In a 2 to 1 ruling, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit overturned the Obama administration's measure to strengthen air quality, citing that the Environmental Protection Agency overstepped their authority by decreasing the pollution allowed by power plants. Utilities and business groups fought Obama's Cross-State Air Pollution Rule arguing that it was costly, burdensome, and arbitrary. The appellate court's ruling favored the business groups. On the other hand, environmentalists who saw the rule as an improvement over the current George W. Bush-era regulation saw the ruling as a major blow to public health (Eilperin). .
The EPA and federal regulators have sought for years to cut sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants in the eastern US. The emissions blow downwind and cause smog and acid rain (Eilperin). .
"In striking down a costly EPA rule for power plants, today's federal appeals court ruling accomplishes two useful things. First, it lessens the harm to the reliability of the nation's electricity grid from unlawful regulations that have placed generating capacity at risk. All Americans will now have more certainty against blackouts and electricity rationing," said Hal Quinn, head of the National Mining Association, which challenged the EPA. "The ruling also calls attention to a troubling but not unmistakable pattern of irresponsibility by a regulatory agency that is once again operating outside the explicit bounds of the law. It should not require repeated rulings by federal courts to restrain EPA's regulatory overreach" (Winter). .
The EPA issued regulations that were intended to take effect on January 1, 2011 but have since been delayed in court. These regulations would require 28 states and the District of Columbia to install new pollution controls and establish a limited cap-and-trade system that would have allowed utilities to buy and sell pollution credits to make their facilities compliant with the standards (Eilperin).