United states

Is the federal government dooming efforts to address climate change?

The Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling limiting the EPA’s authority to limit emissions from power plants is the latest blow to US efforts to combat climate change, adding to a renewed sense of pessimism that the political system of the US will handle a matter at the federal level.

While the ruling, backed by the court’s new conservative majority, doesn’t negate efforts by state governments to take action on the planet, it does put a new limit on the EPA.

It also signals the Supreme Court’s openness to limiting the administration’s powers at the EPA and beyond. The three conservative justices nominated by former President Trump have shifted the court sharply to the right, a shift that could overshadow the court for decades.

Republican officials also remain opposed to taking action on climate change and appear poised to regain the majority in the House of Representatives this fall and possibly the Senate as well.

And even if Democrats retain the Senate, they have so far been unable to push through major legislation to address climate change because of opposition from one of them, Sen. Joe Manchin (DW.Va.).

The Biden administration has set a number of ambitious climate change goals, including cutting the nation’s emissions in half by 2030. President Biden also signed an executive order that will make the federal government carbon neutral by 2050.

But decisions like the one handed down by the Supreme Court this week, as well as congressional gridlock, threaten those goals, as well as the prospect of a presidential bid for Trump, who has withdrawn the U.S. from the Paris climate accord and expressed doubt about the science of climate change.

Barry Rabe, a professor of environmental policy at the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment, called the conservative Supreme Court and sharply divided Congress “a serious set of constraints on executive power.”

“I think Congress still has a lot of leeway if they decide to use it,” Rabe said, adding, “I think there are some real questions [about] how far the court goes with limiting federal agencies.

Democratically governed countries can pick up some of the environmental policy slack. California introduced the nation’s strictest vehicle emissions standards, and a dozen others have since adopted them, leading to a mixed approach across the U.S.

“Given the impasse in Congress, action at the state level is essential,” said Jason Smerden, a professor at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.

Still, experts say action at the state level can’t supersede that at the federal level.

“Climate policy is environmental policy and it is economic policy, and it will likely require the development of many different policy levers and actions over time to meaningfully address the problem,” said Sasha Mackler, executive director of the Center for Bilateral policy energy program.

Democrats in Congress are now taking another shot at a reconciliation package that could include funding for climate programs, including a clean energy tax credit, in addition to other Biden priorities. But the latest attempt to pass the bill along party lines failed in December amid opposition from Manchin, dampening optimism about its prospects for now.

Advocates say now is the time to act, given the possibility of Republican control of the House in January. The GOP only needs to pick up a few seats to regain the majority, and it seems highly doubtful that climate action will be on the agenda of a GOP majority.

“They have an extremely narrow window of opportunity and they need to take advantage of it,” Ellen Scaels, the Sunrise Movement’s director of communications, said of the current Congress.

Josh Fried, who directs the climate and energy program at the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way, said the targeted reconciliation package, which includes investments in clean energy combined with the bipartisan infrastructure law passed last year, would have a significant impact on the federal fight against climate change.

“If they don’t, it will make it harder to scale market demand for clean energy and deploy it at the speed we need,” he said.

Still, some are more optimistic than others that Congress can take bipartisan action on climate even if Republicans take the House majority.

Mackler pointed to the climate and energy strategy unveiled by House Republicans last month, arguing that lawmakers from both sides of the aisle could put together a package that touches on production and supply as well as energy transition proposals.

“I think there are certainly Republicans who are getting much more serious about the challenge of climate change,” he said.

Advocates like Sciales are pushing for Biden to get more involved in pushing a reconciliation package through Congress, mindful of the limited time Democrats have guaranteed majorities in both the House and Senate. They are also pressing Biden to take other unilateral actions, such as phasing out oil drilling on federal lands, something the president actually promotes more as an immediate solution to high gas prices.

“It’s really a short-sighted decision in light of the fact that in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we can’t burn what we have right now, let alone create new sources,” Smerdon said.

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Experts say industry has a critical role to play in the transition to clean energy sources. Industries could, of course, take steps on their own, but it is widely accepted that government intervention is needed to speed up the process sufficiently.

Mackler said he remains optimistic about the U.S.’s ability to meet its climate goals through public-private cooperation, noting the growth of the solar industry, which he said would have defied expectations a decade ago.

But, he warned, “the longer we wait, the harder and steeper the hill to climb.”