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Much ado is being made of recent amendments to the Clean Air Act (CAA) contained in the Biden administration’s budget reconciliation law passed in mid-August, commonly referred to as the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). And with good reason, as the law includes the most significant changes to the CAA since 1990, and the new sections formally define greenhouse gases (GHGs) as an “air pollutant,” consistent with the Supreme Court’s 2007 decision in Massachusetts v. EPA.

However, the IRA amendments to the CAA do not in fact make significant substantive changes in law. Legally speaking, they can’t, given that the IRA is merely a reconciliation bill through which Congress may only assign funding. More to the point, none of the IRA amendments to the CAA address in any way the limitations the Supreme Court recently placed on EPA’s authority to adopt climate change regulation in West Virginia v. EPA, notwithstanding some characterizations to the contrary.…

Continue Reading Clean Air Act Amendments Minimally Impact EPA’s Authority to Pass Climate Change Regulation

On the last day of what was already an historic term, the Supreme Court issued another significant decision impacting EPA’s authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and address climate change. As EPA embarks on a third attempt at a rule targeting CO2 emissions from existing power plants that will pass legal muster, the question now is how the Court’s decision will affect that new rule.
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Continue Reading West Virginia v. EPA: The Supreme Court Speaks Again on Climate

To help reboot after the holiday break, here is a list of air topics we expect to make news in 2022 with a short discussion of why each one may be important to you.
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Continue Reading Welcome Back! These Are the Air Topics That Will Make News in 2022

Earlier this week, EPA published its proposed new methane regulations for the oil and gas sector. These new rules will have significant practical implications for the industry and have the potential to set new precedent for EPA’s authority under the Clean Air Act to address climate change for other industries as well. While the proposal is over 150 pages long, it does not include the actual text of the proposed rules, promising instead to provide proposed text in a supplemental notice early next year.
Continue Reading EPA Issues Highly Anticipated Methane Rule for the Oil and Gas Sector

The U.S. Supreme Court has elected to hear a legal dispute over the scope of the authority granted to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from existing power plants. In orders issued October 29, the Court granted certiorari to four petitioners — West Virginia, North Dakota, the North American Coal Corporation, and Westmoreland Mining Holdings LLC — seeking reversal of a September 2020 D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decision striking down the Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) rule.
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Continue Reading Supreme Court Will Hear Controversy Over EPA Regulation of Greenhouse Gases from Existing Power Plants

The Congressional Review Act (CRA) was adopted in 1996 to give Congress a more powerful check on agency regulation that outpaces congressional intent. But now, for the first time, Congress has used that powerful authority in reverse. By disapproving a de-regulatory action — the rescission of the Subpart OOOOa new source methane standards for the oil and gas sector — Congress has brought a dead rule back to life. The birth, death, and now re-birth of Subpart OOOOa (often pronounced “quad-O-A”) raises several new and important questions.
Continue Reading Subpart OOOOa: What Happens When Congress Revives a Repealed Rule?

On April 5, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit vacated a Trump-era rule that would have prevented the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from setting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions standards for almost any class of stationary sources, except for fossil fuel-fired electric generating units. The court’s decision, issued at the request of the new Biden EPA, clears the way for new sector-by-sector GHG regulations should the new administration seek to set new GHG standards under Section 111 of the Clean Air Act (CAA).
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Continue Reading Rule Limiting EPA Regulation of GHG Emissions Vacated by D.C. Circuit

On the heels of multiple recent indications that it plans to increase its focus on environmental, social, and governance-related (ESG) corporate disclosures, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC or Commission) has solicited help from the public on developing a framework for climate change disclosures. Acting Chair Allison Herren Lee released a statement on March 15, calling for input from investors, registrants, and other market participants “in light of demand for climate change information and questions about whether current disclosures accurately inform investors.”
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Continue Reading SEC Seeks Public Comment on Framework for Corporate Climate Change Disclosures

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced the creation of a new task force on March 4 to address violations of environmental, social, and governance-related (ESG) disclosure requirements. The Climate and ESG Task Force will be located in the SEC’s Division of Enforcement and led by Acting Deputy Director of Enforcement Kelly Gibson, who will oversee a 22-member team drawn from across the SEC. The task force will focus initially on material gaps or misstatements in disclosure of climate risk under existing rules. The task force will use “sophisticated data analysis to mine and assess information … to identify potential violations” and will also pursue tips, referrals, and whistleblower complaints on ESG-related issues.
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Continue Reading SEC Announces Task Force to Enforce ESG Disclosure Requirements

A California state legislator has introduced a bill that would require large corporations doing business in the state to publicly disclose their greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs). The bill, titled the Climate Corporate Responsibility Act, covers publicly traded domestic and foreign corporations with annual revenues in excess of $1 billion. According to state Senator Scott Weiner, who introduced the bill, it could affect up to 5,000 companies. The bill is not limited to any industry sector and would thus impact not only companies typically associated with GHG emissions, like oil and gas producers or power plants, but also would extend to other sectors, including the tech industry, for example.
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Continue Reading Mandatory GHG Corporate Disclosure Bill Introduced in California