16 States Sue U.S. over Global Warming Rule

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 3 (OneWorld) - Sixteen U.S. states have joined a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), challenging its decision to stop California from implementing a landmark law limiting global warming pollution from new automobiles.

Five nonprofit groups -- the Conservation Law Foundation, Environmental Defense, the International Center for Technology Assessment, Natural Resources Defense Counsel, and the Sierra Club -- also filed suit in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco, the same court in which California filed its legal challenge.

Fifteen other states that had adopted California�s standard as their own filed a motion to intervene in support of California.

"While global warming marches onward, EPA continues to drag its feet," said Jim Tripp, general counsel for Environmental Defense. "The agency's decision defies the law, the science, and the will of states representing nearly half of the U.S. population."

At stake are historic California standards to lower global warming pollution from passenger cars and trucks. The California standards are scheduled to take effect in model year 2009 and secure a 30-percent fleet-wide reduction by 2016. The state program would be the first binding program in the nation to strictly limit global warming pollution.

According to scientists working with Environmental Defense, cars and light trucks are one of the United States' largest sources of global warming pollution -- accounting for 16 percent of the U.S. total -- and the fastest growing.

When he blocked California's program last month, EPA Administration Stephen Johnson said energy legislation signed by President Bush will raise fuel economy standards nationwide to an average of 35 mpg by 2020. He said that was a far more effective approach to reducing greenhouse gases than a patchwork of state regulations.

But environmentalists and California officials argue the state's greenhouse gas regulations will be much more effective than the energy bill signed into law by President Bush. The California law would require auto companies to begin cutting their emissions in 2009.

"Between 2009 and 2016 the California standards will prevent a cumulative total of 58 million tons of carbon dioxide, which is about three times the amount we will prevent if we only adopt the new federal standards," California Air Resources Board Chair Mary Nichols told reporters Wednesday.

The Bush Administration's rejection of California's global warming standards marked the first time in decades the federal government had blocked the state's efforts to set tough pollution regulations.

Since the passage of the Clean Air Act 40 years ago, the EPA has granted more than 50 waivers allowing the state to pursue its own policies. That's because the federal law broadly guarantees California's right to adopt its own motor vehicle emission standards as long as they are more protective than the federal emission standards.

The 15 states and 5 nonprofit groups suing the EPA argue there are no federal greenhouse gas emission standards in place for any pollution source.

Environmentalists believe they will eventually prevail in court but that the delays brought on by the legal fight and the Bush Administration's denial could make global warming worse in the meantime.

Jim Tripp of Environmental Defense notes even if the federal courts ultimately rule in California's favor it will not automatically mean the state�s regulations will go into effect.

"In the normal course of events if the Court of Appeals found the EPA's decision arbitrary or capricious, they would then remand the state's waiver request back to the agency for further consideration," Tripp said. "So ultimately it will still be the EPA's decision."

Environmentalists believe change will most likely come 13 months from now when a new president replaces George W. Bush and appoints a new EPA Administrator. Until then, they say, global warming will continue to accelerate, in part because California's tough new standards are not being enforced.

The other states that have adopted or committed to adopt the California standards include: Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Utah, Vermont, and Washington.

Collectively, California and the other states account for nearly one half of the U.S. population and about 45 percent of all new vehicle sales nationwide.