Another defeat for Joe Biden and a blow to American hopes of countering the effects of climate change. To inflict them is again the Supreme Court, which with a vote of 6 to 3 – all six conservative judges voted for yes, against the three liberals – limited the range of action of the White House in energy policy.
The decision affects the EPA, the Federal Agency for Environmental Protection, in its authority to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.
In fact, the Court has sided with the republican-led states and the fossil industrialist, putting a serious obstacle to all the environmental policy on which the White House has worked since day one. The transition from the old industrial system to renewable energy, from wind to solar becomes more difficult. In the opinion signed by Chief Justice John Roberts, the Court finds that the EPA did not have the powers to regulate the emission standards of existing power plants. “A decision of this magnitude and consequence – writes Roberts – is up to the Congress”.
According to the three liberal judges, with the Clean Air Act, the first law on air quality, enacted in 1963 and changed many times over the years, regulatory power had already been attributed to the government. The decision strikes a directive seven years ago when the EPA had required coal-fired power plants to reduce production or finance alternative forms of energy. Both the establishments involved and the conservative governments had challenged the directive.
The anomaly of the Court’s procedure lies in the timing: by custom the judges wait for the regulations to be applied, moreover the judges have decided before even hearing the opinion of the administration. The ruling does not represent a victory for the whole sector because in the last ten years numerous plants have started the ecological transition, also to save on production costs. The powerful fossil fuel lobby will rejoice because it sees its primacy over environmental policies affirmed. What can Biden do now?
The leaders of the EPA have already said they have the tools to circumvent the ban. The agency is working on new rules that force plants to cut polluting emissions from smoke and stop toxic contamination from fine particles in drinking water. But now the possibilities of directly regulating the emission of carbon dioxide, the leader of the polluting elements, have been reduced. Consequences? Another Biden goal is moving away: that of eliminating poisonous emissions by 2050. Not good news in a country where, according to the League of Conservation Voters, four out of ten Americans live in a state, city or territory that aims to have one hundred percent clean electricity by mid-century.