EPA climate rule supporters want court to drop lawsuit

Supporters of the Obama administration’s climate change rule for power plants want a federal court to send the regulation back to the Environmental Protection Agency and let it consider changes. Environmentalists and renewable energy advocates say sending the Clean Power Plan back to the EPA — what is called a “remand” — is preferable to freezing the case indefinitely while the Trump administration figures out what to do with it. Kicking it back to the EPA would end a halt that the Supreme Court placed on the rule last year, allowing supporters to file a new lawsuit when or if the Trump administration formally repeals the Clean Power Plan. “Remand would allow termination of the Supreme Court’s stay pending litigation, and would properly place the responsibility on EPA to follow statutory rulemaking procedures if it wishes to delay implementation or make other changes to the rule,” a coalition of environmental and health groups led by the Environmental Defense Fund told the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Monday. The EPA and its allies took the opposite approach, telling the appeals court that the case should be halted indefinitely so that the Supreme Court’s pause stays in effect...more