Supreme Court Says Greenhouse Gases Are 'Pollutants'

WASHINGTON — In a decision that could lead to broad regulation of greenhouse gases as pollutants, the Supreme Court ruled Monday that the EPA must consider putting controls on carbon dioxide and other gases in automobile exhaust.

The Environmental Protection Agency had declared that it did not have authority to consider the substances as pollutants under the Clean Air Act, and would not do so even if it could.

Splitting along a familiar 5-4 line, the court declared that EPA had to consider the merits of such action, even if controlling greenhouse gases in car exhaust would have a small effect on the worldwide buildup of the planet-warming gases.

In a stinging dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia said the decision was based on such a sweeping definition of air pollution that "everything airborne, from Frisbees to flatulence, qualifies as an 'air pollutant.' "

But Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the majority, said EPA had not given a "reasoned explanation" for its refusal to even decide whether greenhouse gases are causing climate change.

Overturning an appeals court decision that had backed the agency, the court ruled that EPA has that authority and must consider the "merits" of requests to use it.

EPA had turned down a petition by the Sierra Club and other private groups that it issue regulations restricting the quantity of greenhouse gases from new autos.

To do so would undermine President Bush's efforts to achieve technical solutions to global warming and his attempts to pressure other governments to take action, the agency said.

Massachusetts and 11 other states then joined 13 environmental organizations in a lawsuit, seeking to force the agency to consider the petition.

Both lawyers who supported the decision and those who condemned it agreed Monday that it opens the door for use of the Clean Air Act to restrict greenhouse gases not only from cars, but industries as well.

"I was very disappointed and surprised by the ruling," said Ann R. Klee, a former Bush-appointed EPA general counsel who now represents industries, adding that the ruling likely will lead to "more litigation" and requests for action against industrial emissions of global warming gases.

Tim Profeta, director of the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University, said the ruling "flips the greenhouse gas debate completely on its head, by giving the next administration the authority to simply regulate carbon dioxide emissions without waiting for Congress.

"In this climate, a national cap-and-trade program should start to look a lot more attractive," Profeta said. "Industry should be coming to Congress to design a flexible and efficient program right now."

Reacting to the ruling, the White House said the Supreme Court's decision "settled" the question of whether EPA had authority to regulate the gases.

"We're going to have to take a look and analyze it and see where we go from here," said White House Deputy Press Secretary Dana Perino.

EPA said in a statement that the decision was "being reviewed."

Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., a longtime opponent of increasing fuel efficiency requirements on U.S. automobiles, also said the decision settles the debate.

"While I still believe Congress did not intend for the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases, the Supreme Court has made its decision and the matter is now settled," said Dingell.

"Today's ruling provides another compelling reason why Congress must enact, and the president must sign, comprehensive climate change legislation," he said.

In addition to ruling that EPA has the authority to regulate tailpipe emissions of greenhouse gases and does not have the discretion to refuse to do so, the court considered the question of whether states can sue to force the action.

Stevens, writing for himself and Justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Anthony Kennedy and David Souter, said Massachusetts and other states in the suit have a "quasi-sovereign" status stemming from their interest in protecting their citizens.

Massachusetts had argued that its coastline was being destroyed by rising seas and more severe storms resulting from global warming.

In a dissent signed by Justices Scalia, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John Roberts said that even if global warming is "the most pressing environmental problem of our time" and even if "governments have done too little to address it," the case came down to a question of jurisdiction, which he said the court did not have.

"This court's standing jurisprudence simply recognizes that redress of grievances of the sort at issue here 'is the function of Congress and the chief executive,' " Roberts wrote.

Citing his reasoning for Massachusetts' standing to sue, Stevens cited a century-old case in which the state of Georgia successfully sued Tennessee Copper Co. for polluting air and causing trees and crops to die.

In that case, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote that "the state has an interest independent of and behind the titles of its citizens."

"It has the last word as to whether mountains may be stripped of their forests and its inhabitants shall breathe pure air," Holmes wrote.

Stevens said Massachusetts' contention that its shoreline was being eroded as a result of sea level rise and storm severity from global warming gave it similar standing in the case.

"Just as Georgia's 'independent interest ... in all the earth and air within its domain' supported jurisdiction a century ago, so too does Massachusetts' well-founded desire to preserve its sovereign territory today," wrote Stevens.