D.C. Appeals Court OKs EPA Rules on Greenhouse Gases
From Reuters By Ayesha Rascoe
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – An appeals court on Tuesday upheld the first-ever U.S. proposed regulations governing heat-trapping greenhouse gases, handing a setback to major industries like coal-burning utilities and a victory to the Obama administration and environmental groups.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit unanimously ruled that the EPA’s finding that carbon dioxide is a public danger and setting limits for emissions from cars and light trucks were “neither arbitrary nor capricious.”
In the 82-page ruling, the court also found that the EPA’s interpretation of the Clean Air Act to regulate carbon dioxide regulations is “unambiguously correct.”
The court also said it lacked jurisdiction to review the timing and scope of greenhouse gas rules that affect stationary sources like new coal-burning power plants and other large industrial sources.
The court in February heard arguments brought by state and industry challenging the EPA’s authority to set carbon dioxide limits.
(Additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel, writing by Chris Baltimore; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)
Full story: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/26/us-usa-co2-ruling-idUSBRE85P10920120626
h/t to reader Jack Simmons
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Is Lisa Jackson available for comment, or is she still in Rio De Janeiro at Rio + 20 illigitimately working with foreign governments to determine domestic policy in the US?
Matthew R Marler says:
June 26, 2012 at 10:59 am
Unless the Court can find some clearly (legally and operationally) defined arbitrariness, then it hasn’t the authority to overturn the EPA ruling.
==================================================
EPA refers to the IPCC assessments, in the IPCC foreign governments are involved, that are enemies of the US or have financial interests in certain assessments, hence the IPCC assessments can not be considered independent science.
There is a relatively old SCOTUS decision that established the so called CHEVRON doctrine. The doctrine obligates courts to give great deference to the actions for federal agencies that are supposed to have expertise in specific fields along their interpretation of federal laws.
There are two likely explanations or a combination thereof for the DC Circuit’s decision: the court applied the Chevron doctrine and deferred to the EPA without serious evaluation of the underlying facts and circumstances; or the judges are climate change true believers.
It is a sad day for sound science due to actions of judges that will not filter out political and scientific bias that influences some federal agencies. The remedy is to get SCTOUS to revisit the Chevron case and either overrule it or narrow the circumstances in which it is applicable. I am not sure that review of this case is the right time to raise the issue.
JP says:
June 26, 2012 at 11:09 am
And the Courts are enabling all of this.
======================================================
The courts can be contaminated too, exactly like climate science.
Here is Senator Inhofe’s response.
http://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=29e06bfe-802a-23ad-4ed4-acbf2f498e66
This is mostly good news. The finding that setting limits on CO2 emissions is “neither arbitrary nor capricious” is based on solid science as well as the EPA’s regulatory scope — which ought to be expanded. Clearly, the conservative anti-science agenda has been held at bay by the facts and established climate science in this ruling.
Now for some myth-busting.
Contrary to some climate change skeptics’ propaganda, CO2 IS a public danger — when produced in excess, due to its scientifically measured planetary effects on climate, as just about any chemical is in excess. For example, drinking too much water can kill a person. Yet we need it to live. Anyone can argue that “water is not a poison” — but the argument is only partly correct, just as is the same argument about CO2. CO2 is natural, yet releasing so much at such speed, after being locked deep in the earth as fossil fuels is clearly having powerful, negative effects. (Sure, there are may be a few minor positive effects…please don’t torpedo the conversation with those. They are trivial.)
The science is clear. The estimates of its effects and how much consequent danger it poses must necessarily vary, as there are many variables. Hence the qualifiers in the assessments of scientific bodies, like the British Royal Society and IPCC, such as “very likely” and “with a high degree of certainty” — used in strict scientific, not lay, senses. And note that, according to Wikipedia, “no scientific body of national or international standing has maintained a dissenting opinion” that human activities are causing most of the global warming.
