MORGANTOWN – West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey joined with business leaders Monday morning to announce expanded support for the 19-state coalition challenge of the authority of the EPA that is before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Leaders of the West Virginia Coal Association and the West Virginia Business and Industry Council appeared with Morrisey to announce they are among those signing on to amicus – friend of the court – briefs to support the suit.
Separately, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., joined with Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., to lead 47 senators and 44 representatives in filing an amicus brief in the case.
The Biden Administration and the EPA, Morrisey said, want to unilaterally decarbonize the nation without Congressional authority; but a federal agency needs to have a clear statement from Congress to undertake an action of such significant consequence.
As previously reported, the case is called West Virginia v EPA. It stems from a 27-state case led by Morrisey against the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which resulted in a stay of the plan by the Supreme Court in 2016. In 2019, the Trump EPA replaced it with the Affordable Clean Energy Rule, which established emissions guidelines for states to use when developing plans to limit carbon dioxide at their coal-fired power plants. States would have three years to submit plans, in line with other planning timelines under the Clean Air Act.
But in January of this year, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit vacated the 2019 Affordable Clean Energy Rule. In the current petition, Morrisey and the other states say that the D.C. court wrongly used a portion of the Clean Air Act to grant the EPA even more sweeping powers.
The petition comes in the form of a question to the Supreme Court: “In 42 U.S.C. § 7411(d), an ancillary provision of the Clean Air Act, did Congress constitutionally authorize the Environmental Protection Agency to issue significant rules —including those capable of reshaping the nation’s electricity grids and unilaterally decarbonizing virtually any sector of the economy — without any limits on what the agency can require so long as it considers cost, nonair impacts, and energy requirements?”
The coalition filed its opening brief with the Supreme Court last week. Morrisey said Monday that oral arguments are set for Feb. 28.
“This is obviously going to be a big case for our state,” he said. “We know this administration and this EPA is trying to use authority that it does not possess.” The consequence could be skyrocketing energy prices.
Kentucky, New Hampshire and Arizona plan to join the suit, he said, and some others may, also. “We’re hopeful for more.”
Coal Association President Chris Hamilton said, “This challenge is vitally important for our state, our state’s workforce, and our state’s economy.”
BIC chair Mike Clowser said the case has broader implications and affects any regulated industry that has dealings with any federal agency. Congress must make its will clear and that’s why the BIC board voted to become part of the lawsuit.
Capito is ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and Rodgers is Republican leader of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
They said, “If Congress had intended to give the EPA such sweeping authority to transform an entire sector of our economy, Congress would have done so explicitly. An administrative agency like the EPA may decide issues of such vast economic and political significance only when the agency can point to clear congressional authorization.”
They said in their brief, “Congress knows how to address greenhouse gas emissions. In recent years, Congress has decided to pass transformative laws that incentivize reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from a wide range of industries, including the electric power sector.”
All three of West Virginia’s House members — David McKinley, Alex Mooney and Carol Miller — signed on to the brief.
TWEET David Beard @dbeardtdp EMAIL dbeard@dominionpost.com
