The Supreme Court's conservative majority questioned the scope of the EPA's ability to regulate carbon emissions from power plants, suggesting that the court could deal a blow to the Biden administration.
The questioning during the two-hour argument was mostly technical and several conservative justices did not tip their hands. The agency was supposed to be given vast power to set national economic policy, but those who were skeptical said it was not true.
The four cases before the justices, including West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, were not ripe for decision because there is no regulation in place. The court should wait to address concrete questions rather than ruling on hypothetical ones.
Elizabeth B. Prelogar said the courts could consider a new regulation after it was issued.
The Supreme Court did not need to wait according to the Chief Justice and Justice Stephen G. Breyer.
Much of the argument was about whether the Clean Air Act allowed the agency to issue sweeping regulations across the power sector and how clearly Congress should authorize executive agencies to address major political and economic questions.
On the last full day of Donald J. Trump's presidency, a federal appeals court struck down his plan to relax restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. The Clean Air Act limited the measures the agency could use, according to the Trump administration.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that the Trump administration's plan to reduce greenhouse gasses was based on a fundamental misconstruction.
The decision concluded that the E.P.A. has plenty of discretion in carrying out its mandate.
The Clean Power Plan would have forced utilities to move away from coal and toward renewable energy to reduce emissions. The Trump administration tried to replace the rule with one that critics said was toothless.
The Biden administration was given the go-ahead to issue stronger restrictions by the appeals court.
The power sector's emissions were to be cut by 32 percent by the year 2030. It instructed every state to draft plans to eliminate carbon emissions from power plants by phasing out coal and increasing the generation of renewable energy.
The Clean Power Plan was never implemented. It was blocked by the Supreme Court in 2016 because of lawsuits from conservative states and the coal industry. Changes in the Supreme Court's membership that moved it to the right has made environmental groups wary of what the court might do.
The most comprehensive look to date at the threats that global warming poses to homes, human health, livelihoods and natural ecosystems around the world was published on Monday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The report, approved by 195 governments, found that the dangers from climate change are bigger and unfolding faster than before and that humanity may struggle to adapt to the consequences unless greenhouse gas emissions are quickly reduced in the next few decades.
The report said that any further delay in concerted anticipatory global action will miss a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future for all.
Brad Plumer was involved in reporting.
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