But there are not so many variables that the consensus scientific assessments are voided. Computer models are quite accurate in predicting past temperatures, and have been able to predict now-current results. See this useful discussion at Skeptical Science, “Can We Trust Computer Models?”: http://www.skepticalscience.com/Can-we-trust-computer-models.html
Responding to the article, Bern on 25 May, 2011 posts, re: James Hansen’s 1981 temperature predictions:
“…looking at the 30 years of global temperature data prior to 1980, would you have made the same predictions that Hansen did back in 1980? I know I wouldn’t have, without a lot of persuasion. Turns out his climate model was pretty much on the money, though. It’s been more-or-less right for 30 years now, despite being orders of magnitude simpler than current climate models, and despite there being so much more discovered about how the climate works.”
Now the charter or regulatory scope of the EPA should change in order to enable a broad-ranging, coherent, ecologically sensible US energy policy that covers not only vehicles, but everything that produces pollution and CO2. (Wanna bet billions in lobbying dollars go into defeating something like that?? The power and momentum of corporate greed to fight health, ecology and science is sad and sick.) According to the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, “residential and commercial buildings account for almost 39 percent of total U.S. energy consumption and 38 percent of U.S. carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.” (Based on US DOE 2008 data, available in 2008 Buildings Energy Data Book.)
Since buildings account for such a huge proportion of pollution, including (in the current situation), excessive CO2 production, they should be regulated much more heavily than vehicles. What should happen next is covered well in “Mitigating Climate Change: What America’s Building Industry Must Do,” in Design Intelligence: http://www.di.net/articles/archive/3097/
By the way, more evidence has just washed up on shore — literally — that ocean levels are rising “more than three times faster than the global average” on the US East Coast, which will drastically affect property values and punch huge holes in our economy:
http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0626/Sea-level-in-Northeastern-US-rising-more-than-three-times-faster-than-global-average-video
Here is a misleading fairly recent paper by Nils-Axel Mörner, claiming no rise in sea levels — which is now thoroughly debunked by the facts: http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2011/Winter-2010/Morner.pdf
Looks like it’s continuing to be, as Bill McKibben wrote June 5th in the Asia Times, “a tough few weeks for the forces of climate-change denial.” http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/NF05Dj06.html
NOTE + COMMENT: McKibben’s article was originally a response to a nutty Heartland Institute campaign against established climate change science that featured, among other wingnut-style screeching and lying, a “giant billboard with Unabomber Ted Kacynzki’s face plastered across it: ‘I Still Believe in Global Warming. Do You?'” The Heartland campaign claimed that “the most prominent advocates of global warming aren’t scientists. They are murderers, tyrants, and madmen.” Seriously?? Does anybody believe this junk? (Furthermore, bizarrely, a majority of Republicans STILL believe Obama is not a US citizen and that he is a Muslim. Fox News is a major force for ignorance and disinformation. Hey, it’s not news if it’s FALSE, people! Psssst: The earth is ROUND, not flat! Roundish, actually — oblate.)
I’m hoping, as Carl Sagan used to say about nuclear war, that “sanity breaks out” soon regarding the backward state of US public opinion on climate change. The clouds are parting, bit by bit.
“…Court upholds EPA’s greenhouse gas rules for autos – but lacks jurisdiction on stationary sources…”
Potential problem, then. There are some major cities where the traffic at times makes automobiles stationary sources.
Matthew R Marler,
The IPCC is officially a political organization, not a scientific one. Their charter mandates that they publish findings that support a particular conclusion, and by implication prohibits them from publishing adverse findings.
I don’t know what the Clean Air Act would have to say about that kind of organization being cited as a source of “science”, but I know one thing … if the EPA had cited “Barney the Dinosaur” videos for its finding, there is no way on God’s green Earth that this court or any other would have found this to be lawful. So, clearly, either the CAA doesn’t allow this sort of flexibility, or there is a judgment call to be made, which these judges were being called on to make.
RTF
Phil C says:
June 26, 2012 at 10:10 am
This is a victory for science. The Court noted that the EPA relied on assessments by the IPCC, USGCRP and NRC and stated:
_________________________________
Glad you think so. How about living your “Convictions” this means NO Car, NO heat, NO house or apartment, NO supermarket food, NO store bought clothes or anything ELSE!
You only get to use what you can grow or create with your own two hands PERIOD.
