The federal district court for the Southern District of New York upheld a “zero emission credit” (ZEC) program intended to subsidize old nuclear power plants in upstate New York. The ZEC program is one component of the Clean Energy Standard adopted by the New York Public Service Commission. Plaintiffs challenging the New York program were electric generators and trade groups of electric generators. They unsuccessfully argued that the ZEC program was unconstitutional because it was preempted and violated the dormant Commerce Clause. The court held that it did not have equity jurisdiction over the plaintiffs’ claims that the Federal Power Act (FPA)—which grants FERC exclusive jurisdiction over the interstate wholesale electricity market—preempted the ZEC program. The court concluded that Congress intended to foreclose a private right of action, citing both FPA’s provisions for a detailed remedial scheme before FERC and—more definitively, in the court's view—the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act’s addition to the FPA of a private cause of action for a narrow scope of challenges to state action. The court did not find that the relief sought by the plaintiffs would require the court to apply “judicially unadministratable” standards, but the court indicated that such a finding was not necessary to bar jurisdiction. The court also held that the FPA preemption claim would, in any event, fail on the merits. The court—looking to the Supreme Court’s 2016 opinion in Hughes v. Talen Energy Marketing, LLC—said the ZEC program did not impermissibly “tether” ZEC payments to participation in the wholesale capacity auctions and did not directly affect wholesale rates. The ZEC programs therefore avoided field preemption. The court also found that the plaintiffs did not state a plausible claim for conflict preemption because the ZEC program did not run afoul of FERC’s goal of efficient energy markets. The court ruled that the plaintiffs did not have a cause of action to bring their dormant Commerce Clause claim because their alleged injuries did not fall within the zone of interests protected by the dormant Commerce Clause—i.e., the economic interests of out-of-state entities. The court also held that the plaintiffs failed to state a dormant Commerce Clause claim because New York State acted as a market participant when it created ZECs.

Challenge to component of New York Clean Energy Standard that provided payments to certain nuclear facilities providing "zero-emission" power.

Coalition for Competitive Electricity v. Zibelman

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New York Federal Court Upheld “Zero Emission Credits” for Nuclear Plants

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New York Federal Court Upheld “Zero Emission Credits” for Nuclear Plants

Target

Policy instrument

Risk

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Just transition

Renewable energy

Fossil fuel

Greenhouse gas

Economic sector

Finance