San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
A supreme blow to efforts against climate change
It’s summertime, and one way to beat the scorching heat is to head to the cool confines of a movie theater to catch the latest blockbuster. Now, imagine a story about how humanity faces an existential threat, but the heroes trying to save the day are stripped of their strongest and best powers. Suddenly, the story hinges on whether they can find other ways to save future generations from looming catastrophe.
If only such a plot were fiction. But this is, essentially, the story of climate change following the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent 6-3 decision blocking the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating carbon emissions from power plants.
Carbon dioxide is the leading contributor to climate change, lingering in the atmosphere for as long as 1,000 years. The burning of coal and natural gas at power plants releases vast amounts of this heat-trapping gas (as well as methane). The Biden administration had sought to prepare sweeping rules to limit the power sector’s carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act, but the U.S. Supreme Court said it was beyond the EPA’s scope to do so.
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts found that due to the magnitude of the regulation and the potential impact on the larger economy, not just the power sector, such direction should fall to Congress, not unelected officials.
“Capping carbon dioxide emissions at a level that will force a nationwide transition away from the use of coal to generate electricity may be a sensible ‘solution to the crisis of the day,’ ” he wrote. But “a decision of such magnitude and consequence rests with Congress itself, or an agency acting pursuant to a clear delegation from that representative body.”
The consequences of this decision are wide-ranging. First, let’s be honest about Congress. It is, in this political moment, incapable of passing any meaningful legislation to address climate change. Second, the ruling potentially puts the clamps on other regulatory actions well beyond environmental concerns. Third, it leaves no room for agency expertise, much less for Congress to delegate regulatory powers to these experts.
As Justice Elena Kagan wrote in her dissent: “Congress knows what it doesn’t and can’t know when it drafts a statute; and Congress therefore gives an expert agency the power to address issues — even significant ones — as and when they arise.”
Climate change is often written
about and discussed on a global scale — terrifying United Nations reports, melting polar ice caps, extreme weather, habitat destruction and potential diaspora — but it is also a local issue.
San Antonio is warming — an obvious reality underscored by this particularly searing spring and summer. June was the hottest on record in San Antonio, with 17 days reaching triple digits. May was also the hottest on record here, with five days in triple digits.
This is in part due to La Niña, which produces warmer, drier weather. But it is also climate change. In March 2020, the Office of the Texas State Climatologist at Texas A&M University released a report showing the number of triple-digit degree days in Texas doubled over the past 40 years and would likely double again by 2036.
And this will come at a cost. The recent extreme heat has played a role in increased CPS Energy bills. Flow rates in many area rivers are nonexistent. Drought threatens the Edwards Aquifer, our primary water supply. High temperatures can be fatal.
So, what can be done?
At the local level, CPS Energy officials must move forward with a plan to repurpose and shutter its coal-fired J.K. Spruce power plant. Spruce Unit 1 should cease operations, and the idea of a carbon-neutral geothermal project there is intriguing. The newer Spruce Unit 2 should be converted to natural gas. We also support the city requiring building owners to track energy usage.
Texas — land of natural gas and methane emissions — could also be a leader in climate innovation. The state leads the nation in wind energy production, but it has yet to fully tap into its solar capacity. It could foster battery storage innovation and carbon sequestration.
And at the federal level, Congress should approve a fee-and-dividend program, as the Citizens’ Climate Lobby has proposed, that would create market incentives to transition to green energy sources.
This ruling is a blow for climate progress — but not the urgency we possess for action.
Let’s be honest — Congress won’t do
anything, but CPS Energy and
Texas could