According to sources within the Obama administration, the Environmental Protection Agency will delay issuing a final rule that would limit carbon emissions from new power plants. The EPA proposed the carbon pollution standard for new power plants a year ago. The EPA received more than approximately 2.5 million comments during the public comment period, which closed in June 2012. The deadline for a final rule was set for the end of March.
The regulation’s origins stem from the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency, 549 U.S. 497 (2007), which found that the EPA had the power to regulate greenhouse gases as a "pollutant" under the Clean Air Act. Consistent with the Supreme Court’s ruling, in 2009, the EPA determined that greenhouse gas pollution threatens Americans’ health and welfare by leading to long-lasting changes in our climate that can have a range of negative effects on human health and the environment.