I did the analysis Phil C. and you will have to roll back technology to before that of the 1800’s to meet the EU or California’s mandated 80% reduction in CO2 emissions if it is applied across the USA.
So Let us look at what real facts tell us.
The average for the USA is 335.9 million BTUs per person. ~ http://www.nuicc.info/?page_id=1467 (Total population: 246,081,000)
The U.S. in 1800 had a per-capita energy consumption of about 90 million Btu. http://www.bu.edu/pardee/files/2010/11/12-PP-Nov2010.pdf
(Total population: 5,308,483)
If the USA reduces its energy consumption by 80% it equals 45.18 million Btu. per person IF THE POPULATION WAS THE SAME.
Given the increase in technology and hydro power lets use the 1800 consumption level of about 90 million Btu. per person instead of 45 Btu per person that the 80% reduction would mandate.
Before 1800, farmers made up about 90% of labor force.
It took about 250-300 labor-hours to produce 100 bushels of wheat from 5 acres with walking plow, brush harrow, hand broadcast of seed, sickle, and flail and that was in 1830. (1987 – 2-3/4 labor-hours required to produce 100 bushels from 3 acres but that takes lots of oil.)
It was not until between 1810 and 1830 “manufacturing” was transfered from the farm and home to the shop and factory. It wasn’t until the 1840′s that we saw factory made farm machinery, labor saving devices and chemical fertilizers became common. It was until the 1860′s that kerosene lamps became popular.
Also up until the 1850′s dung and wood were the major source of energy. http://dieoff.org/page199_files/image002.gif
In other words for the USA to use HALF the energy per person that was used in 1800 we must abandon ALL factories and 90% of the population must return to subsistence farming using animals. AND WE STILL WILL NOT REACH 80% REDUCTION!
Remember in 1800 there was only 2% of the current population in the USA. Solar and Wind just are not going to produce enough power to keep us in anything but a few lights and if we are lucky a refrigerator per village. (Or the local overlord gets to use ALL the alloted energy and we get nothing) The FACTORIES to produce those Solar Panels and Windmills use a huge amount of power and that is why cotton mills and other primitive factories were built on rivers. Do you really think you can even produce the equipment needed to keep some semblance of civilization going if we cut our CO2 levels to the advocated 20% of the current levels??
I sure hope you are out there pushing Nuclear power for all you are worth, because I can go back to subsidence farming, I have the horse drawn equipment, the horses, green house, heritage seeds, sheep and goats and more important the knowledge, but I really doubt you could or Hansen or Jones or the rest of the (self-snip) who are pushing this nonsense.
What these (self snip) politicians keep forgetting is without energy you have no COMMUNICATION or TRANSPORTATION and therefore your civilization devolves to tiny city states. This is what happen to Rome and other great civilizations because of the onset of COLD climate. Seems we are not waiting for the next little Ice Age, we are going to trash the USA based on the mandates of an UNELECTED bureaucrat!
The EPA will almost always come out on top in these cases because the legal question comes down to whether the law empowers them to makes these determinations, not whether they have done an adequate job of doing so. To really bring these folks back under the control of elected officials and the populous the authorizing legislation that created this bureaucracy must be repealed and replaced, hopefully by a law crafted to prevent the inevitable mission creep that all bureaucratic structures are subject too.
The EPA’s many over the top actions in recent times may actually present the only opportunity we are likely to ever see to create the political consensus to accomplish this. Most of the voting population still cling to the naive notion that the EPA is actually trying to protect the environment. Unfortunately any candidate who has the political courage, the ultimate oxymoron, to actually challenge them is automatically portrayed as a complete lunatic by the media stooges who just as unfortunately still provide most of the mouthbreathers with their worldview. Somewhat ironically the only real hope of generating a voter rebellion is if Ms Jackson and her thugs behave even more outrageously between now and the election to an extent that not even the continuing silence of the MSM can conceal it from even the dimmest voter.
\\The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit unanimously ruled that the EPA’s finding that carbon dioxide is a public danger and setting limits for emissions from cars and light trucks were “neither arbitrary nor capricious.”//
Yes, but is it correct? Is it necessary? If the science is found wanting and AGW is a costly illusion, what then?
