The religion of transition using the EPA to halt power plants, emission controls that cannot be attained and mandating renewable energy not matter the consequences. The EPA got specifically called out by SCOTUS earlier this year, it didn't make a difference, until now. Hopefully for EPA, they will be restrained in making law since the Chevron rule is history. Hopefully this will get some control back from this out of control agency just halting projects on a whim. Of course, behind the guise of climate change nonsense.
So, it's great the EPA may have been cut down to some lesser degree, but then there is still the Department of Interior, (DOI), the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to hamstring energy development, while promoting and spending billions on renewable energy whatever the consequences. The BLM ignores the rights of communities and its concern for its resources as it the agency ignores all comers and plows through sensitive areas of historic tribal sites, impacts endangered species and all wildlife with abandon to build the SunZia 515 miles of twin transmission lines to hook into 1000 wind turbines being constructed in 3 counties in New Mexico. Now BLM is currently mowing down thousands of Joshua trees in the Joshua Tree National Park to spread thousands of solar panels across the Mojave. Both projects are to bring electricity to power 3 million homes in CA. CA is desperate to get all of this underway by 2025 into 2026 when the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant is shuttered (prematurely we should add). And, as so happens, FERC streamlines its plans and permitting process to make it harder for states to opt out on their 20 year transmission plan to cross cross the country at an initial cost by Federal Electricity Regulatory Commission of $1 billion. FERC is corralled PJM Interconnection that regulates a single coal plant in Maryland, that soon shells out $6.8 billion for a 13 state transmission line projects since Maryland has decided to close its one reliable coal plant. Now, Department of Energy steps in to take the lead on the main contact for project devleopers (Big Wind and Solar) so they wont' have to navigate different processes with 8 federal agencies. Unlike a natural gas pipeline company that will have to stick by the rules.
The agencies have become so powerful, it will take more than the SCOTUS revocation of the Chevron rule. These agencies are hell bent on getting this country into a made for government and its power brokers disaster, if it takes them getting a system that delivers energy that cannot be controlled or affordable.
Today, Biden comes up with more millions to bring the offshore wind turbines back from the dead that will start construction once again along the Atlantic coast. Gov. Murphy of NJ was to the moon and sent Biden a tweet "Thank you POTUS for bringing us one step closer to 100% clean energy future. That's a good one but he's in a bind once he singlehandedly killed the PennEast pipeline which was completed except one permit from NJ, - denied. Murphy is all in on wind, of course since NJ electricity rates are through the roof and the state is experiencing outages. (Uh Oh, climate change) but Murpy fails to mention to his taxpayers that he earmarked hundreds of millions of dollars for the projects. So, another wind developer Atlantic Shores will be sending out high sonar signals along the ocean floor and then begin laying cable for onshore connections the first quarter of 2025 so again, the impact will begin. Of course, the citizens along the coast are as mad as hell, but again, FERC, BOEM, their Governor give a rats ass. And now instead of hearing the pleas of the people that the don't want this visual blight offshore, Atlantic Shores will build turbine arrays within a 102,124 acre block and suck it up peasants we're bringing 200, 1,048' high turbines in from 12 miles offshore to 8.7 miles offshore so you can really enjoy the little red lights blinking on and off closer to shore for your visual pleasure.
On it goes and it will all create a costly, unreliable electric hodgepodge from coast to coast and north to south, but they'll never reach their goal to end fossil fuels since no matter how hard they try, they can't ignore physics as it pertains to the grid. So, they tell themselves it must be done but like everything the government does, its mania will bring the country to a new world just like the old world in 1882.
At the urging of the federal government, various private groups sue the federal government over some issue. Rather than go to court, the Federal government decides to settle the lawsuit, one they could have easily won on the merits. This settlement is then blessed by the courts and enacted by the federal agencies that encouraged the lawsuit in the first place. This bypasses congress, laws, rulemaking, and allows the bureaucrats to dictate major policy changes without review or oversite. At the end of the day everyone gets to claim no responsibility for the new laws thus enacted. Congress never passed them. The bureaucracy claims they were "forced to write them by the court and the terms of the settlement. The court says "hey, we just rendered a judgement on the case the government decided to settle."
