December 7th, 2024 by WCBC Radio

West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey's office on Friday argued a challenge, asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to declare unlawful the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s recently-released new rule on existing coal-, and new natural gas-powered plants.

That rule would force power plants fueled by coal or natural gas to capture smokestack emissions using currently unworkable technologies or shut down. It would regulate those plants under the Clean Air Act by imposing more stringent emissions standards. The rule ignored 2022’s rebuke from the U.S. Supreme Court in West Virginia v. EPA, which warned that EPA should not use a narrow regulatory provision to force coal-fired power plants into retirement en masse.

“We are confident with our argument that this rule strips the states of important discretion while using technologies that don’t work in the real world,” Attorney General Morrisey said. “The landmark West Virginia v. EPA is clear that Congress placed real limits on what the EPA can do, and we will ensure those limits are upheld."

“This green new deal agenda the Biden administration continues to force onto the people is setting up the plants to fail and therefore shutter, altering the nation’s already stretched grid. We need the plants to stay open.”