West Virginia v. EPA

The U.S. Supreme Court denied eight emergency applications for immediate stay of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency final rule establishing new greenhouse gas emissions standards and guidelines for new and existing fossil fuel-fired electric generating units. Justice Thomas would have granted the stay. Justice Alito did not participate in the consideration or decision of the applications. Justice Kavanaugh, joined by Justice Gorsuch, wrote a statement indicating that in his view, “the applicants have shown a strong likelihood of success on the merits as to at least some of their challenges” but that they were unlikely to suffer irreparable harm before the D.C. Circuit decided the merits because compliance work was not required until June 2025.

After the D.C. Circuit denied requests for a stay, six emergency applications, including one filed by West Virginia and other states, were submitted to Chief Justice Roberts seeking an immediate stay. Chief Justice Roberts requested a response to the applications by August 19. The arguments in the applications to the Supreme Court for an emergency stay included that the final rule is “déjà vu all over again” because the final rule was “no less problematic” than the Clean Power Plan. The states contended that the final rule set “impossible-to-meet standards” that would impose “major, jarring shifts in the nation’s power market,” forcing closure of coal-fired plants.

On April 25, 2025, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals granted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s motion asking the court to continue holding in abeyance the challenges to the final rule establishing new greenhouse gas emissions standards and guidelines for new and existing fossil fuel-fired electric generating units. The final rule also revoked the first Trump administration’s Affordable Clean Energy Rule. EPA said it had decided to initiate a new rulemaking process to reassess the rule and that it intended to issue a proposed reconsideration rule in spring 2025 and a final rule by December 2025.