Hopefully this is the next issue the Supremes will tackle - Chevron repeal allows the courts to start questioning these settlements and stop deferring to the agencies that are making them. If the settlement creates a significant policy change, the court should insist that change MUST be blessed by congress.
As an example, between 2009 and 2012, EPA chose not to defend itself in over 60 lawsuits from special interest advocacy groups. These cases resulted in settlement agreements and EPA publishing more than 100 new regulations - including the Clean Power Plan.
Another example - The inflation reduction act required the federal government to hold lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico. The administration encouraged groups to sue over the leases. The feds then entered into a dubious settlement agreement with the Sierra Club. This stipulations in the settlement effectively ended leasing. Chevron sued over the settlement and won an injunction against it. The Feds immediately appealed the injunction, and suddenly seem more than interested in fighting things out in court.
Yes, they settled the case with the Sierra club, and when Chevron challenged that settlement, decided to fight things out in court.
"I have noticed that legal issues tend to swing from one extreme to another." Boy do I have an appreciation fot that! California family court is , or was a pretty hostile place for a man, I am not sure if things have improved. The whole time I am getting drug through the coals, I kept getting told it was because it was because women had rough before. Hu?
You raise a good question. The Chevron deference is a difficult case. It boils down to whom you trust. The well-intended legislators do not necessarily have the required expertise in issues dealing with medicine, health, energy and others to name a few. I recognize that career bureaucrats are not beholden to the public, but that means endless litigation and leaving it to the courts. No easy answers!
In the Reagan era, there were fewer than 5,000 regulations. What did Chevron do? It gave us hundreds of thousands. Other cases need to be reconsidered. For example, Massachusetts sued the EPA to demand they regulate CO2 because of the believed harm to Massachusetts residents due to "climate change." EPA said they didn't have the authority. The Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA said not only that EPA had the authority, but that it MUST regulate CO2.
Consider these three, for a taste of the vacillating contrasts at SCOTUS:
Plessy v. Ferguson: Constitution does NOT prohibit assigning schools by race.
Brown v. Board of Education: Constitution DOES prohibit assigning schools by race.
Morgan v. Hennigan: Constitution REQUIRES assigning schools by race.
The Chevron deference was a significant problem allowing the ballooning of the unaccountable administrative 4th branch of government (now 438 agencies totaling 2.2 million unelected employees) to wrest control from the legitimate three branches. The other part of the problem that Loper Bright v. Raimondo doesn't address is the almost unfathomable concentration of woke ideologues within the ranks of the bureaucracy paired with the civil service employee protections afforded all but about 4,000 of the more than 2 million unelected bureaucrats. Trump made an attempt to open up this closed system to more active executive oversight by issuing an executive order late in his presidency that would have required all of the agencies to create a schedule (Schedule F) of all employees in "confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating" positions. These employees would have been exempted from the civil service employee protections that make them nearly impossible to fire. These exemptions from protection are supported by the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act and would have made an estimated 50,000 bureaucrats at-will employees serving at the discretion of the executive. Unfortunately, Executive Order 13957 was rescinded 2 days after Biden was sworn in. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM - yes one of the 438 agencies) has attempted a blocking move to prevent reinstatement of Schedule F by issuing a new rule in April of this year making the civil service employee protections more permanent. As OPM likely can't point to actual legislation granting it the authority to extend such protections, the Loper Bright decision will likely make the new rule vulnerable to challenge, reopening the door for Trump to move forward with Schedule F if reelected.
The issue with deference is that it defers to experts who are not guaranteed to be objective. Courts are a way better place to decide on disputes over regulations. Sure, judges are not subject matter experts, but they can and will depose testimonies from (hopefully) both expert opinions and counter-opinions. Chevron deference was made at a time where the common mindset in agencies was to serve the American people by objectively setting reasonable standards. Unfortunately, those days are long gone now. Agencies hat set off on a path of making their science and rules adhere to a radical political agenda rather than to scientific objectivity. Correction of this course in court is highly welcome.
