597 U.S. ___, 142 S. Ct. 2587 (2022)
In 2015, the Environmental Protection Agency promulgated the Clean Power Plan rule addressing carbon dioxide emissions from existing coal- and natural-gas-fired power plants under Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act.1 The rule identified three building blocks as the best system of emission reduction, including generation shifting from coal-fired plants to natural gas plants and from both to renewable sources.2 EPA projected that the rule would reduce coal's share of national electricity generation from 38% in 2014 to 27% by 2030, impose billions in compliance costs, raise electricity prices, retire dozens of coal plants, and eliminate tens of thousands of jobs.3
The Supreme Court stayed the Clean Power Plan in 2016.4 After a change in presidential administrations, EPA in 2019 repealed the Clean Power Plan, concluding that generation shifting exceeded its statutory authority, and replaced it with the Affordable Clean Energy rule, which relied solely on heat rate improvements at individual plants.5
Dozens of parties, including twenty-seven States, and private parties challenged the repeal and the ACE rule in the D.C. Circuit. The Court of Appeals held that EPA's repeal rested on a mistaken reading of the Clean Air Act and vacated both the repeal and the ACE rule.6
Following another change in administrations, EPA moved to partially stay the D.C. Circuit's mandate as to the Clean Power Plan while considering new rulemaking. The court granted the stay.7 Westmoreland Mining Holdings LLC, The North American Coal Corporation, and several States then petitioned for certiorari, which the Supreme Court granted.8
Whether this case remains justiciable notwithstanding the Government's contention that no petitioner has Article III standing, given EPA's stated intention not to enforce the Clean Power Plan?9
For standing to appeal, a petitioner must show injury fairly traceable to the judgment below that a favorable ruling would redress.10 The Government bears the heavy burden to show mootness from voluntary cessation, which requires it to be absolutely clear that the allegedly wrongful behavior could not reasonably be expected to recur.11
Yes. The D.C. Circuit's judgment vacated the repeal of the Clean Power Plan and thereby purported to revive it, directly injuring the petitioner States by requiring them to more stringently regulate power plant emissions within their borders.12 The Government failed to carry its burden because it nowhere suggested that, if this litigation were resolved in its favor, it would not reimpose emissions limits predicated on generation shifting, and it vigorously defended the legality of such an approach.13
The case remains justiciable because the petitioners have standing to appeal and the dispute is not moot.14
Whether Congress granted 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?15
In extraordinary cases, the major questions doctrine applies when the history and breadth of the authority asserted, and its economic and political significance, give reason to hesitate before concluding that Congress meant to confer such authority.16 The agency must then point to clear congressional authorization rather than relying on vague language in a long-extant statute.17 Section 111(d) authorizes EPA to determine the best system of emission reduction that has been adequately demonstrated, but prior practice limited such systems to measures improving the performance of individual sources.18
No. The Clean Power Plan claimed unprecedented authority to restructure the Nation's electricity generation by shifting production from coal-fired plants to natural gas and renewables.19 It projected a drop in coal's share from 38% to 27% by 2030 at billions in costs.20 This approach was transformative because it had never been used under Section 111 before 2015.21 It enabled a cap-and-trade regime Congress had repeatedly rejected.22
It required expertise in electricity markets that EPA lacked.23 Therefore the vague term system in Section 111(a)(1) supplied no clear authorization.24
Congress did not grant EPA authority under Section 111(d) to base emissions caps on generation shifting.25
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Section 111(d) charges EPA with setting the degree of emission limitation achievable through the best system of emission reduction for pollutants not covered by other programs.28 Generation shifting qualifies as such a system because it is the most effective and cost-effective means of reducing power-plant carbon dioxide emissions.29 Congress deliberately omitted any technological limitation from the text governing existing sources.30
It knew that the best system would evolve with changing circumstances.31 The major questions doctrine does not apply when the agency acts squarely within its expertise and the statutory design.32