Texas v. EPA

The D.C. Circuit issued orders denying the petitions for rehearing. The denial of the petitions for rehearing came after the D.C. Circuit ordered EPA in April 2015 to rescind regulations that required PSD and Title V permits solely based on a source’s greenhouse gas emissions.

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After the Supreme Court's decision in <a href="https://climatecasechart.com/files/case-documents/2014/20140623_docket-12–1146_opinion.pdf">Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA</a>, two states, along with trade associations and other organizations representing various industrial sectors, filed petitions for rehearing. The petitions argued that rehearing was necessary because Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA negated the D.C. Circuit’s dismissal of the proceedings on standing grounds. The D.C. Circuit’s ruling was grounded in its interpretation of the Clean Air Act’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) permitting requirements were “self-executing” for stationary sources that emitted greenhouse gases—the D.C. Circuit therefore reasoned that petitioners’ injuries were caused by the statute itself and not by EPA’s actions. Petitioners argued in their petitions for rehearing that since the Supreme Court expressly rejected this interpretation, the D.C. Circuit’s ruling should be vacated and the petitions for review should be granted or the matter reheard.

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The D.C. Circuit granted the unopposed motion seeking to extend the deadline to file petitions for rehearing.

Petitioners filed a motion seeking to extend their deadline to file a petition for rehearing.  Petitioners asked that the deadline for filing the petition and for issuing the mandate be extended until 30 days after the Supreme Court’s disposition of pending petitions for a writ of certiorari that seek review of <a href="https://climatecasechart.com/files/case-documents/2012/20120626_docket-09-1322-10-1073-10-1092-10-1167_opinion-1.pdf">Coalition for Responsible Regulation v. EPA</a>, in which the D.C. Circuit upheld EPA’s regulation of greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.  The motion papers assert that deferral of the deadline would not significantly delay issuance of the mandate because the petitions for writ of certiorari have been distributed for conference on September 30, only two weeks after the mandate is currently scheduled to issue.  The motion is unopposed.

The federal Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit dismissed, on standing grounds, challenges by Texas, Wyoming, and industry groups to United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rules that imposed federal permitting requirements for greenhouse gases. The D.C. Circuit concluded that section 165(a) of the Clean Air Act (CAA) was “self-executing,” finding that the provision requires that major emitting facilities obtain Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) preconstruction permits with best available control technology for every pollutant regulated under the CAA regardless of whether a pollutant is included in a given state’s implementation plan.  The D.C. Circuit therefore held that industry petitioners lacked standing because their purported injury—that they would be subject to PSD permitting requirements for greenhouse gases—was caused not by the challenged EPA rules, but by “automatic operation” of the CAA. With respect to the state petitioners, the court ruled that a successful challenge to the EPA rules would result in a “construction moratorium,” not restoration of the states’ permitting powers.  The states therefore lacked standing because their challenge would not redress the alleged harm to their “quasi-sovereign interests in regulating air quality within their borders.”  Judge Kavanaugh dissented.

The D.C. Circuit lifted an emergency stay that had blocked EPA from taking over Texas’s greenhouse gas permitting program, holding that the state did not satisfy the standards required for a stay pending review. The decision allows EPA to issue permits for large stationary sources of greenhouse gas emissions in Texas pending a review of the merits of the lawsuit. 

After EPA published a rule that would allow it to issue permits for new and modified sources of greenhouse gas emissions in Texas, Texas filed a petition for review in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. EPA said that it took the action because Texas refused to implement greenhouse gas emissions permits as it was required to do under prevention of significant deterioration (PSD) provisions of the Clean Air Act starting January 2, 2011.

Texas filed an emergency motion in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals seeking a stay of an EPA rule providing for a federal takeover of the State's Prevention of Significant Deterioration permitting program for new and modified stationary sources.