States Plan Suit to Prod U.S. on Global Warming

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October 4, 2003States Plan Suit to Prod U.S. on Global WarmingBy DANNY HAKIM

 

DETROIT, Oct. 3 — California plans to sue the Environmental Protection Agency

over the Bush administration's recent decision that the agency lacked the

authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from tailpipes and other sources,

state regulators said on Friday.

 

Nine other states, including New York, Massachusetts and Oregon, as well as

environmental groups like the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense

Council, are expected to join the suit. The legal strategy, an effort to prod

federal action on global warming, sets up a battle between the Bush

administration and the states over policy on climate change.

 

In California, the suit is also seen as an effort to stave off challenges to the

state's plan to regulate automotive emissions of greenhouse gases.

 

" This issue is vital to the future of our state, " Gov. Gray Davis said in a

statement. " It affects important resources like our rich agricultural lands;

Sierra snowpack; the safety of our forests and our seaside communities. "

 

Mark Merchant, a spokesman for the E.P.A., said: " It's apparent that California

is reading the Clean Air Act one way and the E.P.A. is reading it another way.

There's a difference of opinion there, and California has decided to ask the

court to make a decision. "

 

The move comes after suits filed by several states challenging the Bush

administration's loosening of regulations over power plants.

 

Mr. Davis's administration announced on Friday that the suit against the E.P.A.

would come in a matter of days. California and the other states and

environmental groups planned to make a joint announcement within a few weeks,

but the Davis administration moved up its timetable because of the impending

recall election, people briefed on the planned lawsuit said.

 

The suit stems from the E.P.A.'s decision, announced in late August, that it did

not have the authority to regulate emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases

linked to global warming trends. Many scientists, but not all, say such trends

are leading to a variety of health and environmental problems.

 

The E.P.A. decision came in response to a petition from environmental groups to

take action on climate change and was a reversal of the Clinton administration's

policy on the matter. Environmental groups and regulators in several states say

the Clean Air Act does give the federal government such authority.

 

" If the United States is ever going to regulate greenhouse gases, it will start

with a victory in this lawsuit, " said David Bookbinder, Washington legal

director for the Sierra Club.

 

The Clean Air Act directs the government to regulate air pollutants, including

" any physical, chemical, biological radioactive substance or matter which is

emitted into or otherwise enters ambient air " if they " may reasonably be

anticipated to endanger public health or welfare. " Climate change is included as

a possible harm to public welfare.

 

The case could resolve whether greenhouse gases will be classified as air

pollutants.

 

The nine other states expected to join the suit are New York, Washington,

Oregon, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maine, Illinois, Vermont and Connecticut,

officials in California said Friday.

 

Because of its history of smog problems, California has long been the most

aggressive state on matters of air policy. Because the state's air policies

predated the Clean Air Act, it has the authority to set its own standards, and

other states can pick California's more aggressive rules over the federal

government's.

 

Last year, California's Legislature became the first and, so far, only

legislative body in the nation to enact a measure aimed at curbing global

warming emissions from cars.

 

The legislation put the state at odds with the auto industry, which is widely

expected to sue the state. Environmental groups are concerned that the E.P.A.'s

ruling could be used as a legal argument to undercut California's authority to

regulate greenhouse gases.

 

" California has the dual motive of wanting the federal government to do the job

and to push back on the attempt of the Bush administration to interfere with

California's attempt to do its job, " said David D. Doniger, a policy director at

the Natural Resources Defense Council.

 

Mr. Merchant said the E.P.A. action did not necessarily preclude California from

acting on its own.

 

The auto industry has yet to file suit because the specifics of the measure

itself have not been written. The ultimate tenor of the regulation depends on

who occupies the governor's office, because the chairman of the state's Air

Resources Board is an appointee of the governor.

 

Arnold Schwarzenegger, the leading Republican candidate whose enthusiasm for

Hummers has unsettled environmentalists, supports the legislation.

 

" California's landmark legislation to cut greenhouse gases is now law, " a

statement on his Web site says. " I will work to implement it and to win the

expected challenges in court along the way. "

 

Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company |

 

 

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