The decision is not out of the ordinary. As a former Ferc regulator, I remember when the 9th Circuit told Ferc that it couldn’t punt and rely on fish and wildlife agencies to determine effects on hydropower projects. That required Ferc to develop it own expertise to render an independent decision.
I suspect that the courts will have to also develop their own expertise and rely on independent consults or their own staffs to educate the justices on the nuances of each case. This won’t be easy and it may in many cases be problematic to find experts that are truly independent. This may mean more delays and controversy in deciding cases which industry may regret in the long run.
The vast majority of suits in the last twenty years were brought by the wreckers, not the builders. Delaying the wreckers, like the Sierra Club and the National Resources Defense Council and Friends of the Earth and ... is a plus.
“Quantifying any targeted benefit to the environment - as justification for the rules, is an other example of a missing information for regulations imposed"
As both a former federal employee and a long-time regulatory practitioner in the oil & gas industry, my view is this is a long needed "course correction." I think various executive agencies over the past 10-15 years have engaged in "mission creep." This evolution has accelerated under the Biden Administration. Chevron was about "deference," not abdication of Congress' obligation to legislate. Objectively, there is little doubt particular agencies (like EPA) have clearly abused their privileges. Time to rebalance and (hopefully) return a bit of sanity to the rulemaking process...
As someone paid to interpret government regulations as a consultant to companies, it's totally out of control.
Employees at federal agencies don't see regulations as enacting the will of congress, or God forbid, the American people. They see them as a personal wish list. Just thinking up stuff that might be a good idea and might benefit someone or other. And completely oblivious to either cost, or enforceability of the regulation.
The religion of transition using the EPA to halt power plants, emission controls that cannot be attained and mandating renewable energy not matter the consequences. The EPA got specifically called out by SCOTUS earlier this year, it didn't make a difference, until now. Hopefully for EPA, they will be restrained in making law since the Chevron rule is history. Hopefully this will get some control back from this out of control agency just halting projects on a whim. Of course, behind the guise of climate change nonsense.
So, it's great the EPA may have been cut down to some lesser degree, but then there is still the Department of Interior, (DOI), the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to hamstring energy development, while promoting and spending billions on renewable energy whatever the consequences. The BLM ignores the rights of communities and its concern for its resources as it the agency ignores all comers and plows through sensitive areas of historic tribal sites, impacts endangered species and all wildlife with abandon to build the SunZia 515 miles of twin transmission lines to hook into 1000 wind turbines being constructed in 3 counties in New Mexico. Now BLM is currently mowing down thousands of Joshua trees in the Joshua Tree National Park to spread thousands of solar panels across the Mojave. Both projects are to bring electricity to power 3 million homes in CA. CA is desperate to get all of this underway by 2025 into 2026 when the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant is shuttered (prematurely we should add). And, as so happens, FERC streamlines its plans and permitting process to make it harder for states to opt out on their 20 year transmission plan to cross cross the country at an initial cost by Federal Electricity Regulatory Commission of $1 billion. FERC is corralled PJM Interconnection that regulates a single coal plant in Maryland, that soon shells out $6.8 billion for a 13 state transmission line projects since Maryland has decided to close its one reliable coal plant. Now, Department of Energy steps in to take the lead on the main contact for project devleopers (Big Wind and Solar) so they wont' have to navigate different processes with 8 federal agencies. Unlike a natural gas pipeline company that will have to stick by the rules.
The agencies have become so powerful, it will take more than the SCOTUS revocation of the Chevron rule. These agencies are hell bent on getting this country into a made for government and its power brokers disaster, if it takes them getting a system that delivers energy that cannot be controlled or affordable.
