President Joe Biden speaks on the phone with EPA Administrator Michael Regan
A court victory last week for Joe Biden upholding the administration’s most radical set of climate regulations to date could prove to be an electoral anchor for the president come November. But the timing of the move means a potential Republican sweep this fall might not be enough to reverse it.
In a short, unsigned order on May 18, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected a Republican-led effort to halt implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) latest rule on power plant emissions. The new regulations, which were finalized in April, are effectively the first federal mandate to cut carbon emissions from power plants.
If the rules survive further legal scrutiny – and Biden remains in office – industry experts have warned they could virtually eliminate the coal industry overnight and would decimate America’s power production capacity.
More significantly for Biden’s political future, thousands of jobs could be on the line, most notably in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania. The coal industry supports more than 36,000 full and part-time jobs nationwide. Americans throughout the country could also see their electricity bills climb even higher, leading to cascading price increases throughout the economy.
As reported by Politico, the new EPA rules will require the nation’s coal plants to “install carbon capture technology if they plan to continue operating past 2039.” Coal plants will specifically be mandated to capture 90 percent of their carbon dioxide emissions by 2032 or face closure. The rules will further force these plants to reduce mercury emissions by 70 percent.
The new rules are considered entirely unrealistic by industry experts, who see them as a way for the Biden administration to effectively force the closure of America’s roughly 200 remaining coal-fired power plants.
American Petroleum Institute Vice President Dustin Meyer claimed that the EPA rules “fail to properly consider grid reliability and the need for new natural gas plants to maintain that reliability.” Edison Electric Institute President and CEO Dan Brouillette further reiterated the impossibility of the administration’s demands by explaining that current technology “is not yet ready for full-scale, economy-wide deployment, nor is there sufficient time to permit, finance, and build” the infrastructure for compliance.
The new EPA rules are likely an attempt by Biden to shore up support among the Democrat base, which has at times expressed frustration with the president for perceived lack of action on the climate. However, appeasing environmentalists may come at the cost of alienating moderate Democrat and independent voters.
West Virginia Senator Shelley Moore Capito, who currently serves as the ranking member for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, noted that “electricity demand is set to skyrocket thanks in part to the EPA’s own electric vehicles mandate, and unfortunately, Americans are already paying higher utility bills under President Biden.”
“Despite all this,” she continued, “the administration has chosen to press ahead with its unrealistic climate agenda that threatens access to affordable, reliable energy for households and employers across the country.”
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares, who joined the 25-state coalition seeking to block implementation of the new rules, also said that the EPA regulations “threaten the stability of our nation’s energy supply and infringe upon the sovereign rights of states to manage their energy resources.”
Notably, the EPA finalized the rule just in time to avoid the Congressional Review Act, a law which allows a new Congress to overturn federal agency actions within a certain time window. Any rules which were finalized in the Federal Register before May 22 are not subject to reversal under the law when the new Congress convenes next January.
The best opportunity for blocking the new regulations appears to be in the courts. The Supreme Court’s decision in the landmark 2022 case West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency established the precedent that the agency only has the authority to regulate individual power plants and not the entire power sector. “Congress did not grant EPA in Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act the authority to devise emissions caps based on the generation shifting approach the Agency took in the Clean Power Plan,” Supreme Court Justice John Roberts explained in that decision.
The EPA’s new regulations appear to run afoul of the Court’s ruling in that case. West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrissey has accused the EPA of “not fully understand[ing] the direction from the Supreme Court,” arguing that the new rules strip states “of important discretion while using technologies that don’t work in the real world.”
Nonetheless, the new rules are still in effect, and may do real damage to the coal industry before a court strikes them down – which may be exactly what the Biden administration is hoping for.
The result could be disaster for both the American people and Biden’s re-election bid.
Alan Jamison is the pen name of a political writer with extensive experience writing for several notable politicians and news outlets.