Here is the decision itself:
http://www.cadc.uscourts.gov/internet/opinions.nsf/52AC9DC9471D374685257A290052ACF6/$file/09-1322-1380690.pdf
In briefly skimming it, it seems that the basis of the decision is the definition of “pollution” in the clean air act.
D.C. Circuit jurisdiction is limited to District of Columbia. Doesn’t mean squat for anyone outside of it. The decision was predictable not on the merits but on the court that made it. Sort of like knowing which way the 9th circuit will decide or how Mother Jones bloggers would decide… LOL
“If the law supposes that,” said Mr. Bumble,… “the law is a ass—a idiot.” – Dickens
Plus ça change. Sigh.
Richard T. Fowler: if the EPA had cited “Barney the Dinosaur” videos for its finding,
Such a premise can’t possibly lead to a clear and relevant conclusion.
Gail Combs says:June 26, 2012 at 11:31 am
Gail: Liked what you said and got great imagery from it. And as Anthony says in response to the egregious Phil C: “…but it is also a tragedy for America.” Unfortunately, Phil C and his ilk would welcome any ‘tragedy’ for America. I often wonder what kind of country he and people like him would prefer to live in…as much as I would dearly love to know what kind of climate he/they would like to live under – and how they would control it – assuming that they alone have the arrogance to believe they could control it..
And nuclear winter too! We nutty neanderthals have long been in denial about that as well.
Sorry. I just can’t stop laughing. The story is so funny. It is bound to bounce.
The only thing, so far, that is more hilarious is the deluded clown @June 26, 2012 at 11:22 am traipsing in here dragging his knuckles and a SS link claiming; “Models work”
You couldn’t make it up.
Again, sorry. I have had a hard day and this type of thing is why WUWT is the only source of cutting edge science, humor and pathos that I visit daily and recommend to everyone I meet. I would be utterly lost without it. The wonder, the laughter and the face-palming.
I have a new name for these guys. I will post nearer the top of a more relevant thread when I have fleshed it out.
@ur momisugly Matthew Marler
@ur momisuglyquidsapio:
“Right now, most Americans do not believe that CO2 is a pollutant that should be regulated.”
and
“What science supports the contention CO2 is a pollutant?”
—–
1) Most Americans are not climate scientists. Most Americans are not ANY kind of scientist. They do not and should never decide what a pollutant is. That is for scientists. By analogy, do you want “most Americans” to vote on the best procedures to transplant a human heart or send rockets into the sky as well??
2) Climate science supports the contention that CO2 is a pollutant…of sorts. Clearly there are contexts and situations in which it is not. CO2, according to any fifth-grade science textbook, is emitted as part of the natural carbon cycle by plants. But CO2, as I’ve said in an earlier post, IS a pollutant in the planetary context of global warming. It is causing and will cause even more massive, earth-shaking destructive results, which cannot be reversed for thousands of years, if ever.
By analogy, water is a “pollutant” in the case of overdose, for example. Drinking too much water can kill you. Any chemical might be a pollutant in the proper context.
Think, man, think! (But that’s not what the conservative media want you to do. Wake up, you’ve drunk the Kool-Aid!)
Of course, climate science denialism being a religion, I surmise that, “to a high degree of certainty” “it is very likely” that no amount of reason, facts or science will convince you to change your religiously held, rigid, dogmatic beliefs. 😉 (If they weren’t irrational beliefs, then facts would change them.) Enjoy them, it’s your right. But please step out of the way so we can use science to make our planet healthy again.
Dave Wendt: The EPA will almost always come out on top in these cases because the legal question comes down to whether the law empowers them to makes these determinations, not whether they have done an adequate job of doing so.
I think some writers here are not accepting that.
The EPA regulations were the subject of many editorials in the scientific journals and received a lot of support. The court case was the subject of many editorials in the scientific journals, urging the court to rule in favor of the EPA; and the court doubtless received amicus curiae briefs, supporting and opposing EPA. Under the law, the court could not rule against the EPA without overwhelming evidence from the scientific community, or from somewhere else, that EPA was in violation of the law. That a bunch of us think the IPCC and other reviews were biased does not constitute the sort of thing that the judge could use to rule against the EPA.