Today, Biden comes up with more millions to bring the offshore wind turbines back from the dead that will start construction once again along the Atlantic coast. Gov. Murphy of NJ was to the moon and sent Biden a tweet "Thank you POTUS for bringing us one step closer to 100% clean energy future. That's a good one but he's in a bind once he singlehandedly killed the PennEast pipeline which was completed except one permit from NJ, - denied. Murphy is all in on wind, of course since NJ electricity rates are through the roof and the state is experiencing outages. (Uh Oh, climate change) but Murpy fails to mention to his taxpayers that he earmarked hundreds of millions of dollars for the projects. So, another wind developer Atlantic Shores will be sending out high sonar signals along the ocean floor and then begin laying cable for onshore connections the first quarter of 2025 so again, the impact will begin. Of course, the citizens along the coast are as mad as hell, but again, FERC, BOEM, their Governor give a rats ass. And now instead of hearing the pleas of the people that the don't want this visual blight offshore, Atlantic Shores will build turbine arrays within a 102,124 acre block and suck it up peasants we're bringing 200, 1,048' high turbines in from 12 miles offshore to 8.7 miles offshore so you can really enjoy the little red lights blinking on and off closer to shore for your visual pleasure.
On it goes and it will all create a costly, unreliable electric hodgepodge from coast to coast and north to south, but they'll never reach their goal to end fossil fuels since no matter how hard they try, they can't ignore physics as it pertains to the grid. So, they tell themselves it must be done but like everything the government does, its mania will bring the country to a new world just like the old world in 1882.
Use this to fix Sue and Settle.
At the urging of the federal government, various private groups sue the federal government over some issue. Rather than go to court, the Federal government decides to settle the lawsuit, one they could have easily won on the merits. This settlement is then blessed by the courts and enacted by the federal agencies that encouraged the lawsuit in the first place. This bypasses congress, laws, rulemaking, and allows the bureaucrats to dictate major policy changes without review or oversite. At the end of the day everyone gets to claim no responsibility for the new laws thus enacted. Congress never passed them. The bureaucracy claims they were "forced to write them by the court and the terms of the settlement. The court says "hey, we just rendered a judgement on the case the government decided to settle."
Hopefully this is the next issue the Supremes will tackle - Chevron repeal allows the courts to start questioning these settlements and stop deferring to the agencies that are making them. If the settlement creates a significant policy change, the court should insist that change MUST be blessed by congress.
As an example, between 2009 and 2012, EPA chose not to defend itself in over 60 lawsuits from special interest advocacy groups. These cases resulted in settlement agreements and EPA publishing more than 100 new regulations - including the Clean Power Plan.
Another example - The inflation reduction act required the federal government to hold lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico. The administration encouraged groups to sue over the leases. The feds then entered into a dubious settlement agreement with the Sierra Club. This stipulations in the settlement effectively ended leasing. Chevron sued over the settlement and won an injunction against it. The Feds immediately appealed the injunction, and suddenly seem more than interested in fighting things out in court.
Yes, they settled the case with the Sierra club, and when Chevron challenged that settlement, decided to fight things out in court.
Imagine the advancements American ingenuity can lead with modern technologies and a reasonable regulatory environment.
That is truly an exciting proposition made possible by this ruling. Its importance cannot be overstated.
"I have noticed that legal issues tend to swing from one extreme to another." Boy do I have an appreciation fot that! California family court is , or was a pretty hostile place for a man, I am not sure if things have improved. The whole time I am getting drug through the coals, I kept getting told it was because it was because women had rough before. Hu?
meh . . . I am always wary of the blow-back sweeping changes take.
This is also going to affect medicine, food, travel, etc . . . maybe not all for the best
we may just wind up with 50 sets of rules - not just one
I would have thought "Mend it , don't end it" would be a true conservative philosophy
You raise a good question. The Chevron deference is a difficult case. It boils down to whom you trust. The well-intended legislators do not necessarily have the required expertise in issues dealing with medicine, health, energy and others to name a few. I recognize that career bureaucrats are not beholden to the public, but that means endless litigation and leaving it to the courts. No easy answers!
Bravo!
Big River (aka Robert Bryce) keeps rolling along.
Is there a way to apply Loper Bright to the California Air Resources Board? How do they get away with mandating electric cars, and locomotives!
