Jody Freeman, a law professor who worked for two years for the Obama White House, explains the logic behind the President's plan to tighten emissions standards at existing power plants:
Even the president's…modest plan to set standards for power
plants is legally risky, especially with regard to existing plants. The
law calls for states to set these standards, subject to EPA approval.The most effective approach would be for the EPA to allow states
maximum flexibility. For example, states could comply with the standards
for power plants through emissions cuts that would come from energy
efficiency and renewable energy programs. These reductions could count
as credits, easing the cost of the program for power plants and
reinforcing steps the states have already taken to address climate
change.But the courts might balk at such an interpretation, which seems to
stretch the word "standard" into a broader emissions trading program.
And the EPA has never used this approach.The administration has been sued at every step of its greenhouse gas
program, and these new rules will be challenged too. In recent years,
courts have invalidated EPA pollution rules that offer novel
interpretations if they go beyond the law's literal text. As a result,
the most economically sensible policies run the greatest risk of being
struck down.The situation isn't ideal, but it's what happens when Congress sits
on the sidelines. The action shifts to the executive branch, and then to
the courts.
Freeman makes good points, but letter writers to the paper aren't happy, in a set of letters the paper bluntly calls Earth vs. Capitalism.
And in his own way, Toles describes the political scene, the insanity of which cannot be overstated:
Kit Stolz 