High court backs EPA in clean air case; can override state decisions

January 22, 2004

High court backs EPA in clean air case

By Richard Willing, USA TODAY WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court handed environmentalists a victory Wednesday, ruling in an Alaska case that the U.S. government can force states to follow federal anti-pollution measures rather than less restrictive state regulations.

By a 5-4 vote, the justices said the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (news - web sites) can make Alaska install equipment designed to reduce pollution by 90% on a power generator at a zinc mine near the Arctic Circle town of Noatak. Because the mine is a major employer in that area, state regulators had agreed to let it operate with less costly equipment that cut pollution by 30%.At issue was whether the federal Clean Air Act empowers the EPA to override state decisions. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (news - web sites) typically has sided with the court's conservatives in favoring states' rights in such disputes. But in the Alaska case, she joined the court's four more liberal members - Stephen Breyer (news - web sites), Ruth Bader Ginsburg (news - web sites), David Souter (news - web sites) and John Paul Stevens (news - web sites) - in backing the federal government's authority."We fail to see why Congress, having expressly endorsed an expansive surveillance role for EPA ... would then implicitly preclude the agency from forcing states to comply," Ginsburg wrote for the majority.Justice Anthony Kennedy (news - web sites), writing for the dissenters, said the opinion clashed with the "principles that preserve the integrity of states in our federal system."The court errs, in my judgment ... based on nothing more than substantive disagreement with the state's discretionary judgment."Supporters of increased legal protections for the environment praised the decision. The ruling "is good news for the lungs of every American and shows that the federal government has an obligation to secure clean, safe air," said Vickie Patton, senior attorney for Environmental Defense, an advocacy group that filed a brief supporting the EPA. Jerry Taylor, director of natural resource studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, accused the court of "second-guessing" a reasonable local decision."If the costs and benefits of the mining regulations at issue primarily affect Alaskans, and Alaskans are content with the trade-offs involved, what business is it of the EPA?" Taylor asked.The decision, which upheld a ruling of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (news - web sites), came in the first of eight environmental regulation disputes the court will review in the next few months.http://story.news./news?tmpl=story & u=/usatoday/20040122/ts_usatoday/highcourtbacksepaincleanaircase