Global Courant 2023-05-25 16:40:53
Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices indicated Wednesday that they likely have split opinions on whether a governor has the right to force power plant owners to pay for their planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions, or whether he first needs approval from a legislature that refuses to to go along with the plan.
At stake is Pennsylvania’s bid to become the first major fossil fuel-producing state to introduce carbon pricing.
On Wednesday, the state’s highest court heard arguments over whether a lower court was right last summer to stop Pennsylvania’s participation in a multistate consortium that places a price and falling cap on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
But the justices repeatedly turned the conversation to the underlying legal question still being considered by the lower court: whether former governor Tom Wolf usurped the constitutional power of the legislature to authorize any form of taxation.
In that dispute, Republican lawmakers argue that the carbon trading plan is an unconstitutional tax because it lacks regulatory approval; state attorneys argue that it is a fee a government agency is allowed to impose to run a program.
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Justice Christine Donohue, a Democrat, suggested it could be difficult to decide one issue without settling the other.
“I don’t even know how we would make that holding without raising our hands as to whether it’s a tax or a fee and we just don’t play ‘hide the coin’ that way,” Donohue told a Senate attorney. . Republicans.
There’s a huge amount at stake: Pennsylvania would have raised more than $1 billion if it had started participating in 2022, when, according to calculations by the Natural Resources Defense Council, Wolf sought to create a non-profit environmental advocacy group.
Participation in the consortium became the central pillar in Wolf’s plan to combat global warming. It’s also a political minefield for Governor Josh Shapiro, Wolf’s successor and a fellow Democrat who was supported by unions who fought against the plan.
The Conemaugh Generation Station emits steam in New Florence, Pennsylvania, on Feb. 6, 2007. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court indicated on May 24, 2023 that justices’ opinions on forcing power plant owners to pay for their emissions are likely to be divided . (Todd Berkey/The Tribune-Democrat via AP)
The Supreme Court consists of four justices elected as Democrats, two as Republicans, and one vacancy.
Judge Kevin Brobson, a Republican, raised a number of objections to the plan.
At one point, he questioned whether the cost of the carbon credits that power plants would have to buy is too high to be considered compensation for a regulatory process.
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He then suggested the plan is a “chicken and egg thing,” with an agency imposing a fee before deciding how to spend it, a capability he said could be exploited by agencies with an underfunded program.
“So aren’t we bypassing the authority of the General Assembly and the governor’s authority and basically allowing agencies to pump up their inadequate funds and just build this treasury?” Brobson asked a lawyer representing Shapiro’s administration.
The attorney, Matthew White, said the money must be spent in accordance with state air pollution laws and that the ordinance provides for the use of the money to support energy efficiency programs, renewable energy use and efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. reduce, improve.
White also said there is no evidence that the fees are sufficient to address the problem of greenhouse gas pollution.
Democratic judges closely questioned claims by a Senate Republican attorney that the carbon pricing plan cannot legally be a fee, in part because it works through regional auctions that impose costs and requirements on power plants in certain states but not others.
“So since it doesn’t address everything, it shouldn’t address anything in terms of regional impact?” Donohue asked.
Donohue also seemed to suggest that the carbon pricing program goals could be protected by an environmental rights amendment to the Pennsylvania constitution.
Shapiro has maintained that he is not in favor of joining the consortium, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, on Wolf’s terms.
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But he continues to fight for it in court and his top environmental protection appointee told lawmakers in March that joining the consortium is “a vehicle” that could help achieve Shapiro’s “strong and very ambitious goals” to help the environment.
Republican lawmakers, fossil fuel advocacy groups, industrial power users and labor unions oppose it, saying it will hurt the state’s energy industry and drive up electricity bills.
State officials, independent researchers and environmentalists say the money made from the auctioning of allowances would stabilize or lower electricity bills while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and aiding the transition of fossil fuel workers to new industries.