The judge ruled correctly. The flaw is in the law. Write to your congress critters.
Thanks Tim for the great link by Morner. At least he is one scientist that actually looks at the data without manipulating it. He actually uses, on site, historical facts, rather than computer models.
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2011/Winter-2010/Morner.pdf
@Phil: You wrote: “The question before the court is jurisdiction and not science. Can the EPA write their own laws? To classify CO2 as a “poisonous gas” is the job for Congress. And Congress refused to do so. So, Progressives took an unusual step. They had individual states sue the EPA and they won.”
Decent people lost that battle to progressives in the 1930’s. Congress can pretty much delegate it’s law making authority to whatever agency it wants. That’s they way they delegate the unpopular decisions they secretly want, but cannot vote for because their constituents do not. Dismantling the administrative agencies in the US needs to be a top priority.
Richard T. Fowler says:
June 26, 2012 at 11:30 am
Matthew R Marler,
“The IPCC is officially a political organization, not a scientific one. Their charter mandates that they publish findings that support a particular conclusion, and by implication prohibits them from publishing adverse findings.”
—–
I’d like to see your documentation and evidence for the statements. You imply that the IPCC is solely a political organization, and by implication, has no science behind it. Which is absolutely false. This is an example of providing partial truth to support an untrue conclusion. Typical Fox News-style propaganda.
As a body which reflects and assesses science, the IPCC is mandated to publish scientific findings to the best of its ability.
That being said, because IPCC is subject to political forces, having to weigh and balance thousands of scientific reports and investigations (which arrive at various conclusions, being dependent on many variables), as well as kowtow to some extent to political pressuring from various nations, they have some restrictions on what they can publish and recommend. The main problem with the IPCC reports published so far is that they have been too conservative when compared with the science.
One article I read (wish I could find it) said that China, which stands to profit and move ahead mightily in economic terms if eco-friendly energy initiatives are delayed (because it is so dependent on dirty coal and oil), has watered down the published IPCC reports. Many scientists believe, for example, that the oceans are likely to rise much more, much faster than the IPCC’s published projections. And that such conservatism is likely holding back all nations from making eco-friendly changes to energy production as fast as we truly need them.
Do extensive reading and research, and you can find this stuff. Or keep reading what many people post here, largely from ignorance. Echoes never change. Knowledge does. Are the echoes of falsehoods so soothing that they must be believed over scientific knowledge??
Every agency should have their powers explicitly defined by law and the EPA is the People’s Exhibit A why this is necessary. The EPA can’t do this if Congress would simply pass a bill that sharply states what the EPA can do. Anything outside that mandate would be unlawful.
For this, we need better people in Congress, particularly the Senate, and a President who would sign the bill.
RIO+20 ended with a whimper, the NGO’s locked out of the process completely and any resolutions with any actual teeth in them never even having a chance to pass because BRIC shut them down cold. Who is BRIC?
Brazil, Russia, India and China.
The new leaders of the free world!
You see Phil C, this was no victory for “science”. It was a demonstration that the wealthy can be duped out of their own money by the simplist of con games while the poor, who have nothing to be conned out of, are not so easily had. This was a victory for legal process and politics over science. If the United States were not the wealthy country she is, this insanity would have gotten no more traction than it has in the BRIC countries.
The only question left for history to provide an answer to, is if the United States will destroy themselves utterly with policies of green fancy (like Europe seems poised to do) or wake up and take a step back from to total stupidity before that happens. But I am bright enough, Phil C, that I do not cheer from the sidelines as we do terrible harm to ourselves, nor am I so naive (as you appear to be) that the harm doesn’t at some point affect me personally, as it will you also.
But for all I know, you are fabulously wealthy, and so that much more susceptible to being conned out of your own money. Your grasp of science and economics is so weak as to suggest that there must be another explanation for the glee with which you cheer damage to the American economy in particular, and the world in general, and somehow imagine that this will do less harm to society the world over than a tiny increase in world temperatures that all the ACTUAL scientific evidence suggests would be beneficial.
But then you don’t define less people dying from cold, less people dying from hunger, less people being homeless, less people having clean drinking water, and less people having access to medical care as good things, do you.