought of as a backstop or catch-all provision, protecting against pollutants that the NAAQS and HAP programs let go by. But the section is not, as the majority further claims, an “ancillary provision” or a statutory “backwater.” Ante, at 20, 26. That characterization is a non-sequitur. That something is a backstop does not make it a backwater. Even if they are needed only infrequently, see ante, at 6, 20, backstops can perform a critical function—and this one surely does. Again, Section 111(d) tells EPA that when a pollutant—like carbon dioxide—is not regulated through other programs, EPA must undertake a further regulatory effort to control that substance’s emission from existing stationary sources. In that way, Section 111(d) operates to ensure that the Act achieves comprehensive pollution control.
Section 111 describes the prescribed regulatory effort in expansive terms. EPA must set for the relevant source (here, fossil-fuel-fired power plants) and the relevant pollutant (here, carbon dioxide) an emission level—more particularly, “the degree of emission limitation achievable through the application of the best system of emission reduction which (taking into account the cost of achieving such reduction and any nonair quality health and environmental impact and energy requirements) the [EPA] Administrator determines has been adequately demonstrated.” §7411(a)(1).
To take that language apart a bit, the provision instructs EPA to decide upon the “best system of emission reduction which . . . has been adequately demonstrated.” The provision tells EPA, in making that determination, to take account of both costs and varied “nonair” impacts (on health, the environment, and the supply of energy). And the provision finally directs EPA to set the particular emissions limit achievable through use of the demonstrated “best system.” Taken as a whole, the section provides regulatory flexibility and discretion. It imposes, to be sure, meaningful constraints: Take into account costs and nonair impacts, and make sure the best system has a proven track record.1 But the core command—go find the best system of emission reduction—gives broad authority to EPA.
If that flexibility is not apparent on the provision’s face, consider some dictionary definitions—supposedly a staple of this Court’s supposedly textualist method of reading statutes. A “system” is “a complex unity formed of many often diverse parts subject to a common plan or serving a common purpose.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 2322 (1971). Or again: a “system” is “[a]n organized and coordinated method; a procedure.” American Heritage Dictionary 1768 (5th ed. 2018). The majority complains that a similar definition—cited to the Solicitor General’s brief but originally from another dictionary—is just too darn broad. Ante, at 28; see Brief for United States 31 (quoting Webster’s New International Dictionary 2562 (2d ed. 1959)). “[A]lmost anything” capable of reducing emissions, the majority says, “could constitute such a ‘system’” of emission reduction. Ante, at 28. But that is rather the point. Congress used an obviously broad word (though surrounding it with constraints, see supra, at 7) to give EPA lots of latitude in deciding how to set emissions limits. And contra the majority, a broad term is not the same thing as a “vague” one. Ante, at 18, 20, 28. A broad term is comprehensive, extensive, wide-ranging; a “vague” term is unclear, ambiguous, hazy. (Once again, dictionaries would tell the tale.) So EPA was quite right in stating in the Clean Power Plan that the “[p]lain meaning” of the term “system” in Section 111 refers to “a set of measures that work together to reduce emissions.” 80 Fed. Reg. 64762. Another of this Court’s opinions, involving a matter other than the bogeyman of environmental regulation, might have stopped there.
For generation shifting fits comfortably within the conventional meaning of a “system of emission reduction.” Consider one of the most common mechanisms of generation shifting: the use of a cap-and-trade scheme. Here is how the majority describes cap and trade: “Under such a scheme, sources that receive a reduction in their emissions can sell a credit representing the value of that reduction to others, who are able to count it toward their own applicable emissions caps.” Ante, at 8–9. Does that sound like a “system” to you? It does to me too. And it also has to this Court. In the past, we have explained that “[t]his type of ‘cap-andtrade’ system cuts costs while still reducing pollution to target levels.” EPA v. EME Homer City Generation, L. P., 572 U. S. 489, 503, n. 10 (2014) (emphasis added). So what does the majority mean when it says that “[a]s a matter of definitional possibilities, generation shifting can be described as a ‘system’”? Ante, at 28 (emphasis added; citation and some internal quotation marks omitted). Rarely has a statutory term so clearly applied.
