Court Vacates EPA Ozone Fee Guidance For Qualifying As Legislative Rule

摘要

A federal appeals court has vacated EPA's guidance allowing states to suggest alternatives to imposing large fees on industrial sources of ozone pollution, siding with environmentalists' claims that the guidance was effectively a final rule that should have undergone notice-and-comment rulemaking because it changed the law on ozone fees. In a unanimous July 1 decision, three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected EPA's three main arguments: that the guidance does not qualify as final action, that the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) lacked standing; and that the group's claims were unripe for judicial review. EPA was "firing nearly all the arrows in its jurisdictional quiver," the ruling says. "All three arrows miss their target."