U.S. District Judge Anthony Ishii threw out a suit by automakers challenging a California law regulating greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks.
The Fresno judge rejected automakers claims that the emissions law, authored by former Assemblywoman Fran Pavley (D-L.A.), set standards that were technically and financially impossible and usurped the U.S. foreign policy and the federal government's role in regulating vehicle mileage.
Ishii found that the law, which sets stricter standard than the Clean Air Act, requiring 30
percent reduction in tailpipe greenhouse gas emissions by 2016, should stand as long as the Environmental Protection Agency grants the state a waiver from federal law.
California has waited for two years for a waiver for the law, which a number of other states plan to adopt (SF Chronicle says 16 other states, NY Times says 15, California AG Brown says 14). The EPA has said a decision will come by the year's end.
“This is the fourth major legal victory for California and a stinging rejection of the automobile industry’s legal challenge to greenhouse gas emissions standards,” Attorney General Edmund Brown Jr. said of yesterday's decision in a press release. “This court ruling leaves the Bush administration as the last remaining roadblock to California’s regulation of tailpipe greenhouse gas emissions."
This is a legal tipping point, leaving auto manufacturers and the Bush administration isolated on the regulation of gases that contribute to global warming, Pavley told The New York Times.
Several recent court decisions have sided with states and environmental groups that laws enacted to fight smog can be applied against greenhouse gases.
The auto industry groups are waiting the EPA's decision on California's waiver before considering an appeal, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
The Sierra Club says eventually automakers “will have to stop throwing lawyers at the problem and start hiring engineers." KCRW Public Radio's "Which Way L.A" discusses the case and the ability of automakers follow the Sierra Club's advice (LISTEN).
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