Bush EPA regulation pitting fish against power plants to be heard by High Court.
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court decided to hear a case involving utility company efforts to overturn an environmentally friendly holding by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. The dispute in the case involves an EPA regulation that permitted energy companies to avoid the most costly technologies (closed-cycle cooling systems) that protect aquatic life in rivers and lakes surrounding power plants. The harm at issue stems from the process by which power plants take water from surrounding sources in order to cool the plant’s operations. Unfortunately, without this costly technological feature, this process does substantial damage to the aquatic life.
The Bush Administration put in place a rule that allowed these companies to undertake a case-by-case cost-benefit analysis in determining to what extent the damage to aquatic life should be mitigated by technology. Environmental groups sued, claiming that the Clean Water Act requires the use of the more expensive and effective technology, and the Circuit Court agreed—specifically holding that it was not clear that the costs of this technology could not be reasonably borne by the industry.
Although the Supreme Court will consider overruling this decision when the case comes before it, if the next president disagrees with this Bush Administration pro-business policy, the issue could quickly become moot, as the regulation could be overturned by the EPA.
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