Last month, we wrote about the two key rulings that curbed the EPA’s ability to enforce climate-damaging pollution in everything from our water and air to emissions and greenhouse gases. While it’s still early days following those rulings, there’s growing evidence that, as most legal experts predicted, there will be ripple effects throughout the growing body of environmental judgments that relied on the doctrines that had been a part of the legal landscape for the last 40 years. Here’s where a handful of key rulings and proceedings stand and what they could mean for the fight against climate change.

A Quick Summary of the Supreme Court Rulings That Curbed Climate Action

There is no question about it: The conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, has targeted the EPA and its actions in its latest session.

First and most significantly, the Supreme Court gutted the EPA’s ability to enforce climate rules when they upended what is known as the Chevron Doctrine, a 40-year-old ruling that formed the backbone of several key climate rulings around the country. The Chevron Doctrine, or Chevron Deference as it’s also known, essentially gave judicial deference to government agencies (and those agents) with more extensive expertise. Essentially, it put climate enforcement in the hands of on-the-ground experts with knowledge in the space rather than in the hands of judges with little to no experience in environmental science. When the Supreme Court upended the doctrine, it stripped the government agencies (including the EPA) of the right to interpret any legal ambiguities. Instead, it shifted that burden back to the courts.

In addition to this ruling, the Supreme Court also eliminated a six-year timeframe for lawsuits that target federal regulations, essentially opening the floodgates for corporations to bring lawsuits against any regulation at any time. That means that the statutory deadline for filing lawsuits against regulations enacted by Congress is now a moot point, allowing well-funded corporations to bring a legal challenge at any time.

There’s also the ruling that came down this summer dealing with interstate pollution. The ruling in Ohio vs. EPA challenged what was known as the “good neighbor” plan, which essentially aimed to hold power plants and factories in the Midwest and West accountable for ozone pollution that drifts into Eastern states and causes everything from asthma and lung disease to premature death. The Supreme Court suspended the plan for the time being. Experts saw the decision as a blow to the Biden administration, forcing it to hold off on enforcing regulations for the foreseeable future.

The conservative Supreme Court majority also stripped the EPA of its ability to address water pollution and power plant emissions in this year's session. It’s important to note that these rulings resulted from long-term efforts by the conservative right to curb environmental regulations and enforcement by various federal agencies.

The Current Climate Cases Hung up in Court as a Result of the Supreme Court’s Rulings

Robust reporting at The Grist enumerates several climate cases tied up in court due to this flood of massive change around the enforcement and legality of climate and environmental protections.

As the story notes, a solar project is currently caught up in one of the many issues being re-litigated in light of the upheaval the conservative majority on the Supreme Court caused with its rulings this summer. A solar battery project in Montana is at the heart of the dispute. As The Grist reports: “Utilities had challenged the agency’s decision to make a solar and battery storage facility in Montana eligible for benefits under a 1978 law that requires utilities to purchase power from small renewable energy projects. Utility groups argued that the project in question shouldn’t qualify because its combined power capacity exceeded the size allowed under that law. The D.C. Circuit, invoking Chevron, deferred to the agency in upholding its decision.”

Following the Loper Bright decision (the one that undid the Chevron Deference), as E&E News reported on July 3, “In a short order Tuesday, the justices granted a request to reverse a lower court ruling affirming the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s approval of the Broadview solar array and battery storage facility in Billings, Montana. The order was one of nine directing federal courts to reconsider decisions on everything from Internal Revenue Service audits to the removal of officials from federal offices, based on Friday’s Chevron ruling.”

There are also a spate of Appellate courts referring other cases back to lower courts following the upheaval caused by the Supreme Court. As Grist notes, there’s a case working its way back through lower courts, that focuses on the responsibility that retirement fund managers have to ensure that the investments they choose take climate risks into consideration.

Another case challenging automotive emissions rules has been referred back to the litigants to explain how the ending of the Chevron Deference impacted their arguments. The parties have 21 days to build their responses, and as Grist points out, the case could have a significant impact on transportation emissions rules going forward.

What it All Means for Climate Efforts

While we are not legal experts here at Climatebase, one thing is clear: The work of the conservative majority on the Supreme Court has unquestionably undermined the ability of the EPA and other government agencies to enforce environmental protections and slow down climate change.

The Chevron rule itself provides the underlying doctrine for more than 17,000 cases, and with the additional layers of the other rulings passed down by the Supreme Court this summer, more climate cases will likely be challenged and brought to court, bogging down an already jam-packed legal system and shiting more power into the judiciary than ever before. Litigating these cases will take incredible amounts of time, effort, and money, with a strong bias toward corporations with unmitigated coffers of cash and the ability to drag lawsuits out for as long as need be.

As Grist points out, the sheer fact that the Supreme Court has gutted the EPA and other federal agencies’ ability to enforce regulations will likely discourage agencies from pursuing the policies needed to slow climate change. When you add in the ongoing gridlock in Congress, the outlook for climate action through the courts is relatively dire. We’ll have to wait and see how these and other cases shake out to know for sure what the future holds, but, for now, the outlook isn’t great.

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