In the Reagan era, there were fewer than 5,000 regulations. What did Chevron do? It gave us hundreds of thousands. Other cases need to be reconsidered. For example, Massachusetts sued the EPA to demand they regulate CO2 because of the believed harm to Massachusetts residents due to "climate change." EPA said they didn't have the authority. The Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA said not only that EPA had the authority, but that it MUST regulate CO2.
Consider these three, for a taste of the vacillating contrasts at SCOTUS:
Plessy v. Ferguson: Constitution does NOT prohibit assigning schools by race.
Brown v. Board of Education: Constitution DOES prohibit assigning schools by race.
Morgan v. Hennigan: Constitution REQUIRES assigning schools by race.
The Chevron deference was a significant problem allowing the ballooning of the unaccountable administrative 4th branch of government (now 438 agencies totaling 2.2 million unelected employees) to wrest control from the legitimate three branches. The other part of the problem that Loper Bright v. Raimondo doesn't address is the almost unfathomable concentration of woke ideologues within the ranks of the bureaucracy paired with the civil service employee protections afforded all but about 4,000 of the more than 2 million unelected bureaucrats. Trump made an attempt to open up this closed system to more active executive oversight by issuing an executive order late in his presidency that would have required all of the agencies to create a schedule (Schedule F) of all employees in "confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating" positions. These employees would have been exempted from the civil service employee protections that make them nearly impossible to fire. These exemptions from protection are supported by the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act and would have made an estimated 50,000 bureaucrats at-will employees serving at the discretion of the executive. Unfortunately, Executive Order 13957 was rescinded 2 days after Biden was sworn in. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM - yes one of the 438 agencies) has attempted a blocking move to prevent reinstatement of Schedule F by issuing a new rule in April of this year making the civil service employee protections more permanent. As OPM likely can't point to actual legislation granting it the authority to extend such protections, the Loper Bright decision will likely make the new rule vulnerable to challenge, reopening the door for Trump to move forward with Schedule F if reelected.
The Civil Service System was Woodrow Wilson's idea to protect the bureaucracy from democracy. It needs to be replaced by the Mandarin system.
The issue with deference is that it defers to experts who are not guaranteed to be objective. Courts are a way better place to decide on disputes over regulations. Sure, judges are not subject matter experts, but they can and will depose testimonies from (hopefully) both expert opinions and counter-opinions. Chevron deference was made at a time where the common mindset in agencies was to serve the American people by objectively setting reasonable standards. Unfortunately, those days are long gone now. Agencies hat set off on a path of making their science and rules adhere to a radical political agenda rather than to scientific objectivity. Correction of this course in court is highly welcome.
The decision is not out of the ordinary. As a former Ferc regulator, I remember when the 9th Circuit told Ferc that it couldn’t punt and rely on fish and wildlife agencies to determine effects on hydropower projects. That required Ferc to develop it own expertise to render an independent decision.
I suspect that the courts will have to also develop their own expertise and rely on independent consults or their own staffs to educate the justices on the nuances of each case. This won’t be easy and it may in many cases be problematic to find experts that are truly independent. This may mean more delays and controversy in deciding cases which industry may regret in the long run.
The vast majority of suits in the last twenty years were brought by the wreckers, not the builders. Delaying the wreckers, like the Sierra Club and the National Resources Defense Council and Friends of the Earth and ... is a plus.
“Quantifying any targeted benefit to the environment - as justification for the rules, is an other example of a missing information for regulations imposed"
As both a former federal employee and a long-time regulatory practitioner in the oil & gas industry, my view is this is a long needed "course correction." I think various executive agencies over the past 10-15 years have engaged in "mission creep." This evolution has accelerated under the Biden Administration. Chevron was about "deference," not abdication of Congress' obligation to legislate. Objectively, there is little doubt particular agencies (like EPA) have clearly abused their privileges. Time to rebalance and (hopefully) return a bit of sanity to the rulemaking process...
As someone paid to interpret government regulations as a consultant to companies, it's totally out of control.
Employees at federal agencies don't see regulations as enacting the will of congress, or God forbid, the American people. They see them as a personal wish list. Just thinking up stuff that might be a good idea and might benefit someone or other. And completely oblivious to either cost, or enforceability of the regulation.