The DC Circuit just struck down the Trump administration’s Affordable Clean Energy Rule which had replaced the Obama era Clean Power Plan for power plant C02: EPA “failed to rely on its own judgment and expertise, and instead based its decision on an erroneous view of the law.”

The Opinion faults EPA saying the clean air act doesn’t require it to “turn its back on” generation shifting (the key element of the Clean Power Plan) which it says had been shown to be a cost effective way to reduce electricity sector emissions.

The court utterly rejects the Trump EPA view that their hands are tied: “there is no basis—grammatical, contextual, or otherwise” for the view that EPA can only require controls/reductions at@the source. Quite a loss for Wheeler and Trump on the way out the door.

Today's decision clears the deck for the Biden EPA team to adopt a strong new rule for powerplants and puts pressure back on Congress to pass a climate regime because a fresh legislative approach would be most cost effective and comprehensive. EPA on offense is a powerful tool.

It's still amazing to me that the Trump team didn't offer a backup argument that their narrow take on the Clean Air Act is at least "reasonable". They might have gotten away with that. But nope. Hubris. Shows you the cynicism: they just wanted to block a future admin from acting.